Ben Coley believes Jon Rahm can emulate Nick Faldo and successfully defend his title at the Masters, where his selections also include Shane Lowry.
Golf betting tips: The Masters
4pts win Jon Rahm at 14/1 (Paddy Power, Betfair Exchange, Betway)
3pts e.w. Jordan Spieth at 20/1 (Betfred 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10)
2pts e.w. Joaquin Niemann at 25/1 (Betfred 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10)
1.5pts e.w. Tony Finau at 40/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1.5pts e.w. Shane Lowry at 45/1 (bet365, 888sport 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Si Woo Kim at 70/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
The golf season never really ends, yet to many it's only just about to begin. The Masters Tournament marks the beginning of a major summer that lasts three months. It is this quarter of a year through which this sport is now measurable: four opportunities, in April, May, June and July, to make history, to remove any semblance of doubt.
Even Scottie Scheffler, the best player in the world and set to go off among the shortest-priced favourites since Tiger Woods in his heyday, must win majors if he's to avoid having his achievements lost to the fissure which separates one side from the other. Men's professional golf is in a sorry mess thanks to people who care little for those of us who want to love it. This week, we forget about all that.
And so to Augusta National, the single most recognisable place in the sport, that status justified not by the painted grass or bright-white bunkers, but by the genius of the design. It tests players in ways they ought to be tested, mentally and physically. They will have to call upon a range of clubs and a variety of shots. They'll have to make decisions on the fly, from when to attack to simply when to hit as wind swirls among the trees.
They'll know, every single one of them, that things can go badly wrong very quickly at holes like the fourth and fifth, or the 10th and 11th. They'll also know that you simply have to score on the par-fives, which last year's champion played in 10-under. And they ought to know that Jack Nicklaus aimed at the bunker on 12 when the pin was back-right, the hole that has defined the 2016 and 2019 tournaments lately.
As I wrote last year, chances are you can walk every one of these holes in your mind. With archaic broadcasting restrictions finally loosened, now we get to see all of the masterpiece which gives this tournament its identity. The Masters can never leave this place. You cannot be a Masters champion without Amen Corner, without surviving what follows. You cannot slip on a Green Jacket anywhere but inside the Butler Cabin.
Not that the tournament itself always lives up to this sort of billing. At times, partly because the golf course allows for separation, partly because of its smaller field, the maxim that the Masters only begins when they reach the back-nine on Sunday has been exposed as a myth. Our last two champions, Scheffler first and then Jon Rahm, both walked that final walk knowing that the job had long since been done.
With 2020's November peculiarities and even 2021's historic rise of Hideki Matsuyama each missing just that something, it is five years since the Masters was more than we could have imagined. Tiger Woods winning major number 15, somehow, after more than a decade stuck on 14, was on another plane. Like all the great majors, it uncoiled slowly until it uncoiled quickly, and there left standing, somehow, was the greatest of them all, hugging his children in scenes that will outlast us.
This year almost certainly won't serve up a repeat, Woods set to go off as a 150/1 chance whose body means his mind won't be enough, but it could come close. The PGA Tour-versus-LIV Golf narrative is just one fascination among many and a generally bright and sunny forecast, for the weekend especially, should allow the Masters to blossom. Turn the pretend bird sounds up to 11 and settle yourself in for four of the best days in all of sport.
What does it take to win the Masters?
Of late, the formula for the first men's major of the year has not been complicated: Scheffler and Rahm had both been exceptional during the early months of the year, both had shown a love for the course before. In each case, the few golfers who could get close enough to bring the outcome into doubt were similarly in-form, similarly world-class, similarly comfortable at Augusta National.
A broader view brings in some surprises, such as Charl Schwartzel (2011) and Danny Willett (2016), but there have been bigger shocks in each of the other three major championships. With 10 or 12 places on offer you don't need to find a 250/1 winner to make scouring those outsiders worthwhile, but the champion will almost certainly come from higher up the betting. They always do here.
With the exception of Patrick Reed (2018), every one of them since Schwartzel ranked inside the top 10 in greens in regulation, which while now considered dated, does tell us something which ties into the heightened importance of a good short-game when it is required. However efficient a player is around the greens, only someone as dazzling as Reed managed to survive missing a lot of them. Generally, Augusta wins that battle.
