By Tom Edrington

Augusta, GA

The Masters had a tension-filled finish, complete with a string of birdies and a playoff, it's just that it wasn't provided by the players everyone expected.

The build-up and hype were too much for many of the world's top players to live up to and while Bubba Watson was outlasting Louis Oosthuizen for his first career major, Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy, Luke Donald and a few others were left to wonder what happened.

For Woods it was his inability to control his ball and score on the par-5s, McIlroy was done in by a pair of double-bogeys on the front nine on Saturday and Donald was just not a factor in a major once again despite being the top-ranked player in the world.

Perhaps it was just too much to begin with, the expectations for an epic Masters too high. Woods, McIlroy, Phil Mickelson and Donald had all won this season and seemed to be at the top of their games coming to Augusta National.

Of that group only Mickelson delivered.

Woods was not the same player that dominated the field at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. Kicking clubs and missing greens, he recorded just two birdies on the par-5s all week. That's just not going to get it done and he knows it.

"If I look back on the week, I played the par 5s atrociously," Woods said. "This is a golf course you just have to dominate the par 5s, and I did not do that at all this week."

Woods finished at 5-over, tied with McIlroy. Donald managed a hollow 68 on Sunday and climbed to 3-over for the tournament.

Looking for his first green jacket and to rebound from a meltdown on the back nine in the final round a year ago, McIlroy shot 77-76 over the weekend and was never a factor.

"I played pretty well over the first couple days and then just came out on Saturday and really just didn't have it that front nine," McIlroy said. "And that sort of killed me for the rest of the tournament. Yeah, I mean, just one of those things. But I'll come back next year and try my best again."

Donald let another major go by without making much noise but the chatter around whether or not he is a true No. 1 won't die down. It's hard to be considered the best golfer in the world when you haven't won any of the tournaments that are the true measuring stick of golfing greats.

"I think regardless of ranking I should be contending. I feel like my game is good enough," Donald said. " Obviously my game was good enough to get me to No.1. Obviously that's my focus in my career right now is to get myself into contention and win the big ones. Yeah, it's always disappointing when I don't do it."

Mickelson was disappointed as well but not for not showing up, but for letting an opportunity slip away. He had his chances and battled back from a crushing triple-bogey at the par-3 fourth, but didn't have enough Masters magic to win a fourth green jacket.

"It's disappointing that I didn't grab that fourth green jacket. It's disappointing that I didn't make it happen on the back nine and get the putts to fall, even though I felt like I was hitting them pretty good," Mickelson said. "I gave them all good chances, I just couldn't quite get them to go."

But unlike Woods, McIlroy and Donald, at least Mickelson gave it a go.

 

 

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