Future arrives with Tiger’s record Masters win

A panel of 15 golf writers were asked to vote on the top five Masters in history. They are being republished this week because the Masters has been postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic. The 1997 Masters was voted No. 2. The following story moved on was on April 13, 1997.

AUGUSTA, GA. » Young, gifted, a black man in a white man’s game, Tiger Woods seemed too good to be true. At the Masters, he was even better than advertised.

In one of those rare instances when reality exceeds expectation, Woods won by a record 12 strokes Sunday at Augusta National Golf Club and suddenly the notion that he might be the greatest golfer ever doesn’t seem far-fetched.

Woods’ record-setting Masters victory was as much about Jack Nicklaus as it was about Jackie Robinson. His potential as a record-setter is as great as his role as a social pioneer.

His play was so perfect, so dominant, and the triumph at the Masters so complete that even Woods found it hard to believe.

By the time the smiles he flashed on the final fairway dissolved into the tears of an emotional hug with his father, Woods’ victory had already transcended the fact that he was the first black to win a major professional golf championship.

His record-setting performance made every milestone in golf seem vulnerable.

“I never thought I would have the lead like I did,” Woods said after winning. “You envision dueling it out with Faldo, or Nicklaus or Watson, someone who is always tough to beat down the stretch, or birdieing 16, 17 and 18 to get into a playoff.

“But never in the fashion I did,” he said. “That’s something you never dream of. It’s kind of nice that it became a reality.”

No one could have imagined what the 21-year-old Woods would do here this week.

Closing with a 69, Woods finished at 18-under-par 270, the lowest score ever shot in the Masters and matching the most under par by anyone in any of the four Grand Slam events.

His 12-stroke victory over Tom Kite was not only a Masters record by three strokes, but the greatest winning margin in any major since Tom Morris Sr. won in the 1862 British Open by 13 strokes.

And, for the record, Woods was the youngest by two years ever to win the Masters.

After making his final putt, Woods became a kid again, squeezing his eyes tight, fighting back tears and hugging his father, Earl, who taught him the game, and his mother, Tida.

“My dad said last night, ‘If you play well and be yourself, it would be the most rewarding round you’ve ever had.”

It might have been more than that. “Phenomenal performance,” Nick Faldo, last year’s winner, told Woods. “Welcome to the green jacket.”

Entering Sunday with a nine-stroke lead over Costantino Rocca, the final round was a mere formality which he handled perfectly, playing safely but not shyly.

“He’s out there playing another game on a golf course he is going to own for a long time,” said Nicklaus, who won the Masters at 23 and whose six titles are more than anyone else’s. “I don’t think I want to go back out and be 21 and compete against him.” What Woods did this week at Augusta means that anything is possible. The Grand Slam — winning the Masters, U.S. Open, British Open and PGA in the same year — is not out of the question for Woods, and breaking the record low score of 59 for a competitive round could be only a matter of time.

A scintillating 66 followed by a 65 in the middle two rounds — when only one other player could shoot a 66 — proved that, and it ended the tournament.

His remarkable accomplishments as a golfer, however, didn’t overshadow yet another significant achievement:

Woods’ victory came just two days shy of 50 years after Jackie Robinson became the first black to play major league baseball.

And surely, 50 years from now, the day Tiger Woods won the Masters will be discussed with just as much awe and perhaps with as much significance as Robinson breaking baseball’s color barrier.

Woods, however, credited those who had gone before him:

“I wasn’t the pioneer. Charlie Sifford, Lee Elder, Ted Rhodes, those are the guys who paved the way. All night I was thinking about them, what they’ve done for me and the game of golf. Coming up 18, I said a little of prayer of thanks to those guys. Those guys are the ones who did it.”