Being Adam Scott under ordinary circumstances is a choice assignment.
He apparently ordered his looks from the Calvin Klein collection.
He has dated tennis stars (Ana Ivanovic) and movie stars (Kate Hudson) and that ever-popular classic, the former Swedish nanny (Marie Kojzar, his current significant other, now an architect).
Go ahead and try to dislike either his golf swing or his personality. Impossible. To his fellow pros, he is a hail fellow well-met. To his fellow Australian pros, he is their north star.
Now, add all the benefits of being the defending champion on Masters week, and the gig of being Adam Scott makes its final break with reality and becomes some sort of Nora Roberts romance novel.
As host of Tuesday’s champions dinner, he got to serve whatever he desired. And what he wanted were bugs. Moreton Bay Bugs, the name those colorful Aussies give to a kind of clawless, prehistoric looking lobster that lives in their alternate universe.
“Would you like some drawn butter with your bug, Mr. Nicklaus?”
With pretty much the run of the place last week, Scott brought his father out for a couple of fun rounds at Augusta National. “He said to me that would be the highlight of his golfing life, and I think it lived up to his expectations,” Scott said. Almost forgot to mention — he’s also the good son. Phil Scott didn’t keep score and never was able to sink the 15-footer on 18 that was the signature of his boy’s victory last year.
“And that looked a lot longer on TV than it did on the green,” a smiling Phil recounted.
Now that Adam has won one of these things, the confidence he brings in here is palpable. The past two times he has been in contention, he wobbled, squandering big weekend leads at the Australian Open and the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill. But that seems to trouble him hardly at all when discussing the current state of his game.
“I feel I’m playing really well; I really like the last couple week’s work I’ve done,” he said.
One of the perks of winning a Masters, aside from the $1.4 million paycheck, is being able to take the champion’s green jacket off Augusta National grounds and wear it to the drive-thru, the hardware store, or just around the rumpus room — wherever one chooses for a year. There have been few players who have taken better advantage of that clothing option than Scott. He took it with him everywhere. He went more green than the president of the Sierra Club.
And still, he said, “There are lots of places I’d love to wear it that I didn’t get the chance to: I think in Australia a lot more. I had such a quick trip home. There weren’t enough nights, and there a lot more places to wear it than I had nights up my sleeve.”
“The only way to deal with that is winning again. Then I get to take it again around with me,” he said.
Part of the understated bravado that Scott packed for his week here can be seen in the sly gleam in his eye whenever he mentions retaining traveling privileges with that green dream coat. Something he mentions quite often, by the way.
“I really got this thing in my head that I’m quite determined not to leave (the jacket) here on Sunday,” he said.
Winning again would put the 33-year-old Scott in most select company. Only a year ago he became the first Australian to win a Masters. Should he successfully defend this week, he would become the fourth man of any nationality to win back-to-back Masters. The others were Tiger Woods (2001-02), Nick Faldo (1989-90) and Jack Nicklaus (1965-66).
“I don’t know if there are answers to why only a couple guys have managed to repeat their performance,” Scott said.
“Just one of those things. In time, I’m sure more and more guys will (repeat), but at the moment, it’s only a couple, but I’d like to add my name to that list this week.”
A year ago at this time, Scott was being measured for the role of best player to never win a major. The memory of his four consecutive closing bogeys that cost him the 2012 British Open was still a fresh wound. And now we wonder if he might keep company with three of the greats of the past couple of generations.
Why is it so difficult to go back-to-back at the Masters? Perhaps because it is so difficult to even win once.
He has his backers in the media. Paul Azinger, one of the players succumbing to the gravitational pull of ESPN analysis, proclaimed him the favorite. “There’s horses for courses, and Adam Scott has had a couple chances to win at Augusta prior to winning last year,” he said. This is Scott’s 13th Masters appearance, and he has not finished worse than eighth in the past three years.
“(Augusta National) just seems to suit him and his style, his power and the way he flights the ball,” Azinger said.
In one respect Scott didn’t make it any easier on himself by winning last year. His victory seemed to be the jolt that shocked to life the entire continent of Australian golf. There are a slew of countrymen he inspired that he must now contend with this week — six Australian professionals in the field, three of them earning a spot with PGA Tour victories in the past four weeks. Jason Day, who was already in by virtue of his third-place finish here last year — he also was a runner-up in 2011 — said his injured thumb is much better now, which makes him a real threat.
“Going back last year after Scotty won, it was very inspiring for a lot of (Australian) golfers on the Tour to kind of kick their game up another level,” Day said.
There are challenges up and down Thursday’s list of tee times to Scott’s noble quest to keep the green jacket in his hanging bag. In his favor is the tradition of his own making, that of playing near the lead here on weekends.
You want tradition? Phil Scott will give you tradition, while showing where his son has come by his confidence.
“I hope we are developing a tradition that he wins here every Sunday,” Dad said.
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