‘MY FINISH WAS THE PERFECT TRIBUTE TO SEVE’
Masters champion Jon Rahm on Seve, making history, and golf’s new Big Three
Forty years ago, Seve Ballesteros won his second Green Jacket. You won your first on what would have been his 66th birthday. How special does it feel to have done that?
The history of the game is a big part of why I play, and Seve is a big part of the history and a big inspiration for me. If it wasn’t for that Ryder Cup in ’97, my dad and I talk about it all the time, we don’t know where I would be or where as a family we would be.
For me, to get it done on the 40th anniversary of his (second Masters) victory, his birthday, on Easter Sunday, it’s incredibly meaningful. To finish it off the way I did – an unusual par, very much a Seve par, it was in a non-purposeful way, a testament to him. I know he was pulling for me.
No other European has won the US Open and the Masters. How do you reflect on the enormity of what you’ve achieved?
I find it hard to believe, if I’m being honest. If there’s anything better than accomplishing something like this, it’s just making more history.
Out of all of the accomplishments and the many great players who have come before me, to be the first European to do something like that, it’s just a very humbling experience.
And you have to say it’s a pretty good duo of Majors. The US Open is about as hard a test as you’re ever going to find in the game. I kept seeing the stats, the lowest score to par out of two starts (at the Masters) and how great I’ve done in the past but never gave myself a chance to win. All I asked for this time was a chance to win, and I got it.
We’ve got to ask you about that tee shot on 18. What were you thinking when you reached for a provisional ball?
Nothing, really. I had a four-shot lead, so I was confident with that. But I think that was karma. I was just telling Adam, (Hayes, Rahm’s caddie), how great I hit a low fade the entire week. I was bragging about it a little bit, and, of course, on 18, that happens, which was maybe two feet from missing that tree. It will be a good story to tell in the future. I won the Masters and didn’t even make it to the fairway on the 18th tee shot.
How exciting is it to be halfway towards the Grand Slam?
(Smiles) Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. It would be absolutely amazing to achieve that, but it’s a long way away. I would like to say that I entered the race when I won the US Open, but, of course, you’re so far away you don’t want to think about it, right. As players, of course it is on your mind. But it’s a long road ahead to be able to accomplish that. I mean, the fact that two players like Phil (Mickelson) and Arnie (Palmer) weren’t able to achieve it, well, it speaks a lot.
People always talk about the Big Three in golf. We had Jack, Arnie and Gary Player. Then came Tiger, Vijay Singh and Phil. When you reflect on what you, Rory and Scottie Scheffler have done over the past year, does that make you the game’s new Big Three?
You can say that if we can do it for at least five years, like many of those players did, right? Even while Tiger went on his run in the 2000s, Phil and Vijay still managed to win 45 and 20-plus times in that time frame, which is amazing. I think for us to be compared to something like that, we have a very long way to go. It could be the start. But there’s still a long way to go.