By: Preston Young
If you had told me five years ago that I’d be genuinely excited to watch golf on a Sunday afternoon, I probably would have laughed. I grew up around the traditional sports — baseball, football, basketball. Golf was never really part of the rotation. I got into it about three or four years ago and couldn’t tell you exactly what flipped the switch. I’ve always been drawn to competition, the tension of a close game, a late-inning at-bat, a fourth quarter drive. That edge where one moment can change everything is what makes sports worth watching.
Golf scratched that same itch, just differently than I expected. In most sports, the competition is loud. Golf is the opposite. It’s one player, one shot, one moment of focus, and the consequences are completely unforgiving. There’s nowhere to hide on a golf course. You can’t run out the clock or lean on a teammate, and the mental side of it is unlike anything else in sports. Once I understood that, I was hooked.
And if you’re going to get into golf, there’s no better place to start paying attention than Augusta.
The Masters is different from every other tournament. There’s a feeling to it that’s hard to explain, the immaculate course, the azaleas, the same iconic holes you’ve seen a thousand times but never get tired of watching. Even the broadcast feels quieter, more reverent. Like everyone involved knows they’re somewhere special. What I’ve come to appreciate most is the tradition. Same course, same green jacket, same Amen Corner, every April. And yet every year tells a completely different story.
Last summer I made it to the Travelers Championship, which was my first live professional golf experience. There’s something about being on the course, watching the world’s best make it look effortless, that shifts your perspective. It stopped being something I watched casually and became something I actually followed.
This year’s Masters was everything I hoped it would be. Rory McIlroy came in as the defending champion and looked dominant early, building the largest 36-hole lead in tournament history. Then Saturday happened. He gave most of it back, and heading into Sunday he was tied at the top. For a few hours it genuinely felt like we were watching one of the great collapses in sports unfold in slow motion. The back nine was chaos, multiple players cycling through the lead, and then McIlroy just steadied himself, birdied through the middle of the round, and held on to win by one. He became only the fourth player in Masters history to win back-to-back, joining Nicklaus, Faldo, and Tiger. Watching him say he couldn’t believe he waited 17 years to get one green jacket and ended up with two in a row was exactly the kind of moment that reminds you why Augusta is different.
Of course, not everyone was ready to just enjoy it. And honestly, I get why.
After his dominant second round, McIlroy admitted he’d skipped three PGA Tour events leading up to the Masters and instead made repeated day trips to Augusta to practice, even saying he would drop his daughter at school, fly up on his private jet, play a round, and fly home for dinner. By his own account he was on the course close to ten times in the three weeks prior. “This place feels like my home course,” he said. People were not thrilled. He also withdrew from the RBC Heritage, a $20 million event the following week, before it even started to practice for the Masters.
The criticism is understandable. Those events he skipped rely on star players to draw fans and sponsors, and McIlroy basically said publicly they weren’t worth his time. There’s also a real access question: not every player can arrange that kind of extended preparation at a private club. The counterargument is fair too: scouting courses before majors isn’t new, the rules allow it, and any player could theoretically do the same. But I think what actually bothered people wasn’t the preparation itself, it was how casually he dismissed those other tournaments out loud. There’s a version of this where you do your work quietly and let the golf speak.
Personally, I watched a guy nearly blow a historic lead, survive a brutal final round, and win one for the history books. Whatever he did to prepare, it made for great television. But the bigger debate about access and tour commitment is legitimate, and winning doesn’t close it.
That’s what keeps pulling me back to golf. You don’t need to know every player’s backstory to understand that something matters when it happens on that course in April. Some traditions take a while to find you. This one found me at the right time.
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