The 87th Masters starts today and eight former Bulldogs (still not counting Patrick Reed) will try to win the prestigious green jacket. Bubba Watson is the only former Georgia golfer to win a major. He won in 2012 and 2014 and is one of 17 players to ever win the Masters more than once. Other Dawgs have come close throughout the years. Here are the best-ever finishes by former Bulldogs at golf’s first major plus the history of the ones in this year’s field.
Three Bulldogs shared the best finish last year as Russell Henley, Sepp Straka and Hudson Swafford all finished tied for 30th.
Here is a little info on the eight Dawgs in the 2013 field ---
Harris English - Official World Golf Ranking (42nd) - 4 Career PGA Tour Wins
English has played 16 PGA Tour events this season and has made the cut in ten of them. He has two top tens this season including a finish of tied for 2nd at the Arnold Palmer Invitational last month. Last season, he did not compete at the Masters despite qualifying. He had surgery a few months earlier to repair a torn labrum in his right hip. However, he still attended the event. He had his best major finish two years at the U.S. Open in Torrey Pines as he finished third. Here is how he has done at The Masters.
Brian Harman - Official World Golf Ranking (29th) - 2 Career PGA Tour Wins
Harman has played 13 PGA Tour events and made the cut nine times. He finished in the top 25 in six of those nine made cuts and had a runner-up finish at the World Wide Technology Championship as well as two weeks later at The RSM Classic. He has missed the cut in three of his five events, but finished tied for 17th at the WGC-Dell Tech Match Play. He has two career top tens in majors. He finished tied for 2nd at the 2017 U.S. Open and then tied for sixth at last year's Open Championship. He has never finished in the top ten at The Masters, but does have one of the best finishes by a Bulldog. In 2021, he was second after the first and second round, but finished just outside the top ten.
Russell Henley - Official World Golf Ranking (38th) - 4 Career PGA Tour Wins
Henley has played 11 PGA Tour Events with seven made cuts. This season he won the World Wide Technology Championship back in November. It was his first win since April of 2017. He has zero career top tens at Majors, but has nine top-25s. He played in the Masters last year for the first time since 2018. In 2018, he had a son the Tuesday of the week of the Masters and finished tied for 15th in that event.
Chris Kirk - Official World Golf Ranking (32nd) - 5 Career PGA Tour Wins
Kirk has played in 14 PGA Tour events this season and has made the cut in ten of them. He has four top tens this season including a win on a playoff hole back in Febrauary at The Honda Classic. He also has a pair of third place finishes this season. His three top-three finishes is tied for the most he has ever had in one season (had had three in 2014). His win this season was the first since the 2015 season. His caddie is also a former Bulldog named Michael Cromie. Cromie was an honroable mention All-American back in 2014. Kirk will be playing in his first Masters since 2016.
Kevin Kisner - Official World Golf Ranking (47th) - 4 Career PGA Tour Wins
Kisner has played nine PGA Tour events this season and has made the cut five times. He has yet to finish in the top ten this season after finishing in the top ten five times last season. However, last September he did compete in the President's Cup and was part of the winning Team USA team. He and his family had one of Wednesday's most memorable moments at the Par Three tournament. Kisner almost aced one of the holes and the ball lipped out and seconds later he threw his cap to the ground. Later in that hole, he had his little son, Steven, tap in the short putt. He missed and the younger Kisner threw his plastic club to the ground in disgust.
Keith Mitchell - Official World Golf Ranking (45th) - 1 Career PGA Tour Win
Mitchell has made the cut in 11 of 13 PGA Tour events this season. He has finished in the top 25 in five of them including three top tens. His best finish this season was tied for fourth at Pebble Beach in February. He finshed all four rounds under par in that tournament as in his previous tournament, The American Express. Over the last two seasons, Mitchell has made the cut in 31 of 39 PGA Tour events. While having one career appearance playing at The Masters, he played at Augusta National in all four seasons while playing for the Dawgs and was a patron four or five times growing up.
Sepp Straka - Official World Golf Ranking (33rd) - 1 Career PGA Tour Win
Straka has played in 13 PGA Tour events and made the cut in nine of them. He has two top tens this season including finishing second in a playoff last October at the Sanderson Farms Championship. His twin brother Sam also played at the University of Georgia while Sepp played. Sam was also Sepp's caddie during the 2020 Olympics and finished tenth overall for Team Austria. His father was Austrian while his mother is from Moultrie, Georgia.
Bubba Watson - Offical World Golf Ranking (222nd) - 12 Career PGA Tour Wins
Watson is currently playing LIV Golf and is the captain of the RangeGoats team. He has played in three tournaments this season (had injured right knee last season) and has a best finish of 23rd. Bubba has five career top tens in the majors with three of them coming at Augusta National. He has had at least one round under par in 12 of 14 years of playing at The Masters. On Wednesday, he had a hole-in-one during the Par Three contest.
One thing to look for at this year's Masters (besides both the PGA Tour and LIV Tour playing together - 18 LIV golfers are in the field) is how much larger the course. For example, the 13th hole is now 545 yards instea of last season's length of 510. Another thing is to expect rain. Lots of rain is in the forecast starting on Friday.
Here are Thursday's tee times and groupings - remember the earlier the tee time on Thursday is, the later it is on Friday.
