I hope the men in the Green Jackets are happy. The leader at The Masters after three rounds is two over par. Players who are six and seven shots over still have a chance to win.

It wasn’t much fun to watch. It was embarrassing for the players.

In fact, there were times I thought I was watching the US Open and not The Masters. Players were struggling to make par; they accepted a bogey as good enough. The course was punishing.

But that’s not what I want to see at the Masters. The US Open is about survival; the Masters is for swashbuckling. The US Open calls for patience and caution. The Masters calls for bold charges and gambling.

The two were as different as night and day, and that’s what made the two premier American golf majors so much fun. But after today, I’m not sure I could tell the difference between the two.

What the course needs is a good rainstorm tonight to soften it up and allow the players to take those gambling shots at tightly placed pins.

Fred Couples shot a four over 76 at the Masters on Friday, matching Gary Player’s 23 consecutive years of making the cut. Couples won the Masters in 1992.

On an Augusta Course that was taking down some of the best players in the world, Couples birdied the 13th, and then parred the last five holes to finish right on the line at eight over.

Player made his run of 23 Masters between 1959 and 1982. 

Starting in 2008, PGA Tour winners from the previous year will automatically get an invite to the Masters.

It’s an old idea, revived. PGA Tour winners were invited between 1972 and 2000. Then, the winners exemptions were repealed and replaced with players from the top 50 spots in the World Golf Rankings. That added an international flair to the tournament, but according to Augusta Chairman Billy Payne the tournament lost something in the exchange.

“I can remember innumerable times where winners of tournament events would be more excited to hear that they had automatically qualified for the Masters than to receive the first-prize money check,” Payne said. “So it was an exciting component of golf that really only the Masters could offer, and we all thought it appropriate that we bring it back.”

Winners of tournaments opposite the WGC events will not be invited, nor will winners of tournaments held after the PGA.

Invitations based on the previous year’s money list will be reduced from the top 40 to the top 30. The Masters has eliminated the invites for the top 10 players on the money list published the week before the tournament.

The final change grants exemptions to the 30 players who qualify for the previous year’s tour championship. The newly instituted FedEx Cup points system determines those spots.

I think it’s great for the Masters to return to the old system. But it’s not so good for THE CORPORATE SPONSOR OF THE WEEK. Now players getting a winner’s check will stand there, accept the CORPORATE SPONSOR OF THE WEEK trophy and check and say “I’m going to the Masters!”

Kind of puts it all in its place.

Few phrases in sports evoke as strong an image as “the Amen Corner.” Coined in 1958 by golf writer Herbert Warren Wind, it refers specifically to the second half of the 11th, the 12th, and the first half of the 13th holes at Augusta National, site of the Masters Tournament.

Wind, who was writing for Sports Illustrated, used the phrase to describe the scene of the critical action of the 1958 Masters, when Arnold Palmer earned his first major Championship.

Wind wrote:

On the afternoon before the start of the recent Masters golf tournament, a wonderfully evocative ceremony took place at the farthest reach of the Augusta National course —down in the Amen Corner where Rae’s Creek intersects the 13th fairway near the tee, then parallels the front edge of the green on the short 12th and finally swirls alongside the 11th green.

Wind later said that he was looking for a phrase like “coffin corner” in football, or baseball’s “hot corner”, but that all he could come up with was the title of the song, “Shouting At The Amen Corner,” by Milton (Mezz) Mezzrow.

I just heard on the Masters webcast that Vijay Singh will—for the first time—carry a hybrid at this year’s Masters.

Now, when TIGER starts carrying one ...