If I am playing at The Masters, I want to play in the afternoon. It appears that most of the great scores happened later in the day and as a result Patrick Reed and Marc Leishman are leading the charge. As I watched Amen Corner, I was very surprised to see so great players struggle, while others cruised through without a worry. I am not sure what causes such a disparity, but it sure made a difference to the scores. 

Patrick Reed shone the brightest yesterday. Shooting a -6, he lead the pack with stellar play. With a 31 front 9, he appeared to own Augusta National. To be honest, I am a bit surprised that he played so well, but as Jordan Spieth knows, there is still lots of golf left.

Phil Mickelson and Matt Kuchar had a very disappointing day. Shooting +7 and +3 respectively, they could not get anything going. I wonder if they fed off each other in a negative way to post their tough scores. All I know is that Phil could not putt and Matt could not hit a green in regulation. Today will be better for these two, just you wait and see.

Moving day is a different beast at The Masters. You can be sure that any player outside of the top 10 will increase their risk / reward shots. There is no sense holding anything back because if they are not within 5 strokes of the leader at the start of Sunday’s play, there is a very good chance they will be playing for fun. Yes, I know some great comebacks have occurred in the recent past, but I am not confident it will happen this year. The top 10 scores going into Moving Day show a very strong field, so Patrick and Marc better be ready.

I picked Rory McIlroy to win his first green jacket. He is sitting 5 strokes back at the moment, but that really is nothing on Saturday. Rory needs to continue to play strong and if he posts a 69 today, he will be in the thick of it on Sunday. I still see him winning this year’s Masters.

Has your pick played their way out of contention?

I am a grateful golfer! See you on the links!