Issue No. 180 | April 8, 2025 | Read Online
AUGUSTA, Ga. — I’ve arrived at ANGC. This is my first newsletter at a major while working full time on Normal Sport.
It feels even better than I thought it would.
In case you missed it, I wrote a few things about the lead up to this week.
The Scottie-Rory Masters.
Six amazing Masters stats.
Seven (more) amazing Masters stats.
What the Masters means to me.
I’m especially proud of that last one. Jason and I put a ton of time, effort and energy into it over the last week, and we would love for you to read it!
We’ll start our giveaways on Wednesday through the end of the tournament.
Oh, and if you’re on Twitter, I put together a chance for you to win a box of merch from one of the four majors this year. Check it out here.
One of those giveaways later this week will be from today’s newsletter presenter, Seed Golf. We’ve heard some early week chatter from folks about a rolled back ball that could eventually be specific to majors or perhaps even this major.
I am in favor of rollback for 1 million reasons, but what I didn’t expect when partnering with a golf ball company, is to find out that they were on board as well.
That’s unusual for a golf ball company.
Why is that Seed Golf’s stance?
They truly love golf and think a modern rollback (of anything and everything) represents the best possible version of it at the professional and amateur level.
They are agile enough as an equipment company to handle any changes like this in the future.
Here’s how founder, Dean Klatt, said it to me today: “One of the great things about the game is that we (amateurs) can play the same courses and equipment as the pros. It's rare in sports that the layman gets a peek into how good the pros really are, but modern technology has made that comparison obsolete. … We're missing out on truly seeing all the skills [of top pros] by not requiring them to play through the bag.”
We have loved using Seed Golf balls ourselves and are thrilled to continue to promote them as we enter “let’s dream about what a rolled back ball could unlock at some of these major venues” SZN.
Onto the news!
It is true of me — and probably many of you reading this newsletter — that I have begun to think about the Masters, not from the perspective of the 27- and 31-year-old players but rather from the perspective of their parents.
I’m sort of in between those two worlds right now, but one of them is ahead of me and the other is behind. Which is why I thought these photos of Scottie Scheffler and his mom playing Augusta National on Sunday were so lovely.
You guys know how I feel about my own mom as it relates to golf and life, which is the Scottie side of that equation. But when I look at that photo, I think, What must it be like for your son to be the (two-time) Masters champ?
That must be a mostly odd but sometimes wonderful reality.
You spent all this time feeding and bathing and disciplining and raising this child, this boy. You have seen every facet of him. At his worst among his sisters, at his best in front of the world. You know things about him that he doesn’t yet know about himself.
You have to watch him grapple with what it means to be No. 1, what it means to carry the burden of being the best in the world and everything that entails. For so long, your family insulated him and formed him and shaped him, as all parents attempt to do, to become an independent, productive member of society.
I think often of what Scottie’s dad said to him after he won Match Play and became the No. 1 golfer in the world: "I love you, Scott. I'm more proud of who you are than your golf. You're a wonderful young man."
Now he’s one of the most famous athletes in the world.
Somebody from whom everyone wants a slice of time, a piece of something [raises hand]. How strange and unsettling that must be at times and how nice and peaceful it must be to just play a round of golf with him at this place where it is calm and you’re just his mom again and he’s just your son again.
Nobody really wants to be famous.
We all just want to be loved and cared for and to love and care for others. Fame is just a byproduct of those desires. A path we think will lead to the outcomes we need.
So for all the hoopla and nonsense the last several years have brought to Scottie and his family, I would imagine a four-hour reprieve at this place — of all places — was the most wonderful thing in the world.
1. A Korn Ferry Tour player put tape over his mouth at a recent tournament because he was struggling with anger and he thought this specific thing would help him.
Very normal stuff.
This honestly sounds like something one of my kids would do, not because they were struggling with anger but because they’re 11, 11, 8 and 5 years old.
Yeah, Giannis, what’s up with the tape?
Oh, I thought I was going to curse at Donovan Mitchell and possibly get a technical so I decided to tape my mouth shut just in case.
Sure.
Has your significant other already had enough of you talking about the Masters?
2. Also, as always, the grass heights at ANGC get a shout out in this section.
Totally normal press release.
The above represents Jordan Spieth’s options at the local Augusta barber.
