Masters 2016: Leaderboard, live updates, scores from Thursday’s round at Augusta

No. 15 at Augusta National is usually a hole players attack and try to make up stroke on. That has not been the case during the first round on Thursday. That was really not the case for Angel Cabrera.

Cabrera opted to lay up on the Par 5, only to come up short with his third shot and find the pond in front of the green. Cabrera had to take a drop and then that’s when things got really messy. Cabrera is a very good player with a green jacket on his resume, but that doesn’t make him immune from a very ill-timed chunked shot.

Tom Watson first played the Masters in 1970 as an amateur. It was the first of many memorable marches for Watson at Augusta National. He missed the cut in his first attempt, but would later win two green jackets in the process of becoming one of the best golfers of all time.

This year, Watson is playing his final Masters, an event with a course that he says has “outgrown” his old-man game. No doubt, Watson has spent the week reflecting on history at Augusta National -- his favorite rounds, shots and people here.

Bubba Watson had a short tap-in putt. There was no way he was going to miss from two feet, right? The wind said otherwise.

That putt lacked a little pace to begin with and may not have dropped, but the wind made sure it didn’t. Watson looked like he’d just seen a ghost after the ball shot to the right like that.

There is attacking the pin, then there is what Jason Day is doing at the Masters right now. He’s so dialed in, he nearly holed out for an eagle TWICE on No. 9 with his approach shot just skipping past the hole before spinning back and nearly going in again.

Day had to settle for a tap-in birdie. That was good enough to post a ridiculous 31 on the front nine, the best opening nine score he’s ever posted at the Masters. Day is still charging and now is just one shot behind leader Jordan Spieth.

As the Masters get underway, Rory McIlroy is strolling the green wearing special golf shoes. Attentive viewers will see that McIlroy’s shoes bear a tribute to Kobe Bryant, who is just four games away from retiring. Notice the “4/13” on the side, which is the date he’ll play his final game against the Jazz.

It’s all part of a promotion from Nike celebrating Bryant’s career, and McIlroy is just the first athlete to start the tribute. In the lead-up to his final game other Nike-sponsored athletes all over the world will also wear a Kobe tribute, from Carli Lloyd and Sanya Richards-Ross to Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving. ESPN also reports April 13 will be the day Nike releases the “Black Mamba” version of the Kobe 11, which comes in slick black and gold colors.

Jordan Spieth picked up right where he left off at the Masters. A year after racing past the field to win his first green jacket, Spieth is back in the lead at Augusta National after posting a 6-under round of 66 to open the tournament.

Spieth was fully in the form that allowed him to win a pair of majors and rise to No. 1 in the world last year. He drove the ball well enough, striped a few approach shots into tight pins and was nails with the putter. The last trait was the key to the round as Spieth mastered the very tricky Augusta National greens in a way few players can. He grinded over a few putts, but rolled in putt after putt. That was especially big on a few lengthy par attempts. Spieth was dynamic from 15-25 feet last year and that strength was on display again. He knew it too, fist pumping after one tough par save and even kissing his putter after another.

This is hard to comprehend and quite sad. Ernie Els started his Masters by making a nine on the opening hole. Surely, he must have hit a wayward drive on one of the more difficult tee shots a pro will ever face? No, no he was in fine shape off the tee. Then his approach shot shanked somewhere off into the woods? Nope.

The most unbelievable part of Els’ nine on the scorecard is that he six-putted, and from around six feet according to The Masters’ shot tracker.

There were a few reasons to think Jordan Spieth might not be at his best at the 2016 Masters. He’s struggled some this year and hasn’t been in the top form he was last summer. On Wednesday he cracked his trusty driver of two years and had to add a last-minute replacement to the bag.

Then the first round started and Spieth immediately made those concerns look ridiculous.

Many experts have decided this is Rickie Folwer’s week to become a major champion. After the first hole, many of those same people might have been rethinking their pick. It was a disastrous start for Fowler who, while wearing high tops and joggers, hit his tee shot on No. 1 into the pine trees to the right of the fairway. Things got worse from there as Fowler clipped a tree in an attempt to recover and his ball settled near the trees on the opposite side of the fairway.

When it was all said and done, Fowler walked away from the first green with a double bogey. The Golf Channel was quick to point out, no player has ever won the Masters after double bogeying the first hole.

Lydia Ko had a day at Augusta National beyond even the imagination of the No. 1 woman golfer in the world.

After winning the season’s first major last month for her second straight major and going back-to-back in LPGA Tour events, the 18-year-old phenom said she was excited to head to Augusta to pick up her golf writers’ Player of the Year award.

No, Tiger Woods won’t be teeing it up in this year’s Masters. But if you’re suffering from Eldrick Withdrawal, you can still place a bet on the winner of four green jackets.

That’s right, friends. The over/under from the oddsmakers is 9.5 on how many times Jim Nantz and his announcing cohorts will mention Tiger during CBS’ coverage of the 2016 Masters. The o/u is 5 on the number of highlights from Woods’ sensational Augusta career the network will show over the weekend. ESPN will broadcast the first two rounds on Thursday and Friday.

