1980 Masters Tournament

1980 Masters Tournament
Tournament information
Dates April 10–13, 1980
Location Augusta, Georgia
33.503°N 82.020°W / 33.503; -82.020
Course(s) Augusta National Golf Club
Organized by Augusta National Golf Club
Tour(s) PGA Tour
Statistics
Par 72
Length 7,040 yards (6,437 m)
Field 91 players, 52 after cut
Cut 146 (+2)
Prize fund $359,949
Winner's share $55,000
Champion
Seve Ballesteros
275 (−13)
Location Map
Augusta National is located in the United States
Augusta National
Augusta National
Location in the United States
Augusta National is located in Georgia
Augusta National
Augusta National
Location in Georgia

The 1980 Masters Tournament was the 44th Masters Tournament, held April 10–13 at Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Georgia.

Seve Ballesteros, age 23, won his first Masters and second major championship title, four strokes ahead of runners-up Jack Newton and Gibby Gilbert. Ballesteros had a seven stroke lead after 54 holes and extended it to ten strokes after the front nine of the final round at 16-under-par, eyeing the Masters record of 271 (−17) set by Jack Nicklaus in 1965 (and equaled by Raymond Floyd in 1976). A new record (of 270 or lower) was to be rewarded with a $50,000 bonus from Golf magazine. An hour later, after he found the water at 12 and 13 at Amen Corner, the lead had been reduced to three. Ballesteros regrouped with a birdie at 15 and parred the rest to shoot even-par 72 for the round and held on for the victory.

Well back in the field on Sunday, Nicklaus, age 40, was paired with Arnold Palmer, age 50, which drew large galleries. Palmer shot 69 to finish at even par and T24, Nicklaus had 73 to finish at 291 (+3) and T33. It was their first pairing at Augusta in five years and the first time Palmer had finished higher than Nicklaus there since 1967. Nicklaus regrouped and won two majors in 1980, the U.S. Open and the PGA Championship and was the runner-up the following April.

Ballesteros, of Spain, was the first winner of the Masters from Europe, and won a second green jacket in 1983.

This was the final Masters with Bermuda and ryegrass greens, which were replaced with bentgrass following this tournament.

Field

1. Masters champions

Tommy Aaron, George Archer, Gay Brewer, Billy Casper, Charles Coody, Raymond Floyd (8,11), Doug Ford, Bob Goalby, Jack Nicklaus (3,4,8,9), Arnold Palmer, Gary Player (8,9), Sam Snead, Art Wall Jr., Tom Watson (3,8,11), Fuzzy Zoeller (8,12)

The following categories only apply to Americans
2. U.S. Open champions (last five years)

Lou Graham (8,11), Hubert Green (8,11,12), Hale Irwin (8,9,12), Andy North (8,9), Jerry Pate (9,10)

3. The Open champions (last five years)

Johnny Miller (11)

4. PGA champions (last five years)

John Mahaffey (12), Dave Stockton, Lanny Wadkins (8,12)

5. 1979 U.S. Amateur semi-finalists

Cecil Ingram III (a), Mark O'Meara (6,a), Joey Rassett (a)

  • John Cook (6) forfeited his exemption by turning professional.
6. Previous two U.S. Amateur and Amateur champions

Jay Sigel (7,a)

7. Members of the 1979 U.S. Walker Cup team

Doug Clarke (a), Doug Fischesser (a), Mike Gove (a), Jim Holtgrieve (a), Griff Moody (a), Hal Sutton (a), Marty West (a)

  • Scott Hoch and Mike Peck forfeited their exemptions by turning professional.
8. Top 24 players and ties from the 1979 Masters Tournament

Miller Barber, Bobby Clampett (a), Lee Elder (9,12), Joe Inman, Tom Kite (12), Billy Kratzert, Bruce Lietzke, Gene Littler, Artie McNickle, Jim Simons (9), J. C. Snead, Ed Sneed (9), Craig Stadler (11), Leonard Thompson, Lee Trevino (11,12)