Subject to weather conditions and growth.
This one hit me at some point last week, and I’ll add to it here.
Let’s say you’re an investor and you don’t really care that much about golf or about its recent history. You have unlimited funds.
Which are you investing in from a purely financial play at the following amounts?
TGL (25 percent)
LIV (25 percent)
Masters (1 percent)
PGA of America (owns PGA Champ. and Ryder Cup) (1 percent)
USGA (2 percent)
R&A (2 percent)
That is, would you rather have 1 percent of the Masters at its current valuation or 25 percent of TGL at its current valuation?
Remember, you aren’t voting for which entity you enjoy the most or like the best but rather the one that you think is going to return you a tremendous return. In my hypothetical, you are limited by how much you can invest in anything that isn’t TGL or LIV, which is frustrating but also makes sense given how desirable investing into those companies (i.e. the Masters or USGA) would be.
Here is a question I have been giving some thought to recently: We all say we love watching great golf shots so why is it that we feel nothing when — this is going to sound absurd — a machine like Iron Byron hits high draws or perfect fades?
Is it not the actual shot we love, but the truth that there is a human on the other end of it?
I was considering this on my drive to Augusta while listening to this podcast with Patreon CEO, Jack Conte.
Here’s what he said about AI.
I think people love people.
When I listen to a Kendrick Lamar album, it's not that I care about the output, the work that he has created so much as I care that I am hearing the experience of another conscious being who lived through some serious shit and suffering and like pain and life experience.
And I think a lot of great art and work and even this show and podcast, a lot of it the like really good stuff is stemming from that feeling of connection to another human being. So maybe all that to say, I think the craftsmanship of [content] creation is going to change, but I think for a very long time, longer than most people think, I believe humans will be at the core of creation.
Jack Conte
It is the same reason why I can watch Viktor Hovland and a Korn Ferry Tour player hit the exact same shot — like, Trackman can tell me that they were identical shots — and yet I feel something when Hovland hits that I don’t when KFT Guy hits it because I have a connection to Hovland’s backstory and his struggle and his near misses and on and on we go.
This is probably intuitive and maybe even obvious, but the idea that I could watch a machine hit it farther and straighter than a person but not enjoy it half as much is something that struck me as incredibly interesting.
Also, maybe I’ve been traveling for too long.
In the last 20 Masters, only one player has come from outside the top 10 after the first round to win the tournament. That person is exactly who you think it is, and he did it twice.
First, in 2005 when he opened with 74 and sat T33. Then he shot 66-65-71 to beat Chris DiMarco, after making this shot on 16.
Oh, and that 131 is the record for lowest middle two rounds of the tournament.
In 2019, Tiger did it again. This time he shot 70 in the first round and was just outside the top 10. He went on to shoot 68-67-70 to beat DJ, Xander and Brooks by one each.
A reminder: Tiger should not have won the 2019 Masters given that he only gained 3.43 strokes per round on the field, a number normally nowhere good enough to win a major.
In retrospect, that week feels more and more and more like destiny.
Here is where everyone else who went on to win stood after Round 1.
Scottie: 2nd
Rahm: 2
Scottie: 3
Hideki: 2
DJ: 1
Tiger: 11
Reed: 4
Sergio: 4
Willett (!!): 9
Spieth: 1
Bubba: 2
Scott: 10
Bubba: 4
Charl: 7
Phil: 2
Angel: 6
Trevor: 1
ZJ: 5
Phil: 4
Tiger: 33
What’s even crazier to me is that seven of the last eight winners (everyone but Tiger) and nine of the last 11 (everyone but Tiger and that fake Willett Masters) have been inside the top four after the first round.
👉️ This take from Andy on ANWA’s location — not pin locations, but the actual courses the tournament is played on — is excellent.
👉️ I wrote something last week about how Elon Musk doesn’t want you to see what I write on Twitter. This was hyperbole for effect, but it is true that the algorithm is an unruly beast that benefits the platform, often at the expense of two other parties involved (publisher and reader/consumer). This is brutal and will only get worse, which is why I’m so long podcasts and newsletters. Keep the algorithm away from me.
Here’s how my guy CJ Chilvers says it.
