Surprise Winners of The Masters

While there are four golf majors, the Masters is arguably the pinnacle of the sport. But the fact that every player wants to win it in their respective careers means that Augusta National carries an unprecedented weight that many can never master. 

In more recent years, we have seen the big names earn Green Jackets, including Rory McIlroy, Jon Rahm, and two for Scottie Scheffler. Sports betting markets often reflect those expectations, with the same familiar names dominating the top of the market each spring. 

But it’s not always the case that the world’s best exit the hallowed grounds via the picturesque Magnolia Lane with a new item for their wardrobe. Here are some of the recent players who have caused a shock at the Masters.

2011: Charl Schwartzel

The 2011 Masters is remembered as much for what went wrong as for what went right. McIlroy entered the final round with a four-shot lead, looking every inch a first-time major champion in waiting. What followed on the back nine was one of the great collapses in Augusta history: a triple bogey on the 10th, a bogey on the 11th, and a four-putt double bogey on the 12th that sent McIlroy spiralling to a closing 80. 

Into the vacuum stepped Charl Schwartzel, then ranked 29th in the world, who had gone largely unnoticed until he delivered one of the most audacious finishes in the tournament’s history. The South African birdied the final four holes of his round, a feat that had never been achieved by a Masters winner in the tournament’s 75-year history, to close with a 66 and win by two shots from Adam Scott and Jason Day.

2016: Danny Willett

If McIlroy’s 2011 implosion set the template for Augusta heartbreak, Jordan Spieth’s 2016 final round wrote a new chapter. The defending champion had birdied four consecutive holes to end the front nine and appeared to be sleepwalking to a second successive Green Jacket, leading by five shots as he stood on the 10th tee. 

What followed was almost incomprehensible. Back-to-back bogeys gave way to a quadruple-bogey seven on the par-three 12th, where Spieth put two balls into the water. Five shots became a three-shot deficit in a matter of minutes. 

Danny Willett, playing ahead of Spieth and ranked outside the world’s top 10, had already posted a bogey-free 67 in the clubhouse. The Yorkshireman, who had only committed to playing after his wife gave birth to their first child earlier that week, became the first English Masters champion in 20 years.

2017: Sergio Garcia

For most of his career, Sergio Garcia had been golf’s nearly man. Genuinely one of the most talented ball-strikers of his generation, the Spaniard had accumulated more top-10 finishes in majors than almost anyone without winning one, and had made no secret of his frustration. 

At Augusta in 2017, he entered the final round alongside Justin Rose, and the two played out one of the great head-to-head duels in recent Masters history. Garcia built a three-shot lead before Rose reeled off three straight birdies to take control, only for the Spaniard to respond with a clutch par save at 13 and a stunning eagle at 15 to level things up. 

Both missed winning putts on the 18th in regulation, forcing a playoff. When Rose drove into the trees on the first extra hole, Garcia converted the birdie to win his first major at the 74th attempt, becoming the third Spaniard to win a Green Jacket on what would have been the 60th birthday of Seve Ballesteros.

2019: Tiger Woods

Considering this was his fifth Masters success, it still came as a profound shock given the context of his comeback. Woods had undergone multiple back surgeries and at various points seemed destined never to compete seriously again, let alone contend at Augusta. 

Yet in 2019, at the age of 43, he produced one of the great sporting comebacks of the modern era, playing his way into the final round before making the decisive moves on holes 13 through 16 to emerge as champion by one stroke. 

For those looking for sports tips ahead of that tournament, Woods had been priced as a genuine contender for the first time in years, but even his most ardent supporters could scarcely have believed what unfolded on that remarkable Sunday in Georgia.

2021: Hideki Matsuyama

Hideki Matsuyama’s victory in 2021 was historic on multiple levels. The Japanese golfer became the first player from his country to win a men’s major championship, a moment of enormous cultural significance that prompted congratulations from Japan’s prime minister and had his nation watching in the early hours of the morning. 

Matsuyama entered Sunday with a four-shot lead and ground out a one-over 73 under intense pressure, keeping his challengers at arm’s length. Xander Schauffele made a run of four consecutive birdies to close the gap, but then found the water on the par-three 16th to all but end his challenge. 

When Matsuyama’s caddie, Shota Hayafuji, turned to bow respectfully to Augusta National after removing the flagstick on the 18th green, it became one of the defining images of a genuinely historic week.