Arnold Palmer took on the Masters tradition of honorary starter in 2007 and has been a fixture on the first tee on Thursday mornings ever since. In 2010, Jack Nicklaus joined him in the role and Gary Player, the third member of golf’s original “big three,” was added in 2012. All three were down there again this year, but this was the first time Palmer was not able to make a swing (he was asked about it last year and memorably responded “You’re damn right I will!”).

Palmer has had shoulder problems for awhile now and announced last month that he would not be making a swing. But he was still the star and his good friend and rival, Nicklaus, got emotional.

This is your reminder that Gary Player is the most fit 80-year-old man you know. Player continued his duty on Thursday morning as one of the honorary starters, joining Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer on the first tee at 8:05 a.m. ET. It’s just a quick shot, some waves and handshakes, and then he’s out of there. But since this is Gary Player, he had to show up 72 minutes before he was due on the first tee to warm up in the darkness for what is just a quick, non-competitive shot.

He’s going to outlive us all and do this for another 50 years.

The most popular golf tournament in the world tees off Thursday morning. And as usual, you”ll be able to watch an obscenely limited amount of it on television.

The Masters is known for its many traditions, almost as much as it is the golf, and one of the critical tenets it has always operated by is that television coverage shall be limited. Granted, there is a lot more coverage now than when this policy was initially put in place by club co-founder Clifford Roberts. But adjusted for inflation, the 4.5-hour broadcast on Thursday’s round is offensively limited compared to the other major championships that let their broadcast partners run the cameras all day.

The Masters is the only major championship where the viewing audience is so familiar with the course. We know many of these holes and we even know, or think we do, many of the greens and the impact of the hole locations. Here’s Thursday’s pin sheet for the first round.

A cold front moved through Georgia on Wednesday night and in its wake we could see a few lingering showers or thunderstorms in the morning but most if not all of the activity will be out by mid to late morning. Temperatures will be in the low 70s in the afternoon and winds will be on the breezy side. Winds will be out of the west between 10 to 20 mph and some gusts could be 25 to 30 mph. Detailed weather forecast for Thursday below.

All times ET:

The 2016 Masters begins on Thursday and while coverage from Augusta National still isn’t as widespread as many viewers probably wish, it is significantly increased this year, especially online. Television coverage still won’t begin until 3 p.m. ET, as is Masters tradition, but online streams will start earlier than ever.

No longer will the morning waves during the first two rounds be completely out of sight. The main expansion comes in the featured group streams. In previous years, featured group streams started at 12 p.m., well after many of the top players were already into, or even finishing, their rounds. Starting this year, the featured groups will cover more players and start when the players step to the first tee. That means close to an extra three hours of online coverage for viewers. It also means a massive reduction in the blackout times when top players would post great scores yet viewers were unable to watch any of the shots live.

In a field with Jordan Spieth, Rory McIlroy and Phil Mickelson, the name who has attracted the most attention early in Masters week is Bryson DeChambeau. He’s the heralded amateur from SMU who thinks he’s got a real shot not just to make the cut, but to win the green jacket. Once the NCAA sanctioned SMU, he spent almost all his time dedicated to this week’s amateur appearance at Augusta. He’s played 11 practice rounds, got in pro reps with different exemptions to PGA Tour and European Tour events, and studied every piece of Augusta history.

DeChambeau is an elite prospect. He’s in a class with names like Tiger Woods and Mickelson as players who have won the NCAA Championship and US Amateur in the same year. But more of the interest in DeChambeau centers around his extremely different approach to the game. He’s a physics wiz who rattles of terms and concepts that lose about 90 percent of the golf press listening. And part of his different, “Golfing Machine”-based approach is using irons that are all the same length. They’re all about as long as his 7-iron, whether it’s his pitching wedge or 3-iron. No one does this. DeChambeau says he tried it out because he wanted to make every swing on the same plane. He also believes it will make him more comfortable and be easier on his back.

I don’t want to speak for the rest of the golf staff here, but I am going to go ahead and call myself the gambling expert of the group. And by expert, I mean I’ve lost a bunch of money betting on sports. That said, this is a great week for my fellow degenerates. Picking a winner is something that everyone can do, but let’s dive into some prop bets. These hypotheticals can be interesting and a good way to make some quick cash if you choose right. Here are my favorites:

Will there be a wire-to-wire winner? (Yes +685, No -1215)

Unlike almost every other golf tournament, the Masters is a full week-long celebration. The tournament is four days, but there are earlier events and traditions that provoke more interest than many competitive rounds at other golf tournaments. There’s a Champions Dinner, a par-3 contest, and a revolving door of media center appearances that sometimes provide contentious drama. Whether you find it treacly and interminable or not, the hype and obligations around the pre-tournament days are unique to the Masters. It’s a full week from Monday morning through Sunday night’s green jacket presentation.

The mania around this year’s run-up to the first tee shot will be a little toned down compared with last year. At the 2015 Masters, we had the reappearance of Tiger Woods, who had gone into hiding for a couple months to figure out if he could still chip a golf ball. With how ugly it looked in the first couple months of 2015, it seemed unlikely that Tiger would play the season’s first major, where chipping off of tightly mown grass can expose any yips or flaw you might be fighting.