Approach play and that sharp short-game would be my idea of the watered-down version of what it takes to win the Masters, along with being above-average off the tee because of power, rather than accuracy. These are the tools most likely to set someone up to do what you have to do and avoid big mistakes, while taking advantage of those scoring opportunities which do come around often.
Other factors often referred to in majors are recent wins and experience contending for one, demonstrated best by the likes of Willett and Bubba Watson, but a degree of caution is demanded by what happened last summer. Wyndham Clark had never been anywhere near a major lead but was at the very top of his game before capturing the US Open. Brian Harman had, but he'd been winless in six whole years.
And it's this slight scepticism towards most trends which paves the way for the headline selection, defending Masters champion JON RAHM, who can be backed at 14/1 in some win-only markets and on the exchanges.
I've been reluctant to side with defending champions here in the past, for the simple fact that back-to-back winners are exceptionally rare. As for doing it at the first time of asking, only Nick Faldo has managed that. History is stacked against Rahm and there's a perfectly valid theory behind this: hosting the Champions Dinner and the very magnitude of the event makes the job doubly difficult.
That said, many have been close, and it strikes me that they were, like Rahm, members of the absolute elite. Tom Watson, Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player each finished second in their first defences. Arnold Palmer was third. Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods both contended. Jordan Spieth was one swing of a short-iron away from romping to a second Green Jacket, instead finishing second.
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Even Scheffler, whose 10th place looks pretty good on paper, would've been close to winning again had his putter behaved, and given what we know of him, I struggle to believe that missing putts was anything to do with making a speech on Tuesday night. For the very best players in this sport, a successful Masters defence is not out of the question.
Rahm remains one of those. It's difficult to contextualise LIV Golf performances and the recent emergence of strokes-gained data hasn't helped much, but Rahm has played five events, finished no worse than eighth, and generally looks to be playing well. I don't think it's a stretch to argue that had he played these five events again but over the regulation 72 holes, he would already be a winner, perhaps more than once.
There's no compelling evidence to suggest that he's regressed from the player who won here, finished 10th in the US Open, and was runner-up at Hoylake, all before an imperious Ryder Cup display and then that bombshell news that he'd decided to join LIV, where on Sunday he felt he hit the ball really well.
Rahm's Augusta record is outstanding and he was a dominant winner in the end last year, leading the field from tee-to-green and producing putting figures few among the elite can match. His performance looks all the more remarkable when you consider that he started with a four-putt double-bogey, that he had a bad draw in horrible weather, and that nobody has won an April renewal by a wider margin since Woods in 1997.
Above all else, I think the supposed hoodoo of the defending champion, coupled with the fact he's now a LIV Golf player, has inflated his price to the point that we have to give him the benefit of the doubt.
For context, Rahm won this tournament as around an 8/1 shot last year. Scheffler was slightly shorter as defending champion, more than halving in price from 2022. A lot has happened over the past 12 months and it's a matter of personal opinion as to whether Rahm's prospects have been hurt by his shock decision to leave the PGA Tour. Mine is that we simply don't know, but that at 12/1-plus, it's well worth paying to find out.
Brooks Koepka is about the same price to win this as he was LIV Miami last week. Rahm's odds have doubled and he played much better than Koepka. Yes, that's a nod to the latter's phenomenal record in majors, but Rahm is the only player in men's golf who has won more than one recently. He's the second most likely winner of this tournament, behind Scheffler, and rates genuine value at the pick of the win-only prices in particular.
Another reason to believe that Rahm ought to be shorter is that there are so many potential Masters candidates with questions to answer. The likes of Justin Thomas, Patrick Cantlay, Viktor Hovland and Collin Morikawa have all been poor for most of the year. Two of the leading candidates on paper are debutants, a far greater handicap than having won here 12 months ago. Antepost selection Will Zalatoris has hit the brakes at just the wrong time, as have young stars Tom Kim and Min Woo Lee.
Of course, these are world-class golfers and some might turn things around during the Masters itself, but there's no denying that this is a tough place to visit if you're not firing on all cylinders. Among the recent champions who hadn't won an event in the run-up, Matsuyama is the only one whose form looked a little suspect, and it was better than several of the above names have been showing.
