The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
NO. 1 OUT ON DAY ONE
After Johnson withdraws with freak back injury, Hoffman ends first round in lead on a windy day during which Palmer’s absence leaves a void.
AUGUSTA — Absence was the theme of Thursday at the Masters, and the poet be hanged. It made absolutely no one’s heart grow fonder.
The eloquent Dustin Johnson put it far better as the world’s No. 1 player was withdrawing from the world’s No. 1 golf tournament. “It sucks. It sucks really bad,” he said. Both the first group to leave footprints in the dew at No. 1 tee box and the last of the day to launch were short a player. They came out in the missing man formation — twosomes — and the loss was palpable.
The loss of living, breathing tradition: For the first time since 1954, a Masters Thursday commenced without Arnold Palmer, the four-time champion who died in September. Through their tears, Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player performed the chore of hitting the early morning ceremonial tee shot, Nicklaus saluting the heavens before he issued a befitting wallop down the middle.
And the loss of the next big thing: At a little after 2 p.m., Thursday’s most compelling competitive drama played out without a club in anyone’s hands. Would he or would he not report the tee?
Johnson had not stuck the landing when, venturing outside in his stocking
feet to move his car, he tumbled on the wet porch stairs of his rental home the day before. His backside and elbow took the worst of it. All that night he treated his aching lower back. On Thursday afternoon, he tried to work out the pain on the practice range, even telling ESPN he was going to try to give it a go just minutes before his tee time.
The Augusta member who, way below his pay grade, was in charge of the standard at the first tee slid all three names of the last group into their assigned slots at the assigned time. Bubba Watson entered the roped-off tee box first. Then Jimmy Walker. Waiting. Waiting. Only to see the green coat reach high and take down Johnson’s name and caddie number. The masses groaned in unison.
“It’s tough. I want to play,” Johnson said out back of the old clubhouse. “I’m playing probably the best golf of my career (having won his past three events), and I look forward to this tournament every year. And to have a freak accident happen yesterday afternoon after I got back from the course — it’s tough.”
Johnson said he could regain no more than 70 percent of his swing Thursday. The pain in his lower back wasn’t so bad on his backswing but shot through him on impact. Not that he expected it to linger. “If it happened on Monday, I don’t think we would have any issues. But it happened Wednesday afternoon,” he said.
Oh, if only Johnson were built more like 59-year-old former champion Sandy Lyle rather than a fitness-club ad model. “He hasn’t got a big bum like me,” Lyle said, suddenly appreciating his posterior padding.
Meanwhile, the leaderboard read like a Teamsters roll — Charley Hoffman, 7 under, followed not so closely by William McGirt, 3 under. Theirs were the only two rounds of the day in the 60s. And they, hmmm, also possess plenty of padding. A new PGA Tour trend, perhaps?
The wind, gusting to 30 mph, had won. The more unpredictable the conditions, the more the unexpected is brought into play. Let’s see: Hoffman, the world’s 52nd-ranked player going 7 under while all nine of the top 10 who were fit to play Thursday failed to break par, going a combined 21 over. And McGirt, the Masters first-timer, playing this well in these conditions? Yes, all that qualifies as the unexpected.
A funny thing happened to Hoffman, who birdied all four of Augusta National’s par 3s, on the way to a hoped-for even-par round. He just kept hitting it stiff.
“It’s one of those rounds where you could shoot your way out of the golf tournament pretty quick,” he said. “And obviously I was just trying to make pars. And while I was trying to make pars, I put myself in position to be able to make birdies. I was able to convert those birdies and turn it into a fantastic round.”
Notable among the struggling stars was Jordan Spieth, the 2015 Masters champion whose chance to defend died with a quadruple bogey on No. 12 on Sunday last year. He got his back-nine quad out of the way early this time — on the par 5 15th on Thursday. It was just as ugly as the other, in a different sort of way. He spun his third shot off the front of the green into the water. Hit his fifth over the green. Pitched long. Threeputted.
But at least he has time to recover this time. “It looks something like single digits might win this tournament,” he said, before Hoffman went on to birdie five of his last seven holes. “And I certainly can post single digit under par at this point — got three rounds to go.”
And beware the Masters senior flight. Phil Mickelson, 46, got exactly what he wanted out of this blustery day, posting a 1-under 71 thanks largely to his Masters crisis-management skills.
“Man, I love it. I love it,” he enthused afterward.
More wind shall blow today. The theme shifts fully to those still on the grounds, battling its bite.