Augusta's surprises: an unexpected leader, the winning caddy and uncomfortable Tiger

This game called golf is very rare. More than rare, it's inexplicable.

Scottie Scheffler was a great junior player, earned a scholarship from the University of Texas, went professional in 2018, played on the second professional circuit in the USA and made it to the PGA Tour in the 19/20 season. He had good performances, but he could not win despite having had the opportunity to do so on several occasions.

Last year was one of Steve Stricker's choices to complete the American Ryder Cup team, something that surprised many why other names with more scrolls were left out. He had a very good performance there, defeated Jon Rahm in the singles on Sunday, but the victory on the circuit was still denied. A few weeks ago everything changed.

In February he won his first win by winning the Phoenix Open in tiebreaker, two weeks later he won again at the Arnold Palmer Invitational and at the end of March he won Match Play.

From not being able to win to doing it three times in 7 weeks. You will wonder what this player changed to have achieved this string of triumphs, well, it is the same question that we all ask ourselves because in reality nothing has changed in his game. The only change happened a year ago when he changed caddies and Ted Scott went on to bring him the clubs. Scott is one of the best caddies on the circuit, he was in Bubba Watson's bag when he won his two Masters, and there is no doubt that he has had a lot to do with Scheffler's big leap.

After those three victories Scheffler jumped to the top of the world ranking and reached the Masters as one of the names to be reckoned with, but by no means as the undisputed favorite. He passed half of the Masters and Scheffler with rounds of 69 and 67 leads 5, equaling the biggest difference in Masters history after 36 holes. This 25-year-old, born in New Jersey, is going through those moments when everything goes well. Where good shots have a reward, where bad ones don't cost you, and where the putter is working perfectly. The best example of this happened on Friday's final hole when after deflecting his starting shot to the trees on the right, he was lucky that he had an alley left between the pines overlooking the green. He made a perfect shot from there and almost took the birdie. When everything goes well these things happen, when everything goes wrong that same exit blow is stuck to a log and there is no possible escape.

The day dawned with a clear sky, but from early on the wind started to blow and the temperature never exceeded 18 degrees. Playing in Augusta with wind is particularly difficult, because it swirls among the towering pines and constantly confuses players. The best example is always the 12th hole, the 155-yard par 3 short that has been a deadly trap for the leaders in championship history. Under these conditions, the other one who stood out besides the leader was Justin Thomas, who had played very badly yesterday and who dispatched with the best round of the day (67) to get back into the fight for the title.

Among Scheffler's guards are two former champions in Augusta. South African Charl Schwartzel who won in 2011 and title defender Hideki Matsuyama. The first one has been missing from the foreground and nobody took it into account before we started. On Wednesday he spent hours practicing the game on the green and seems to have found something. On the Japanese side it would seem that his neck pains that caused him to abandon last week in San Antonio have disappeared. Only 3 players in history have been able to successfully defend the title (Nicklasu, Faldo and Tiger) and Matsuyama will try to bring another joy to his country, where golf is passion.

In addition to all this, everyone's eyes were again on Tiger Woods. On Friday morning it became known that one of his fellow players, Louis Oosthuizen, had announced his retirement from the Masters due to problems with his back. Woods would play alone with Niemann, which is never a good thing because with groups of three players ahead of them they would have to wait a long time on each shot. Tiger's arrival on the tee of 1 did not give good signs. His face showed a lot of discomfort, pain somewhere on his body, and he had to make several stretching movements before hitting. The beginning confirmed this and Tiger opened with 4 bogeys in his first 5 holes missing many shots, but as usual he fought until the end, except for a round of 74 strokes, two over par, he will play on the weekend and if the leader is wrong, he is only 4 strokes away from those who are second. He passed the qualifying cut, which was the first goal, but I get the impression that his chances of winning are minimal because his game doesn't seem ready to hit an onslaught on the weekend, but as I always say, I've already learned not to bet against these phenomena.

This Saturday it is defined who will fight for the title on Sunday and who will not. That's why it's so important not to lose track of the leader ahead of the final round. Scottie Scheffler will start walking unknown paths from the moment he reaches hole 1. It is one thing to be the leader of a regular tournament and quite another to be the leader of the Masters. It seems incredible, but it is never easy to play with much advantage and there are several proofs of this. In 1996 the Australian Greg Norman, N1 of the. World in those days, he had 6 of difference entering the final day and ended up losing by 5 strokes that Masters.

6 years ago Jordan Spieth was 5 years apart with 9 holes left to play and he couldn't either. Scheffler is 5 and still has two rounds ahead of him. This is a place where very strange things happen to leaders, especially in the second 9 holes of the court.

A sunny day is expected, very cold and windy. All condiments so that we have a nice third round in Augusta.

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