Most of my favorite blogs and newsletters are over 10 years old. Most of my favorites these days, regardless of age, publish frequently without regard to the size the post or the SEO hits they’re taking. They might publish one to five posts a day that range from one sentence to 10 paragraphs. They are usually experts in one thing but share everything they find interesting – just like the original blogs did back in the 1990s. They have massive archives that Google would find “irrelevant.”
These sites are invaluable to me.
CJ Chilvers
That is the type of place I want this newsletter and website to be.
👉️ Jamie Kennedy’s threads are the best threads. This one on where Tiger hit his shots at the 1997 Masters is epic. The approach shots Tiger had into 14, 15 and 18 were incredible.
👉️ Speaking of threads, this one from Fried Egg on hole evolutions at ANGC is amazing. The original 1, 7, 8 and 11 are wild.
👉️ This from Soly is always a good look at who’s playing well. What stands out?
The good: Henley at 55-1, Bob Mac at 55-1, Lowry at 39-1, and Cantlay at 41-1 (what?).
The questionable: Ludvig at 17-1 and Xander at 21-1 don’t look amazing based on recent form.
The lock: Give me all of the dollars on Spieth at 36-1 though.
👉️ The NLU special project on the boys’ favorite Masters is predictably excellent. KVV is absolutely thriving in that longform essayist podcasting role.
We have a fantasy contest this year for the first major, and since I’m ineligible for the $4,000 in prize money, I decided to drop my (probable) team. If you think you can beat this — and I’m sure you do and probably can — you can join our contest (but you have to become a Normal Club member first — more info here).
A lot of disparate odds and ends this week. Notes and stats and quotes and a whole bunch of stuff about things that I didn’t really know where to put so I’m dropping them here.
• Last Thursday, I went to an elementary school open house and saw this on my second grader’s desk … 🥹🥹🥹
• I was researching something earlier this week and found this little nugget on Byron Nelson from the 2001 Masters (which, you may remember, was a decent one). Nelson was stepping down from his role as an honorary starter.
“I've been coming to this tournament since 1935, and I've enjoyed all of it,” said Nelson, who plans to keep attending the Masters as a spectator. “Now I'm delighted to try and hit this little white ball.”
NYT
Nelson was 89 at the time.
I love how much dignity and joy and simplicity he still maintained when it came to his relationship to golf. I thought that statement was lovely.
• This, on the other hand, was/is not lovely.
• This absolutely rules.
Imagine Si Woo walking out on Thursday in a Pizza Hut visor!
• This, also from Jamie — who has been on a three-week heater on Twitter — amused me.
Also, a non-zero chance Phil has actually done this.
Jamie’s stat will also apply to Bryson and his Normal Sport crystal collection someday.
I asked folks on Twitter for their favorite Masters photo or screenshot, and the replies did not disappoint.
The replies actually fell into one of two very different categories.
Here’s me and my son or daughter or mom or dad at ANGC, which is very sweet and meaningful and by all means, share your story on our What does the Masters mean to you? essay right here.
The memes. And I got what I wanted. Enjoy ...
Honestly, every time I look at this Bryson screenshot, it gets funnier. How did this happen?!
Speaking of the phrase “how did this happen?”
What a photo.
I forgot about this one.
The meme king.
OK, the true meme king.
We had our annual Porter family draft on Sunday with a pint of ice cream at stake. It was a snake draft, and this is exactly the order in which players were drafted.
Some notes.
• The 8-year-old, yes, is addicted to chaos.
• So is the 5-year-old. Min Woo, Sergio, Hatton, Keegan, Henley and Finau is truly the wildest six-player grouping I can imagine. We’re a Si Woo away from the cycle.
• 2-1 Mrs. Normal was going to take Ludvig No. 1 overall.
• I was so busy sorting through reigning major champs in the third and fourth round that I honestly forgot about Spieth, which is devastating.
• I hate to admit this, but my wife’s team is excellent. Extremely high floor. And Spieth.
• I’m not as confident about my team’s floor, but the ceiling is insane. I also have four guys who might miss the cut by five.
Thank you, as always, for reading a golf newsletter that is 2,758 words long. I am rooting for all of you to win the giveaways this week.
Also: We want to continue attending these events and bringing you the best coverage possible. One way you can help support that is by becoming a Normal Club member. We promise we will stop speaking in Spieth memes at some point.*
*We won’t.
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