The Long Fall From Grace

If you watched the Masters on Sunday, you then saw the double-headed nature that is the game of golf.

The reemergence of a Tiger, as he stroked his way from seven shots back to a temporary share of the lead, only to finish tied for fourth; an almost no-named winner in Charl Schwartzel, a man who, by American standards, is missing two letters in his first name; and a 21-year-old phenom, Rory McIlroy, who made the hard, bone-breaking fall from sole possession of first to a tie for 15th, a more than $1.3 million slide and 10 strokes off Schwartzel's winning mark.

McIlroy, the fair-skinned, messy-haired Irishman, shot a brutal 8-over-par, 80 on the day – 43 of those strokes coming on the back nine alone. Golf had carried him to new heights for 63 holes, and the remaining nine swallowed him and passed him like a beer fart in the wind.

It was undoubtedly painful to watch his struggles on the final nine: the seven on the par-4 10th hole as he found spots on the course that commentators said no golfer has been before, the bogey that followed, and the double on the par-3 12th. The shots weren't there and the putts refused to fall.

On his drive on the par-5 13th, McIlroy's drive found the running water in Rae's Creek. His face sank into his arms that rested on his driver. During the fall, he looked frustrated, disgusted, confused and sad. It was the moment he went on to say that he knew he had lost it.

Having been a golfer all my life, my stomach turned watching McIlroy tank. It's not easy holding the lead of a golf tournament. The game becomes more mental than physical. You begin to doubt yourself, second guessing every decision than trust your instincts, your natural ability to play the game. That five-foot putt that seems routine, now looks 20-feet with a double break; the trouble on the left as you step on the tee box becomes even more daunting; and the pressure to string together a few good holes is expounded enormously. And it's the ability to ignore those factors that separate the legends from just being good.

But there was also a beauty in his fall from the top. Through his missed putts, his wayward drives, before our very eyes was the young McIlroy making the next step in his transition to greatness, learning the true meaning of what it is to be a champion: To be one of the best, you have to see and feel the worst.

One day his inexperience will disappear, his nerves will subside, and the mental strength that he so lacked Sunday will prevail. He proved that with brief words walking off the 18th hole.

"It was a character building day, put it that way," he said in his thick Irish accent. "I'll come out stronger for it."

The words spoken of a true champion.