April 22, 1991

Feisty little Ian Woosnam outlasted a wave of challengers and won over a hostile Masters gallery

By John Garrity

The cheers were a rude way of saying, Enough, already. Enough of European golfers winning the Masters. Please, no more Scots, Englishmen, Spaniards or Germans; no more Sandys, Nicks, Seves or Bernhards. And especially -- nothing personal, mind you -- no little Welshmen answering to "Woosie."

"That was a bit disappointing," said Woosnam on Sunday evening, his new green jacket clashing nicely with the red tartan trousers he had worn into the Georgia woods. "Bad sportsmanship. But never mind, that's life; let's get on with it."

Maybe that's what Woosnam was thinking as he stared down at his ball, dimly visible in the murky water off the 13th fairway. Maybe he wasn't still bristling over another taste of American jingoism back at the 10th hole, where spectators had rooted for his ball to roll off the green and down a hill, which it had done. Perhaps, as he dropped a new ball on 13, he was feeling magnanimous. More likely, though, he was thinking dark, bloody thoughts.

Woosnam would bite your shins in a pub brawl if you crossed him, but at 33 he has learned to channel his feistiness. He no longer breaks clubs over his knee or gets booked for racing his Porsche through the Shropshire night at more than 120 mph. "The more angry I get, the better I play," he said on more than one occasion last week. Come to think of it, the 1991 Masters was a pub brawl, and as with most good melees, you couldn't tell much about the fight by who was last out the door. Three men came to the 72nd hole tied for the lead at 11 under par: Woosnam, winner of the USF&G Classic in New Orleans three weeks earlier and a 17-time winner on the European tour; 41-year-old Tom Watson, the people's choice down the stretch; and young Spanish star Jose-Maria Olazabal, the second-leading money-winner on the European tour this season.

By then, however, all three seemed spent. They had fought off challenges by guys who seemed to come out of nowhere -- Ben Crenshaw, Andrew Magee, Jodie Mudd, Steve Pate -- and one man, Lanny Wadkins, who was there among the leaders all along. They also had battled the brain-numbing delays of Masters play. "You never can get a rhythm on this golf course," said Watson, citing his 25-minute wait for a four-group pileup on 13. "It felt like 10 hours out there," said Woosnam.

No one left more of himself on the course than Watson, who had not won since the 1987 Nabisco Championships. Seemingly out of contention after dunking his tee shot in the water on the par-3 12th, Watson wrought pandemonium in the pines by eagling the 13th and 15th holes -- a feat rivaling Gene Sarazen's final-round double eagle at 15 in 1935. His first eagle produced a three-shot swing with the front-running Woosnam, who after taking his drop on 13 had laid up and taken bogey. The eagle at 15 -- following a brilliant five-iron to within six feet of the pin -- gave Watson a share of the lead with Woosnam, who two-putted for a birdie, and Olazabal.

Like Woosnam, Olazabal needed only to win his first major to secure his reputation, which has rapidly been established with a total of seven wins worldwide in 1990 and '91, including a 12-stroke victory at last summer's World Series of Golf in Akron. "I would be very surprised if he does not pull this out," said Seve Ballesteros of his countryman as the contenders made the turn on Sunday. "He is 25, but he is 35 in maturity."

Olazabal was off his game on Sunday and plodded along at a pace that probably crippled the hopes of the fast-moving Wadkins, his playing partner. Olazabal missed fairways consistently and bogeyed three straight holes -- 8, 9 and 10 -- to fall four strokes off the pace, but he birdied 13, 14 and 15 and seized the lead briefly at 11 under. Proving what? "That I'm able to come back," said the man who would be Ballesteros.

No knock on Olazabal, but Augusta National never played easier. Thunderstorms had softened the course on Tuesday night, and three of the four par-5s played downwind all week. Saturday's 30 subpar rounds broke a third-round tournament record, and the 37 eagles over four rounds were 11 more than the previous high, achieved in 1983. "The course is playing so easy," said Davis Love III after shooting a 74 on Saturday, "that I should be doing better."

Another guy who thought he should be doing better was Nick Faldo, who tied for 12th but never made a convincing bid to win an unprecedented third straight Masters. "It's touch," said Faldo on Sunday, explaining what was lacking in his short game. "I just haven't had it this week."

On Thursday, following Masters tradition, Faldo, as defending champion, played with the reigning U.S. Amateur champ, Phil Mickelson. A 20-year-old junior at Arizona State, the lefthanded Mickelson breezed around Augusta National in 69 to Faldo's 72. At the difficult 18th, Mickelson hit his approach six feet behind the hole. Faldo, from a fairway bunker, bounced his into the spectators left of the green. Result: Mickelson, a.k.a. the Next Jack Nicklaus, sauntered onto the green to a dream ovation. For his part, Faldo fussed with the gallery ropes and the gallery, thoroughly upstaged.

Meanwhile, it seemed as if nothing could disturb affable Mark McCumber. Upon arriving at the locker room on Thursday, McCumber found a FedEx from his wife, Paddy. Enclosed were two photos of their five-day-old son, Mark Tyler, and a note: "If you make a bogey, think about this face." He made only one bogey en route to a 67 and a share of the first-round lead with Wadkins and Jim Gallagher Jr. The next day, McCumber spiced his act with stunts. When his birdie putt spun out at 16, McCumber rolled over on his back and his caddie toppled into a greenside bunker.