Big chance for McIlroy but Spieth preferred
All of which means that Scheffler is fully entitled to be a 4/1 shot and that Rory McIlroy may seldom have a better chance to complete the career grand slam at last, and cases for both are straightforward to argue. Scheffler could easily be seeking four wins in a row and it may yet prove to his benefit that he narrowly missed out in Houston. McIlroy has prepared nicely, his approach play seemingly having turned a corner.
Truly, I hope he wins it, but there's one issue I can't shake. Over the last seven years, McIlroy has ranked better than 30th in greens hit only once, meaning he's had to scramble for par far too often. He'll know this, and he does arrive on the back of his best strokes-gained approach numbers in an age. Timing is everything; perhaps, at last, he's got his just right.
The same comment could also apply to JORDAN SPIETH after his typically bonkers 10th place in the Texas Open.
Spieth made a hole-in-one early in the tournament, then on Saturday hit his ball from a drainage ditch to the roof of the clubhouse, seemingly on purpose. Sunday had time for a missed birdie putt from inside three feet and if you're new to golf, know this: none of the events listed can be classed as out of character.
As I wrote in my player-by-player guide to the field, Spieth is part magician, part madman, but that's part of what makes him so effective at Augusta, where a degree of daring is required and no little magic dust. He's played the Masters 10 times and has six top-fives. In April, that record is a mighty six from nine.
Runner-up on debut, Spieth was a dominant winner in 2015, then, famously, should've won again in 2016. Across those first three visits just two players outscored him and, all jokes aside, until things went wrong at the 12th, this success had been built on hitting a heck of a lot of greens. Twice, he's led the field.
This course record is why he's shorter in the betting than he is for most other tournaments, some of them less competitive, but as the years go by it's difficult to escape the conclusion that this is entirely justified. Spieth has ended 27 rounds of the Masters inside the top 20, 23 inside the top 10. After a poor third round last year, he powered home to land the place money yet again.
And he returns having hit the ball seriously well in Texas, confirming his own belief that he'd been playing better than his results suggest. This year has been up and down, make no mistake, but he has placed for us twice in three, both at courses he loves. Kapalua in particular, with its sidehill lies and creative demands, offers a worthwhile pointer to the Masters. He had a chance to win there.
"I think my plan in here, I had come off two missed cuts so I wanted to kind of find out really where I'm at and really feel like I made progress," he said on Sunday. "I felt like my game's actually been in a better place than other years and it just hasn't shown for it in the last six, eight weeks. But I wasn't exactly sure. So I think it proved it this week.
"I played the par-fives over par, which is one of my best stats of the year, and I lost like three around the greens, which is also a strength of mine. I feel like I came into the week unsure if I was confident in being able to win next week and I come out of it saying I've got a couple things I've got to work on, but overall I think I'm in a good place to be able to have a chance."
I find that hard to disagree with and while I've sometimes felt he's simply too short to back for a second Green Jacket, given the way Koepka and Cam Smith prepared last week, the form of Hovland and Thomas, the fact that Wyndham Clark and Ludvig Aberg will be seeking to do something nobody has done in almost 50 years, on paper this might be the most winnable Masters since he gave it away in 2016.
Keen on red-hot Joaquin
Next on the list is one of the best players in the world right now, JOAQUIN NIEMANN, ranked seventh by DataGolf and probably worth a place or two higher given his exploits since the back-end of 2023.
Victory in the Australian Open showed this shot-maker at his best and he's built on that by dominating the early part of the LIV Golf season, winning twice and adding another pair of top-10s in just five starts. Only when teeing it up a week after his first LIV win did he struggle, a performance which is easy enough to excuse.
Niemann has been going off second-favourite for these events and rightly so, and I've long felt he's a potential Masters champion. In fact he was among my selections in 2022, when he fired a first-round 69 to lie third only to struggle a little thereafter. Last year he took another step forward on that, finishing 16th, and he'll expect another given the improvements he's made since.
He has the tools you need for Augusta National. Niemann is extremely long off the tee, his approach play can be first-class, he loves to work the ball both ways, and he can be exquisite around the greens, something he displayed in his dominant Riviera victory two years ago, still the most significant of his career.
