Englishman Danny Willett won the Masters golf tournament today in a surprisingly upset victory when Jordan Spieth suffered a complete collapse at Amen Corner.
Spieth looked like a shoe-in to win his second Masters in two years at only twenty-two years of age as he started the last nine holes with a five shot lead on the field. But as I posted this morning, Spieth has a serious flaw in his swing that causes him to miss full shots to the right of his target, especially during pressure situations. (See “Jordan Spieth and His Blocky Left Arm.”)
So, Spieth proceeded to hit his second shot on the par four 10th in the right sand bunker and make bogey. Then he drove right on the par four 11th hole in the right trees to make bogey as well. Then he did the same on his iron shot on the short but dangerous par three twelfth hole. He hit the ball perhaps 30 feet or more to the right of his target as TV analyst Nick Faldo (three-time Masters champion) said. The ball hit on the bank short-right and bounded into Rae’s Creek. That is an absolute No-No at Amen Corner that all players must attempt to avoid. Notice all the missed shots to the right.
Jordan then dropped his ball in the drop circle about seventy yards from the hole. He then hit his wedge shot about as fat as he probably has ever done in his life since he could at least shoot par golf. The result was that the ball went into Rae’s Creek as well. It was very embarrassing. Jordan then dropped another ball in the drop the circle and hit his wedge shot over the green into the back sand bunker and got up-and-down for a seven–a quadruple bogey 7. (In all of my professional golf career, I don’t ever recall making more than a triple bogey on a hole.)
Amen Corner consists of the 10th, 11th, and 12th holes at Augusta National Golf Club. Jordan Spieth had just gone six over par on those three holes to not only lose the Masters lead on Sunday but fall back to three shots behind the new leader–Danny Willett–who was playing two holes in front of Spieth.
For a while, Spieth made a gallant effort to try to catch Willett, but to no avail. Spieth birdied the 13th, 15th, both par fives. He missed a very makeable birdie putt on 16. But he hit his second shot right again on the par four 17th and bogied the hole. That gave Willett the championship with his low round of the day–a 67 to Spieth’s 73. Spieth tied Lee Westwood three strokes back of Willett for second place. It was a very disappointing loss for Spieth and one of the worst finishing collapses in the history of the four major golf championships, rivaling Greg Norman’s loss to Nick Faldo at the 1996 Masters.
When the leaders got started today, Spieth missed his long iron shot on the par three 4th hole so far to the right that he yelled at the ball to not go out-of-bounds. Yet he save par. I’ve never seen anyone in the Masters hit it OB there to the right. And he hit his second shot right on the next hole, the par-four 5th hole, to make bogey. But he bounced back, as he often does, by birdying the the next four holes to begin the back nine with a five shot lead.
I was also was noticing that Danny Willett, who I had never watched play before (on TV), was really swinging well and playing some solid golf. So, even though Spieth was putting together this big lead at that time, I said of Willett, “this guy could win this tournament.” My intuition was right about both Willett and Spieth’s missed right shots due to his blocky left arm in his swing.
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