Golf Books #120 (The Magnificent Masters: Jack Nicklaus, Johnny Miller, Tom Weiskopf, and the 1975 Cliffhanger at Augusta)

Long before any of the players actually hit a golf ball, the 1975 Masters Tournament was destined for the record books when Lee Elder became the first African-American ever invited to the exclusive Augusta club’s tourney.

He was among the veritable Hall of Fame-list of competitors that week: Arnold Palmer, Tom Watson, Gary Player, Lee Trevino, Hale Irwin, Billy Casper, and Sam Snead. But Elder, rattled by the media attention, missed the cut.

By the weekend, this would be overshadowed, however, by a showdown of the game’s three heavyweights: Jack Nicklaus, Johnny Miller, and Tom Weiskopf. Their back-and-forth battle would rivet the golfing world and dramatically culminate in one of the greatest finishes in Masters’ history.

Gil Capps, a twenty-two-year veteran of the golf industry with NBC Sports and the Golf Channel, recaptures, hole-by-hole, the thrilling drama of this singular event from golf’s golden era, from the media-crazed build-up to the tournament’s final dramatic putt that would change the game of golf forever.

Publication Date: March, 25, 2014 (source)

About the Author

Gil Capps is an Emmy-award winning associate producer with NBC Sports. He has been around the game of golf his entire adult life and has worked at the Masters every year since 2003. He lives in North Carolina.