Riviera is arguably the best PGA Tour stop at which to go hunting for clues, a point underlined by last two champions there, Matsuyama and Rahm. Bubba Watson has five victories across the two courses, Adam Scott has three. Mike Weir and Fred Couples are multiple Riviera champions, Phil Mickelson ditto as well as at Augusta, and Dustin Johnson is among the many players to have won at both venues.
The other course which offers significant pointers in part because the wide fairways and sidehill lies is Kapalua, where Niemann lost a play-off months before winning at Riv, while it's also fair to suggest that he has historically putted best on bentgrass greens, which is exactly what he'll be putting on at Augusta.
There really is only one gap in his profile – the fact he's yet to contend for a major at the weekend. It's rare for the Masters to be won by somebody who has never felt that kind of pressure, but Clark did it in the US Open last year and Niemann, who had major champions right behind him for both his LIV Golf wins, might just have the answers if he works his way into the mix.
It'll surely benefit him to practise with former champion Sergio Garcia over the coming days, something he's certain to do given that Garcia has acted as something of a mentor to him, and for my money he looks a much stronger candidate than all those around him in the betting. It pains me to say it, but I think we're probably getting a couple of points on the price because the market underestimates the level he's played at this year.
Doubts about Thomas lead to Finau
Having put up Justin Thomas every year in memory, at prices from 12/1 to 20/1, I needed him to do something drastic to talk me out of taking 33s. Thankfully, he's done exactly that, first producing one of his worst ever putting rounds to fall from favouritism to 64th in the Valspar Championship, then splitting with caddie Jim 'Bones' Mackay, a multiple Augusta winner alongside Mickelson.
I'm amazed Thomas did that just before the Masters but who knows, perhaps it'll help unearth the sort of performance he's definitely capable of. The bigger worry is that he has looked utterly lost on the greens a couple of times recently and it's become harder and harder to find signs of genuine encouragement, despite his form either side of Christmas and the fact he's so well-suited to Augusta.
Overlooking Thomas and Cantlay at 33/1 isn't something I'd have anticipated, but the latter's long-game stats make for ugly reading and he's typically putted poorly here. Hovland meanwhile, a huge drifter in the market, has shown nowhere near enough on a light schedule. He says he's enjoying figuring it all out at home but that leaves him exposed in the short-term. It's a shame long-term major odds haven't also taken a walk.
Ultimately this tournament is so often won by a form player and TONY FINAU now qualifies following second place in the Houston Open.
Finau putted badly in two of the four rounds and that club is still worrying, but he'd gained strokes in his previous three starts and it wouldn't take much more than an average putting week for him to contend if his long-game is in shape.
The leader in strokes-gained tee-to-green last time, that seems likely and I have him down as one of the most underrated iron players in golf. Finau's freak power is the thing we talk about most, but he's been a fixture in the first quarter of the strokes-gained approach stats and, over the past three seasons, has worked his way towards the very top.
He's married quality approach play with fine work around the greens in two of the last three renewals of the Masters, that's not including 2019 when he was in that final group alongside Tiger Woods and Francesco Molinari, and his putting stats have not been miserable. In fact, he gained strokes two years ago and putted well on his first couple of visits to Augusta, too.
Six cuts made from six appearances shows you how comfortable he is in general at a course which allows him to play the game in the way he learned to play it, hitting a variety of shot-shapes, and all of his best work has come under the April conditions which demand such creativity. That includes a couple of 66s and a 64, scores some very good players have never managed around here.
Alongside the putter the one slight issue is that Finau's performance levels in majors have dropped just as he's started winning PGA Tour events, but he's contended for all four of them in the past and won't fail for any lack of experience. If he can manage just a decent putting week, he can land the place money at the very least and potentially prove an enormously popular champion.
Count on class and course form
SHANE LOWRY is another at the top of his game following an excellent spring which saw him contend for two events in Florida, close with a round of 66 for 19th at Sawgrass, and then make it eight top-30s in 10 starts with 29th in Singapore.
It wasn't a surprise that he failed to justify short prices in the latter event, one he played following a long flight from the US and only because of the sponsors. There are though some concerns that Lowry has thrown away a few chances to win on the PGA Tour since he captured the Open almost five years ago.
