Everyone is entitled to their opinion – remember that before you lambast me for writing a 'clickbait' article. I honestly believe the last three holes at Augusta National are slightly underwhelming.
When I first raised this viewpoint in a team meeting several years ago, I was met by plenty of bemused looks and shaking heads, but I don't think the closing trio at The Masters live up to what precedes them.
For the record, I love Augusta. It's my favourite golf course in the world and The Masters is the best tournament of the year for me. But for the last few years, I haven't been able to shake the feeling that the last three holes let it down slightly.
Everything is relative, of course, and clearly they aren’t bad golf holes. I just don’t think they hit the heights of the rest of the layout – and certainly not the rest of the back nine. If holes 10-15 weren’t so spectacular, I’d suggest switching the nines. For me, holes 7-9 would make for a better finish.
Of course, I understand why people like the 16th and 18th – the former is visually stunning and the 18th has been the stage for so many memorable moments. Perhaps it's a case of overfamiliarity, but I don't see them as exceptional golf holes (like every other hole on the back nine bar the 14th).
Last year, when I ranked the holes at Augusta from best to worst, the 17th was bottom of my list. I asked several members of the Golf Monthly team for their views and the majority also had the penultimate hole in the same place.
If you disagree, as you're perfectly entitled to, please leave me a comment in the box below the article. Now, let me present my case.
The 16th
On the 16th, my issue is perhaps more with the pin positions employed by the tournament organisers than the hole itself (I have a similar gripe on 18 – more on that later). My main contention is the hole is simply too straightforward with Sunday’s pin.
I don’t think hitting an 8- or 9-iron into a 40-foot zone offers enough jeopardy for the third-last hole in the final round of a Major. Yes, the hole looks nice, but the water rarely comes into play and Redbud’s modest length, coupled with a slope that feeds the ball down to the hole, make it too easy for me.
The only times I can remember contenders finding the pond on 16 are Greg Norman in 1996 and Xander Schauffele in 2021.
So many balls end up 20 feet short of the pin and I don’t feel players have to work hard enough for a makeable birdie putt. My unpopular opinion is that 16 would be a far better hole without a slope bisecting the green.
I’d much prefer to see the Sunday pin back right, too. People will say this eliminates the drama of a potential hole-in-one, but I don’t really care about that. I can’t remember anyone making a tournament-defining or tournament-impacting ace on 16.
If you’re chasing the lead, can you hit a mid/short-iron to a tiny shelf? If you can, a two would gain you so much more ground on the field.
You could argue it makes it too easy for a leader to find the flat portion of the green and safely two-putt, but as we’ve seen countless times before, it’s by no means a guaranteed two-putt from the lower level. Often, first efforts are left a long way short coming up the hill.
Historically, the 16th is the 11th hardest hole at Augusta and that’s with the tricky front-right and back-right pins factored in. When the pin is low and left, it doesn’t present a challenge befitting the hole’s position on the scorecard.
The 17th
In my view, the 17th is the worst hole on the course and one of the most forgettable in Major Championship golf. There’s no way it should be the penultimate hole at arguably the best tournament of the year.
Apart from a run-off area front right of the green, it doesn’t really have any stand-out features. Plus, it’s almost a carbon copy of the 14th – the only real difference is the two greenside bunkers.
You also don’t tend to see too many spectators lining the hole and surrounding the green, which means the atmosphere and tension are not what they should be given how high the stakes are.
There are so many epic 17th hole in Major Championship golf and the 17th at Augusta falls well short of that mark.
The 18th
Of the closing trio, the 18th is my favourite – well, the tee shot at least. You have to thread the needle with your drive and it asks serious questions of your mettle if you need a par to win or a birdie to force a play-off – it’s do or die.
Anything over-faded will find trees or the right rough and be blocked out, while anything pulled will clatter into the trees – as happened to Jon Rahm during last year’s final round – or trundle into the fairway bunkers.
From the fairway, the uphill second shot isn’t the most thrilling and again I have an issue with the traditional Sunday pin position. With the backstop beyond the front-middle flag, it doesn’t take a particularly special shot to get close. Even if you’re slightly off line with your approach, you will often still have a flat 25-footer for birdie.
Again, modern players tend to come into this green with no more than 7-iron. I’d have no issue with the backstop if players were hitting their approaches from 200+ yards, but it seems too much of a helping hand in the age of power hitting.
I’d much prefer the final-round flag to sit on the back shelf behind the bunker, as it often does in rounds two and three. If players are chasing birdies, they’d be forced to take it on; if you’re sitting on the lead and choose to play conservatively, good luck two-putting from 60 feet to take the title.
In my view, the final-round flags on 16 and 18 should be in harder positions. Augusta’s back nine yields plenty of birdies, so making players really work for par or hit hero shots for potentially tournament-clinching birdies would add another dimension to the final round.
Changing the pin positions on 16 and 18 would be sufficient, but I do feel the 17th needs a major rethink. When you go back to the same golf course every year, the penultimate hole has to offer more.
