AUGUSTA, Ga. — At 10:12 a.m. Saturday the most compelling and important series of events of the Masters’ first two rounds began to unfold.
Justin Thomas pushed a 10-foot putt right on the 17th green and pushed his idol onto TV screens all weekend. The miss left Thomas in peril of missing his first cut in eight appearances at Augusta National and moved the cut line to 3-over par, which moved Tiger Woods back into the tournament for that moment. Fifteen minutes earlier Woods, who is a five-time winner here and still the patrons’ preferred player, finished bogey-bogey to move from 1-over to 3-over for the tournament. It was his second bogey at No. 18 in two rounds.
As the rains intensified for a few minutes, Thomas pulled his approach shot just short of the gallery left of the hole, saw his chip shot snag on the tacky greens, missed his 10-footer, and was done.
Woods and Thomas were among the 39 players chased off the course by weather at 4:22 p.m. Friday after three trees nearly crushed fans next to the 17th tee. Play resumed at 8 a.m. Saturday in utterly miserable conditions: 48 degrees and rainy.
After he finished, Woods said, “I wish I get a chance to play two more rounds.”
His wish was granted, as he tied Fred Couples and Gary Player with 23 consecutive made cuts at the Masters. Woods has never missed the cut here as a professional. Couples made the cut for the first time since 2018, and, at the age of 63, broke the record Bernhard Langer set in 2020 by four months.
Woods’ presence was largely ceremonial, since he stood 15 shots behind leader Brooks Koepka. Considering the conditions, you wondered if many of the other players with no real chance shared Tiger’s relish to play Georgia golf in North Dakota conditions.
Jon Rahm did.
Rahm had a putt on No. 10 to start the back nine on the cold, rainy Saturday, conditions he embraced. Rahm carded three birdies and two bogeys Saturday morning to go with two birdies Friday afternoon and finished Round 2 at 10-under, two shots behind Koepka. Charismatic amateur Sam Bennett remained in third place at 8-under, one shot shy of Ken Venturi’s amateur record after two rounds set in 1956. No amateur has ever won the Masters.
Third-round play began with nine threesomes off split tees at 11:30 a.m; the weekend at the Masters usually sends everyone off No. 1 in pairs. Defending champion Scottie Scheffler was in the second group off No. 10; Woods, in the last group, was scheduled to start at 1:06 p.m., which gave him about 3 hours of rest on his aching leg. Compellingly, his group will play opposite the leaders, who tee off No. 1.
Woods had seven full holes left to play when he went home Friday. He parred the four of his first five holes, and birdied No. 15, but, as his reconstructed right leg throbbed, he pushed his tee shots on the last two holes to the right.
Thomas was far worse starting from the restart. He began with a double-bogey on No. 11 after he hooked his approach shot into the water, then made four bogeys over his final seven holes. To be fair, Saturday’s collapse was a continuation of Friday’s foibles; Thomas, the No. 10 golfer in the world, was 2-under after 28 holes after two sessions that were played in pristine scoring conditions. Even Phil Mickelson was 4-under.
Once considered among the game’s elite, Thomas, 29, has won two PGA Championships and is a former World No. 1, but his continued inconsistencies at majors clearly land Thomas in the game’s second tier. In his 23 majors since the beginning of 2017, Thomas has missed five cuts and finished outside of the top 20 in seven of the tournaments in which he made the cut.
Rory McIlroy, the No. 2 player in the world, needed a Masters win to complete the career grand slam, but Rors was even worse than JT. He’d finished second last year, and he’d spent the three practice rounds this week trying to convince everyone that he’d shaken his Masters’ jinx from 2011, when he entered the final round with a four-shot lead but disintegrated with an 8-over final 18.
The Ghost of 2011 reappeared Friday. He carded seven bogeys en route to a 5-over 77 Friday, which left him two shots beyond the cut line and unusually piqued; the affable Northern Irishman reneged on his post-round media commitments and fled the grounds.
Thomas’ stumbles Saturday morning let four more golfers back into the tournament, including Charl Schwartzel and Thomas Pieters, who play on the rival LIV Golf tour. As they battle in court for readmission to the PGA and DP World Tours and easier paths to the golf’s four majors, 18 LIV players, led by Koepka and Mickelson, qualified for the Masters. A dozen will play the final two rounds.
Four LIV players missed the cut, including quirky Bryson DeChambeau, petulant Sergio García, and two-time Masters winner Bubba Watson. Louis Oosthuizen, at 7-over with one hole to play, withdrew before the restart. Kevin Na withdrew after nine holes Thursday.
