Seve Ballesteros is always present in one way or another at the Masters of Augusta. This year with much more reason as Jon Rahm is the defending champion. The Cantabrian is an absolute reference for the player from Barrika. In addition, it is worth remembering that his victory last year occurred on the same day as Seve’s birthday and also coincided with this year’s champions dinner. The connection is of 100,000 volts.
Rahm remembered Seve in a very special way in his speech, making it clear once again that without his figure and what he meant and transcended in Spain, he would not be where he is right now. The reference to Seve served for other Masters champions to share with the rest of the diners some anecdotes of the genius of Pedreña. The best, without any doubt, was told by Bernhard Langer.
The German, one of the great absentees from this edition of the Masters due to an Achilles heel fracture, travelled back in time to the Ryder Cup at Valderrama in 1997. Hole 18. Par 4. He was playing the foursome with Colin Montgomerie. The Scot hit the narrow and always very complicated exit. He ended up on the right, badly placed, covered by trees and without a direct line to the green.
Langer arrived at the ball and began to study his options. The first thing he saw was a very low cork tree branch that prevented him from having a direct line to the flag. He was determined to take it out to the street. In the middle of the preparation process for the shot, Seve Ballesteros, captain of Europe, appears like a gust in his buggy, gets off on the move and says to Langer: “Bernhard, the shot you have to make is this: take the iron 1, hit it under the cork tree branch and make a slice of about 50 meters. That way you leave it on the green”. Basically, a madness at the height of a golf genius like Severiano.
The German listened to him between astonished and stupefied. He barely changed his expression and replied: “Seve, I’m sorry, but I don’t have that shot”.
With the Seve option discarded, Langer agreed with Monty to make a lay up, a placement shot to the street. He left it at 100 meters, as the Scot asked him. Montgomerie’s third shot was very good, four meters from the flag. Langer putted and saved the par. Meanwhile, the Americans, who were putting for birdie, signed three putts and lost the hole and the match.
The anecdote is fantastic, it defines Seve, but the resolution of it is even better. Langer closed the story by assuring that he did not remember who formed the American couple. Immediately afterwards, Mark O’Meara and Tiger Woods, also present at the dinner, timidly raised their hand and said that they were the victims. You can imagine it: general laughter all over the table…
However, this magnificent story still had one last twist. Tiger and O’Meara were betrayed by memory. They were not the ones defeated in that match, but Lee Janzen and Jim Furyk, who fell 1 down on hole 18 on the second day of that Ryder Cup. Tiger and O’Meara faced Langer and Monty on the first day in foursomes, but fell by 5 and 3. Something sounded familiar to them, but they were not the protagonists of that iron 1 that history missed.
What history did not miss was the extraordinary wood 3 that Seve hit in his singles match of the 1983 Ryder Cup at the PGA National and that Bernhard Langer also remembered. Ballesteros played against Fuzzy Zoeller and risked it from a street trap to sign the par, tie the hole and save half a point. Langer was one of the few who saw that shot live (there was no television) because he had already won his match against Gil Morgan and had time to get to the 18. Jack Nicklaus, captain of the United States in that Ryder Cup, assures that that wood 3 of Seve is one of the best shots he has seen in his career.