Still, few in the sport are as adept at preparing for and delivering in majors and in general, he's a player you swerve at short odds in smaller events and support at big odds in bigger events. He's not just won a major but also a WGC, and the BMW PGA Championship, as well as the Irish Open way back in 2009 when landing a few bets as an amateur.
Here at Augusta he's one of just three players to have finished inside the top 25 in each of the last four renewals, the other two being Matsuyama and Scheffler, and like the latter he's been inside the top 20 for greens hit for all four. Lowry returns as one of the best iron players in the sport right now, so it seems fair to expect he'll again hit more than his share.
Over the last three renewals, ignoring the one played in November, he's ranked inside the top five in all four strokes-gained categories at some point, and having been third two years ago his Masters credentials are there for all to see. Lowry has the shot-shaping, the approach-play precision and the magic hands to look like an Augusta specialist; increasingly, his results leave no room for doubt.
With his driver having come good and no fewer than 10 major top-25s since he won one, I find the Irishman hard to get away from even if we know there's always a risk he misses one or two short putts. That is his weakness and he'll need to overcome it if he's to become a two-time major champion.
However, so strong has been his tee-to-green game lately that it's only taken decent putting weeks to bag top-five finishes in the Cognizant Classic and again at Bay Hill. More of the same is anticipated and at 40/1 he's a slightly bigger price than he was for The PLAYERS, in a tournament with perhaps fewer potential champions.
Collin Morikawa putts these greens well and for that reason alone you can make a case at 40/1 and bigger, but he has been some way below his best lately. Had it been the case that he's simply not been getting anything out of his game then I'd be willing to chance him, but the truth is the things he's good at have been well below the levels we've come to expect; the levels he will need to quickly find.
There are others like Morikawa who have gone off considerably shorter for events that might be harder to win, such as Sam Burns and Max Homa, but I remain faithful to the view that Augusta seldom sees players like these spring to life. Avoiding such temptation and siding with rock-solid profiles might deny us anything from left-field, but that's the way to play the Masters.
Thorbjorn Olesen has hit plenty of greens in two of his past three visits and can give you a run at the places without threatening to win. He is considered the best of the outsiders, but I'm really sweet on SI WOO KIM and he completes the staking plan.
Quite simply, Kim has just about every base covered bar a recent win and a bit of putting magic as far as I'm concerned. He's long enough off the tee and certainly driving it superbly, his approach play is excellent, and he's a dynamite chipper. His game matches up for Augusta beautifully.
That's why he's made six cuts in succession since failing to do so on debut and while yet to hit the frame, he was close when finishing 12th in 2021, having also been selected on these pages and spent most of the week inside the top 10.
He's an improved player now, of that I'm certain, with his iron play having kept on improving since, and his driver never better. Interestingly, it's his driving that kept him out of the places back then and has also been problematic in two subsequent appearances, whereas he's actually putted well throughout, ranking as high as seventh in 2022.
Given that Kim has gained strokes off the tee every single time he's teed it up in the US since last year's Masters, I've high hopes that he can build himself a platform and at 20th in greens, 25th in scrambling, 11th in three-putt avoidance and fifth in bogey avoidance, hide the name and you'd rate him a massive player on paper.
Kim is known to be hotheaded at times, not necessarily what you'd look for in a Masters winner, but he remains the youngest man in history to win at Sawgrass and, at 28, he has so much more to offer now that he's fit and firing. Give the man a putting stroke and you have a world-class player, who also happens to be a new dad like a couple of very recent winners of this.
Despite that off-course priority (distraction seems like the wrong word) he's been 14th at Pebble Beach, 12th in Phoenix, sixth at Sawgrass and 17th in Houston and while only in The PLAYERS did he make his share, hence the standout result, there's something about these greens that has helped him to putt better lately, even if he did have to use his three-wood for a time when last we were on him.
That's very much the Si Woo experience but I'm keen to buy into it. He loves traditional courses like this one, he's been third at Riviera and 10th at Kapalua, and he might never have been in better control of his long-game than he is today. At Augusta National, that can take you far, and I'm serious when I say there aren't too many golfers I'd rather have a crack at Scheffler with on Sunday.
Posted at 1700 BST on 08/06/24
The Masters: More Sporting Life content
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- Augusta National: Hole-by-hole course guide
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