For a small man, Rory Mcilroy threw a long shadow. On Saturday, he covered each of the 52 other men’s men’s men in Masters, so even the world’s No. 1 Golfer Scottie Scheffler, found himself playing in the shade. Scheffler is a popular golp player, and a particular favorite among fans around here after winning a contest twice in the past three years, but as Mcilroy’s spinning continues, Scheffler’s gallery begins faster than Jordan Spieth’s hair. By the time he made the turn, you could completely take the positions around any green he was there. The center of gravity includes Mcilroy, back to the previous green.
Scheffler was a frontrunner of the same successes, he led the farm from the second round to until the same time. Which means that this year he was in an unfamiliar position of trying to scrap his way until the previous mcilroy, and all in his way, in the first place. He is the turtle chasing the hare. He scored an even Par 72, which left him five under the PAR, and Mcilroy’s leadership was well led.
The chase is not suitable for the Scheffler. Especially this year, when its smooth -focused game seems to be just a little bit of a -sync, like a clock that has slipped for a few seconds. He started the day as one of a group of four players tied to the five underneath, three shots behind Justin Rose’s lead, but found himself a need to work hard to bear what he had. Scheffler played a great twist of bad golf, where he made many mistakes and managed to scramble back from them over and over again. He graduated from a bunker on 2, 4th, 5th and 7th, and somehow he still managed the first nine at the PAR level.
Some days, this is good enough, but not when Mcilroy is playing the way he is just a couple of groups returning to the course. Scheffler knows this too. You can always hear the roars in Augusta National, but one of the big differences this year is that the storm that crashed in the last September has removed so many trees you can see a lot going on around you. So as Scheffler sweated his tour of the opening holes, par, birdie, par, par, par, par, chasing him, and sound, with mcilroy on his shoulder, his way was torn by the same stretch to the birdie, eagle, birdie, par, birdie.
And, until the big white scoreboards around the course, the big red number continued to run next to Mcilroy’s name, seven under the PAR, then nine, then 10, then 11.
Scheffler’s stable golf is fine and efficient when his closest competitors are mistaken, but less effective when they run the type of low scores they manage on Saturday. And it started to show.
On the 5th, Scheffler nodded. He hit his trip to a place he wanted to avoid, towards a pair of large bunkers on the left side of the road. “Dang this scotty!” Scheffler shouted as he threw his tee to the ground. “What is it?” Which is a blue stripe by his standards. Fortunately at that time, his ball was somehow caught in isthmus between the two traps of sand, but he wasn’t on the 7th, where he chopped his second out of the rough on the big bunker, a shot left him doubled in frustration. He lowered one shot there and another on the 12th, where he took two putts after chipping in green.
But he took a second birdie to 15, after chipping at six feet, but he did not get the chance to score a third of 18. leaving him right where he started, at five underneath, many only returned from the lead than the beginning of the day.
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Scheffler’s partner Tyrrell Hatton, does not do better. They are a strange pair, the two of them, small and large, are attached to almost identical outfits. Hatton, squat, barrel-chested and furious, Scheffler straight laced and square-shoulderred as a height of the dummy.
Hatton was able to hit his tee shot flush in the cup in the par-three 6th. Unfortunately for her, it was a cup of beer that was hit under someone’s seat in the front row of the gallery. Hatton saw the funny part of it, but not the bogeys he made on the 1st, 12th, the 16th and the 18th. On the 12th Hatton threw his ball straight into the water after taping it. Hatton always had an hour-bombs that got three seconds left on the clock. He finished three for the day, and outside of it, which was a reminder of how the wrong things could go to Augusta, and how well Scheffler had done to stop his own spinning away from him.
Knowing Hatton, maybe he’ll have some choice words to say about everything. “Dang” and “Heck”, maybe.