Even Nicklaus shot himself in the foot. On the 12th tee he was four under par and two strokes off the lead. Minutes later, after playing the infamous par-3 water hole, he was back at par and six shots off the pace. "I committed a cardinal sin," Nicklaus said later. "I always hit that shot over the [front] bunker, but the conditions were so ideal that I decided to play a little more toward the flag, and I blocked it out right." The ball landed on the steep bank to the right of the bunker and rolled back into Rae's Creek.

They don't hand out dunce caps at the 12th; they just make the wretch hit his next shot from inside a chalk circle by the creek. Nicklaus, shooting three with the penalty stroke, tossed a delicate wedge shot at the flag and watched in disbelief as it spun back off the green and rolled into the water. Said Nicklaus, "I started thinking, What am I going to make here? Seven? Nine? Eleven? Thirteen?"

Seven, it turned out, the day's second quad. The pink and purple azalea blossoms, already wilting, drooped further. It was so quiet in Amen Corner you could hear a legend drop.

This legend, however, would not stay down. Nicklaus birdied 13, 14, 15 and 16, and the quadruple bogey was covered like a kited check. On the 14th, where his four-iron approach stopped inches from the flag, Jackie, his son and caddie, said, "Dad, that is the greatest golf shot I've ever seen."

On the 500-yard 15th, Nicklaus amazed himself. "Guess what club I just hit to that green?" he said to Watson, his playing partner, after clearing the water with his second shot. "A six-iron!"

Watson, amused, passed the information to those behind the fairway ropes: "Jack hit a six-iron."

Make no mistake, the moment belonged to Watson, too. Nicklaus's eagle putt lipped out at 15, but Watson's 15-footer for eagle fell to a huge roar. At the par-3 16th, Nicklaus rolled in a 30-foot rainbow and clutched his head in disbelief. Watson then dropped an equally improbable putt from about the same distance to take the lead at eight under. He was headed for a second straight 68 that would give him a two-shot lead over McCumber, Wadkins, Mark Calcavecchia and Woosnam, who had joined the fun on the leader board with a 66 on Friday. And Nicklaus was just four back.

The round called to mind a pair of memorable Nicklaus-Watson duels: Turnberry in 1977 and Pebble Beach in 1982, both won by Watson. Three weeks earlier the two had led in New Orleans after two rounds and were paired in the final group for the third round, only to disappoint themselves and their fans with sloppy play. Friday at Augusta was different; their climb to the 18th green was the walk of champions. As the ovation built, Nicklaus paused to let Watson pass. Watson put his arm around his old foe and said, "No, no, let's go up together."

Sunday's final walk up 18 was shorter on ceremony, but longer on drama for Watson -- and his co-leaders. The tournament came down to three tee shots, and each golfer played his drive differently.

Olazabal, in the next-to-last twosome, tried to knock the ball past the steep-faced bunkers on the left, but he didn't fade it enough and found the sand. His second shot landed in the trap to the left front of the green. His sand wedge from there left him with a 40-foot uphill putt for par. If he'd made it, pressure would have been on Watson and Woosnam, who were playing together, to escape their own troubles. Olazabal's putt stopped three feet short. "I would love to be able to hit that tee shot again," said Olazabal, who after signing his scorecard remained near the 18th green to watch the final gut-wrenching strokes of the tournament. "Obviously, there's a tremendous amount of pressure out there, but that's golf. "

To shorten the dogleg, Watson attempted to cut a three-wood up the right side with his tee shot. "I did nothing but just shove it," he said of the fateful shot, which rifled into the trees.

That left Wee Woosie, whose strategy all week at 18 had been to take his driver, aim left of center and swing with all his might. "I've seen Greg Norman play it that way," said Woosnam, who after moving in front late in the third round was never more than one shot out of the lead. "Even if I hooked the ball, I knew it would carry the bunker."

Carry the bunker? Woosnam hooked his final drive over grass, sand and most of the gallery. But there was no trouble where Woosnam went, and his only concern for the next five minutes was helping the marshals relocate the few thousand spectators between him and the green.

Watson was not so lucky. The trees in his path were firmly rooted, so his only play was to try to slice a three-iron out of the pine straw and onto the green. He caught the left front bunker instead and, like Olazabal, couldn't get up and down.

That opened the way for Woosnam, whose second shot had landed just off the left side of the green, about 50 feet from the hole. He chose to putt it on and rolled his ball eight feet past the cup. With Watson already having missed his par putt, Woosnam needed this one to avoid a possible three-way playoff. "I felt it was a right-lip putt," Woosnam said. "I kept my head down for the first four feet or so, but I saw the last three feet, and I thought, It's in, baby." When the ball dropped, he crouched and pumped his arm.

Woosnam's wife, Glendryth, who is also tiny, couldn't see the final putt from her nonvantage point among the gallery at 18, but she could gauge what had happened by the reaction of the crowd. The cheers told her 1) that her husband had won, marking the sixth time in the last nine years that a European has gotten the green jacket, and 2) that the Yanks didn't think he was such a bad bloke, after all.

It was a heady moment for a player who once languished on Africa's Safari Tour, where heat, snakes, mosquitoes and diarrhea are more prevalent than azaleas. "I'm not going to change my life for anybody," said Woosnam as he celebrated with a beer at an Augusta hotel. "I just want to be the best and do it in my own little way. Drink a few beers and have fun."

Translation: Mind your shins, mates.