Four rounds of golf, 72 holes, play was stopped multiple times due to weather, and with opening his Thursday round with a double bogey on hole one, Jon Rahm is your Masters Champion. Congrats to the Spaniard!!
With all the "drama" surrounding the first major of the year with the #LIVTour players making their first appearance in an event with the PGA, this weekend in Augusta lived up to the hype. It ended with the best player in the world this year coming out on top. After winning three events early in the year, Rahm didn't play well at Bay Hill, had diarrhea at The Players, and wasn't his best at the Dell Match Play, yet still came in as the third favorite to take home the green jacket.
Brooks Koepka entered Sunday as the leader at 13 under through six holes in the third round. Jon Rahm was second at 9 under.Koepka held the lead through the third round, at 11 under for tournament, with a shot to become sixth person in Masters history to win wire-to-wire. It wasn't meant to be. Remember that double bogey Rahm had to start his Thursday round? No masters champion has ever doubled the first hole on Thursday and come back to win until today. Brooks Koepka, who had at least a share of the lead through three rounds and was up by two on the opening tee, fell apart early in the final round, recording no birdies until the 13th hole on his way to a round of 75. Rahm made early birdies on Nos. 2 and 8 and then built his lead midway through the final nine holes to shoot a final-round 3-under-par 69 and leave Koepka in second place with former champion Phil Mickelson. Rahm finished at 12-under.
Saudi money may talk, but the LIV tour came to play this week though. 12 of the 18 LIV players made the cut this week. They had the 36-hole leader and the 54-hole leader in Brooks Koepka. They had the runner-up in Phil Mickelson. They had three guys in the top 6.
Mickelson was arguably the biggest surprise of the week. Though the 52-year-old has won the Masters three times and is exceedingly comfortable around Augusta National, he has been far from playing his best golf in the past year. In addition to keeping a low profile because of his controversial comments in the midst of joining LIV Golf, his performances have been poor. Not so this week. His Sunday 65 was vintage Phil.
Other players who with notable finishes included Patrick Reed and Russell Henley (-7, T4); Cameron Young and Viktor Hovland (-6, T7); Sahith Theegala, in his first Masters (-5, solo 9th); and defending champion Scottie Scheffler, Collin Morikawa, Matt Fitzpatrick, and Xander Schauffele (all -5, T10).