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Augusta Gets One More Bear
Hug
by Rick
Reilly
Posted: Tue April 14, 1998
Couples
kissed. Strangers hugged. Women in heels threw elbows for
position. Fifty-eight-year-old Jack Nicklaus had just
birdied the 15th hole on Sunday to get within two shots of
the Masters lead, and all heaven was breaking
loose.
One man yelped as he sprinted, "This is the most fun
I've ever had in my
life!"
"Me, too!" hollered his
buddy.
"No!" yelped the guy again. "Not just on a
golf course! Ever! This is the most fun I've
ever had in my whole
life!"
"I
said," hollered his buddy, "me, too!"
The best kind of gifts are the ones you didn't even know
you needed. Last week America got a wonderful gift: one
more loving look at the greatest golfer who ever lived,
maybe the greatest winner in sports history. Yeah, he's a
little hunched over now,
and he has a left hip that probably needs replacing, but
there he was, limping right out of
Shell's Wonderful World of
Golf and onto the leader
board.
"Jack, you think you got a 65 left in you?"
somebody asked him on Saturday night, when he was six shots
out of the
lead.
"Oh, I got
at
least that much in me," he replied. "I just hope I
don't have any
more than
that."
Out he came, Old Saint Nicklaus on Easter morning,
birdieing four of the first seven holes and tilting the
course so much his way that everybody else was left with
MCI galleries—friends and family. In the group ahead of
him, Tiger Woods was learning
what it's like playing next to a tornado. "There were so
many roars, we had to back off, like, every shot,"
Woods said after Sunday's round. Imagine
that.
All this can be blamed on Nicklaus's lousy hearing. Augusta
National officials had declared Tuesday to be Jack Nicklaus
Day, but somehow he heard
Week. They dedicated a plaque to him on a drinking fountain
near the 16th green, and he even cried. But the problem was
he didn't understand the Augusta National Plaque
Policy, which is that when you get one, it means you're long since
done, you're toast, you're the toast being toasted, and
you're supposed to shake everybody's hand, shoot 79-81-160
and disappear, like a good, little legend. When they gave
Gene Sarazen a
plaque, he shot 83-80-WD. When Arnie got his, he shot
79-73-Cessna home. Do you realize that when Ben Hogan and
Byron Nelson were 58, they'd already quit playing
Augusta?
Well, why not? It was what everybody expected—even
Nicklaus. A month before, he'd said this could be his last
competitive Masters. He might come again, might not, but
he'd never be serious about it again. Hell, the USGA had
just given him a kind of
plaque—a three-year exemption to the U.S. Open, the first
multiyear walker in USGA
history.
Problem is, "The guy never acts his age,"
grumbles his
son-caddie, Steve. Jack is forever betting his sons he can ski
faster, catch more fish, sink more free throws than they
can. He has this obstacle course in his backyard. The idea
is to act "exactly
like you're five years old," Jack says. He's out there
climbing tires, hanging from bars, doing push-ups,
hop-overs and Bear crawls. What's 58 divided by five?
Ageless?
So, against all sense, here he was on Sunday, turning
America's most reverential course into the world's greenest
mosh pit. At one point, playing partner Ernie Els signaled
for a pair of earplugs.
If Nicklaus had sunk just a few more putts on Sunday, he'd
be your Masters champion right now, and you might still be
trying to get your father down from the roof. A birdie left
on the lip at 8. A bunny missed by an inch at 9. A blown
three-footer on
12. A downhiller that came up an Efferdent short on 18. He
wound up losing by four to the winner, Mark O'Meara, who
had 10 fewer putts and hit 10 fewer greens. Nobody's been
this old and straight since Lawrence Welk. As it was,
Nicklaus finished sixth,
whipped all four 1997 majors champions, became the oldest man
to finish in the top 10 at the Masters and reminded us all
how nice it would be if he never went away at
all.
He will, though. He has always said he wouldn't be a
walking piece of old newsreel. "If I do go out,"
he said on Sunday, "it was a nice way to do it."
Fine. Except, did you notice something? On the plaque? At
the bottom? They left an inch or two there, just enough for
a union engraver and a hopalong hero allergic to
calendars.
Tell us what you think. Sound off on the CNN/SI Message Boards.
Past Editions of Life of Reilly
Issue date: April 20, 1998
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