Gary Player bids goodbye
after 53 Masters appearances – The Masters Tournament
AUGUSTA, Ga. - Gary Player, 73, dressed in black at the end as he was from the beginning of his career, said goodbye Friday after playing in a record 52 Masters. In his final interview, after he missed the cut, he kept his head down almost the entire time. He didn't want the press corps to see the tears.The roars greeted him as he walked up the 18th fairway for the last time. Was that reception, he was asked, louder than when he'd won his three green jackets?
“Ten times more,” he said. “I'll never forget that as long as I live. It just went on and on and on from all sides.
But it happened on every single hole. All 36 holes, I got a standing ovation. I wish I had words to -- I wish I had the vocabulary of Winston Churchill to say the correct thing, but it was a feast. It was something you'll never, ever forget.”
Player knelt when he reached the 18th green, and someone wondered, was that choreographed or was that spontaneous?
“No, it was just so overwhelming,” Player said. “I just had to say, you can tip your hat and I've seen people do that and I had to do something different; what do I do? It's just a message -- thank you.”
Player, who came from a working class family, isn't retiring from pro golf. He said he would play eight or 10 senior tournaments a year, continue designing courses, and doing charity work, and work on his farm. “I'm most happy is when I'm on my farm with my family,” he said. “I won't be bored. I'll keep very, very busy.”
TIGER'S TOUGH TIME - Tiger Woods followed up his opening 70 with a patchy par-72 Friday, and pronounced conditions tour. “Just tough all around,” he said, after the three-birdie, three-bogey day. The wind was the villain. “I thought it was pretty much difficult all the way around,” he said. “Not only is it blowing, but it's also changing, so you can go through pretty much a three-club swing.”
He found himself seven shots off the lead. Is seven shots doable?
“Yeah,” Woods said.
WOODS' CHANCES -- Woods is hardly out of the running, at seven behind with 36 to play. His biggest comeback to a victory was nine strokes, and he's won four times coming from seven back.
The biggest comeback from 36 holes was Jack Burke Jr., from nine behind to beat Ken Venturi in 1956.
KIM'S PARADE OF ROARS - For all those missing the roars at the Masters, Anthony Kim, 23, in his first Masters, ran off an amazing 11 birdies for a 65 and a 140 total. He had two bogeys and a double bogey, that at the 10th, but who noticed? In his birdie feast, he ran off four straight from No. 5, and four straight from No. 12.
“I really don't know what happened,” Kim said. “The putter got hot, and my confidence kept getting a little bit bigger, a little bit bigger every hole.”
Kim broke Nick Price's record of 10, when the latter shot a 63 in the third round in 1986, when Jack Nicklaus won at age 46.
The obvious conclusion? “If this keeps up,” Kim said, “I like my chances.”
MIZE ON THE TIGHTROPE - For Larry Mize, who won the 1987 Masters with that stunning chip shot in a playoff, is 50 now and at No. 1 thought it would be another short Masters. His tee shot ended up against a tree to the left, in pine straw. “I almost couldn't hit it,” Mize said. It cost him a double-bogey start. Then he birdied the next two and battled winds the rest of the way for a 76 and a 1-under 143. “I'm a little disappointed that I didn't play better today,” said Mize, who missed the cut seven times in the past eight years, “but I'm very pleased that I'll be here for the weekend.”
BACK-NINE AMBUSH - Florida State sophomore Drew Kittleson might still be in his first Masters if he hadn't got ambushed on the back nine. First off was his battle through the Amen Corner in the second round Friday - 2-6-6. That's an eagle at the par-411th - a 6-iron from 193 yards -- a triple bogey at the 12th and a bogey at the 13th. And he also eagled the par-5 15th with another 6-iron, this to 30 feet, and he made the putt. He shot 72 after an opening 78.
FILLED UP - Steve Wilson, 39, gas station owner from Ocean Springs, Miss., and in the field as the U.S. Mid-Amateur champion, just missed an eagle at the 15th when his 5-foot putt didn't drop. “Oh, I was begging it to go in because I knew that was my only chance of leaving my mark here,” Wilson said. He shot 75 after an opening 79 and was headed home, leaving behind an insight into the effects of shaky hands and a thumping heart, from all that pressure. “What it makes you do is it makes you rush and it rushes you into mistakes,” he said.
BUBBA THE EAGLE GUY - Bubba Watson figured he was hanging by a thread after another bad start - in this case, three bogeys over the first five holes. Then came his dynamite stretch coming in - eagle-bogey-eagle. At the par-5 13th, he hit an 8-iron second from 174 yards and dropped a 40-foot putt. After a bogey at the 14th, he hit a 7-iron to 12 at the 15th and holed that for another eagle. “I shot 72 the hard way,” Watson said. And a 144 the hard way.
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