Jordan Spieth has risked the wrath of Augusta National by breaking the omerta around the scourge of ‘mud balls’ at the Masters.
While the course makes for a pristine visual, the quirk of the grass being mowed in the direction of the tee boxes often causes balls to dig in and become coated in mud.
Spieth carded a third-round 69 to reach one under par, but felt shortchanged by the situation and opted to take the rare step of speaking out.
He said: ‘My iron play killed me the last two days, and to be brutally honest with you, it was primarily mud balls. It’s just so frustrating because you can’t talk about them here. You’re not supposed to talk about them.
‘(But) mud balls can affect this tournament significantly, especially when you get them a lot on 11 and 13. They’re just daggers on those two holes. They’ve done a better job – there’s less than normal, but I still had them today on those holes and yesterday.
‘It’s something to pay attention to for sure for leader groups, because you just have to play so far away from trouble or lay up when you’d normally go for it, just random stuff, because it will affect it significantly.’
Jordan Spieth has risked the wrath of Augusta National by speaking out on Masters ‘mud balls’
The quirk of the grass being mowed in the direction of the tee boxes causes balls to dig in
The 2015 champion, who carded his first bogey-free round here since 2016, added: ‘Every person is having to deal with it, but the fact that you’re not supposed to talk about it is a bit frustrating because it is a difference maker.’
Elsewhere, 2007 winner Zach Johnson made a surprise bolt up the leaderboard after shooting a brilliant 66 on moving day.
Going out with the earlier starters after surviving to the weekend on the cut line, the 2023 US Ryder Cup captain recorded an eagle at the second and six birdies to storm his way north to four under par.
Given he has missed almost as many cuts as he has made on the PGA Tour in recent years, it was a surge out of left-field that hinted the later groups, including those of Justin Rose and Rory McIlroy, would find the conditions scoreable. With barely a breath of wind, a series of tucked pins were the course’s prime defense.
Johnson, who told patrons to ‘f*** off a year ago to the day after an implosion, was in a substantially better mood this time.
He said: ‘I don’t know if today is a flash, but today was, for lack of a better term, a stroll in the park. I didn’t feel like it was work. Man, I was in control.’
