It wasn’t only a windy Friday at the 88th Masters Tournament but a revelatory one.
The wind blew at a steady 20 to 25 miles per hour with gusts of 35 mph for the second round, perhaps higher, judging by the billowing shirts and furrowed brows of the men performing on the blustery stage.
No one other than a golf sadist would want such conditions all the time, or even most of the time. They might say “Nae wind, nae golf” across the Atlantic where the game began and endures on often breezy links, but if blew hard all the time, that would only be good for the ChapStick concession.
In Friday’s gusts in Georgia, there was figurative and literal grit in the air, the former from those who embraced the challenge and survived it, the latter being the sand that whipped out of bunkers—particularly on the 17th and 18th holes, and into the golfers’ faces, causing them to shield their eyes like they were driving west on I-20 into a late sun.
There isn’t much chaff on the leaderboard or among those loitering nearby after 36 holes, the places of everyone in contention hard earned.
Of the leaders, Scottie Scheffler was to be expected given his record in recent months, and the only eventuality that would keep him from being in the picture on the back nine on Sunday is if wife Meredith were to have their first child early. Scheffler says he will be off to Dallas if he gets a call.
Despite six career victories, Max Homa has been a minor player in golf’s most important events before two wonderful days this week, but he is executing like he belongs in the bigs through 36 holes, with a 67 in the calm and a 71 in the gale. His post-round descriptions have been as enjoyable as his golf. Homa talks as if he might have grown up around Hollywood and of course he did, with his father John being a longtime acting coach. With two more excellent rounds, Homa can put his name on the major marquee. He sure hasn’t looked like someone who has one major top-10 and a best finish of tie for 43rd at Augusta National.
Bryson DeChambeau has been toiling on the lucrative LIV Golf circuit, where he shot a 58 last summer, a round that he says convinced him to stick with what works rather than constantly reinventing the wheel. He does have a new set of irons in his bag for the Masters, a model his active mind helped design, that just was ruled conforming by the USGA earlier this week. DeChambeau is using some new patience when hitting them, aiming for safety instead of the flagstick. After his second-round 73, he described one such instance with the joy of a kid who had just ridden down the driveway without training wheels. If he can keep mixing the strategical with the power that hasn’t gone anywhere, DeChambeau could earn a green jacket to go with his unprecedented bludgeoning of Winged Foot at the 2020 U.S. Open.
Homa was alongside Tiger Woods for two rounds, and it was a mutual admiration society, each appreciating the other’s skills. When Woods came out early to finish his first round, his body didn’t look as if it was operating well enough to get him to the weekend. Although there was no limp, he looked stiff, uncomfortable. Dottie Pepper, on the ground for CBS, said his walking was “Tin Man-ish.” But as he negotiated the considerable tasks of the second round, the 48-year-old seemed to loosen up, and there were flashes of wizardry, including a birdie chip-in on the sixth, multiple up-and-downs for par, and a glorious 3-wood second shot on the 15th that set up a two-putt birdie.
Who knows what kind of shape Woods’ body will be in for this afternoon’s third round after 23 holes yesterday, but he will not be satisfied with just having made his 24th consecutive cut at Augusta National, which gave him another record among many. Five years after winning his unexpected fifth green jacket, he is seven back with 36 holes to go.
What the wind besides identifying the players who had the moxie to hang in there, was offer a blunt reminder of what compelling golf is and how often that is not what we see week to week. Ball speed was not enough to carry the day in the second round, not with the breeze and on a course heavy with character. The tools of their trade have made it easier for elite golfers, most times and on most courses, diminishing the nuances that once were bigger factors. The strong winds and the landscape around which they danced blunted the technology, at least a little, and returned some of the nuances, and the thought required to be successful dealing with them. There was a lesson in how interesting the play was Friday that ought to resonate once the wind dies, for it could put some life in top-level golf.