So much for the walk-away Masters win for Jordan Spieth. Spieth called Augusta National “U.S. Opens conditions” today and the results certainly backed him up. Only four players were able to finish under par today and Spieth wasn’t one of them.
Spieth’s two over 74 was just enough to keep him in the lead. It was brutally tough at Augusta National but Spieth’s round started out anything but. With birdies at the first and third he had it to eight under and it was looking like a coronation. Then Augusta rose up and bit the twenty two year old. A painful four putt double bogey six at the sixth hole brought Spieth down to earth. After that he scrapped it around with four bogeys to only two birdies. His putter was cold but at the eighteenth he drained a testing putt to get up and down for par. That clutch putt kept him in first place by a single shot over Rory McIlroy.
McIlroy was one of the fortunate ones to finish under par today with a one under 71. McIlroy put the pedal down on the back nine with birdies at thirteen, fifteen and sixteen.
Spieth and McIlroy will tee off in the last group on Saturday and Spieth wasn’t shy about speaking the truth when he was asked about playing with the four time major champion. “I’d rather play with someone less threatening” he said and he wasn’t kidding.
When Bryson DeChambeau left the fifteenth green with a birdie he was at four under par for the tournament and one shot behind Spieth. It was the low round of the day by three shots. You could see that the kid (ha, kid he’s the same age as Spieth) knew he was really doing something special. Then both he and Spieth bogeyed sixteen and then DeChambeau had his “Bonehead” moment. He pulled his first drive on eighteen into a bush and had to re-tee and then pulled that one almost as far left. After a hike through the woods and a concession area, a drop off a cart path and a few more shots his head was spinning as he wrote down a triple bogey seven. Even with a one hole meltdown he is having an amazing tournament. He’s at even par and only four back and is a real threat.
Let’s hear it for the old guys! Former Masters Champ Bernhard Langer (58) is at one over par. Former PGA Champ Davis Love III (51) is at two over. And former Masters Champ Larry (the shot that killed Norman) Mize (57) is at five over. These old guys are good.
Props to Ernie Els. First for the way he handled his disaster of a six putt. He stood in there and answered each and every question and was open about his “problems.” Secondly for fighting back to a one over 73 today. He was seven over on the first hole alone and two over the rest of the tournament.
Last but not least…and least is the operative word here is Phil Mickelson. Mickelson did the absolute least he could to make the cut at his 24th Masters. His day was an absolute disaster but it looked like Jordan Spieth was doing all he could to try and get Phil to the weekend. But Phil didn’t do his part. 
While Spieth was backing up and the cut line was dropping form four over to five over to six over and finally settling at seven over Phil was on his way to his worst score at Augusta in 90 rounds.
After an opening bogey he birdied the next two holes but his next bird did not come until the seventeenth hole and in between he carded three bogeys and three double bogeys. His disappointing day included a four putt, needing two shots to get out of a bunker, putting off the green, two water balls and a putter that looked like he stole it from Ernie Els. With all that he still had a shot at making the cut with a birdie at eighteen but his approach left him over twenty feet from the hole and he couldn’t sink the putt.
He came in to Augusta feeling and playing so well he has to be so very disappointed, as am I. I had picked him as one of my favorites in our Links Life Golf Picks. Ouch.
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