9. Top 16 players and ties from the 1979 U.S. Open

Ben Crenshaw (10,11), Keith Fergus, Bob Gilder, Larry Nelson (11,12), Calvin Peete (11), Tom Purtzer, Bill Rogers, Tom Weiskopf

10. Top eight players and ties from 1979 PGA Championship

Rex Caldwell, Gibby Gilbert, Jay Haas, Don January, Ron Streck, Howard Twitty (11)

11. Winners of PGA Tour events since the previous Masters

Andy Bean (12), George Burns, Jim Colbert, Dave Eichelberger, Ed Fiori, John Fought, Al Geiberger, Lon Hinkle, Wayne Levi, Jerry McGee, Jeff Mitchell, Gil Morgan (12), Jack Renner, Chi-Chi Rodríguez, Curtis Strange, Doug Tewell, D. A. Weibring

12. Members of the U.S. 1979 Ryder Cup team

Mark Hayes

13. Foreign invitations

Isao Aoki, Seve Ballesteros (3,8), David Graham (4,9,10), Mark James, Sandy Lyle, Graham Marsh (9), Peter McEvoy (6,a), Tōru Nakamura, Jack Newton (8)

  • Numbers in brackets indicate categories that the player would have qualified under had they been American.

Round summaries

First round

Thursday, April 10, 1980

Place Player Score To par
T1 Seve Ballesteros 66 −6
David Graham
Jeff Mitchell
T4 Hubert Green 68 −4
Jack Newton
T6 Tom Kite 69 −3
Larry Nelson
T8 Gibby Gilbert 70 −2
Artie McNickle
Andy North
Jim Simons
Ed Sneed

Source:

Second round

Friday, April 11, 1980

Place Player Score To par
1 Seve Ballesteros 66-69=135 −9
T2 Rex Caldwell 73-66=139 −5
David Graham 66-73=139
T4 Tom Kite 69-71=140 −4
Jerry Pate 72-68=140
Jim Simons 70-70=140
Ed Sneed 70-70=140
Doug Tewell 71-69=140
T9 Ed Fiori 71-70=141 −3
Jeff Mitchell 66-75=141
Larry Nelson 69-72=141

Source:

Third round

Saturday, April 12, 1980

Place Player Score To par
1 Seve Ballesteros 66-69-68=203 −13
2 Ed Fiori 71-70-69=210 −6
T3 David Graham 66-73-72=211 −5
Jack Newton 68-74-69=211
Andy North 70-72-69=211
J. C. Snead 73-69-69=211
T7 Rex Caldwell 73-66-73=212 −4
Jim Colbert 72-70-70=212
Gibby Gilbert 70-74-68=212
Jim Simons 70-70-72=212
Fuzzy Zoeller 72-70-70=212

Source:

Final round

Sunday, April 13, 1980

Final leaderboard

Champion
Silver Cup winner (low amateur)
(a) = amateur
(c) = past champion
Top 10
Place Player Score To par Money (US$)
1 Seve Ballesteros 66-69-68-72=275 −13 55,000
T2 Gibby Gilbert 70-74-68-67=279 −9 30,500
Jack Newton 68-74-69-68=279
4 Hubert Green 68-74-71-67=280 −8 15,750
5 David Graham 66-73-72-70=281 −7 13,200
T6 Ben Crenshaw 76-70-68-69=283 −5 9,958
Ed Fiori 71-70-69-73=283
Tom Kite 69-71-74-69=283
Larry Nelson 69-72-73-69=283
Jerry Pate 72-68-76-67=283
Gary Player (c) 71-71-71-70=283

Sources:

Scorecard

Final round

Hole   1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9    10   11   12   13   14  15 16 17 18
Par 4 5 4 3 4 3 4 5 4 4 4 3 5 4 5 3 4 4
Ballesteros −14 −14 −15 −15 −16 −16 −16 −16 −16 −15 −15 −13 −12 −12 −13 −13 −13 −13
Gilbert −4 −4 −4 −5 −5 −6 −6 −6 −6 −6 −6 −6 −7 −8 −9 −10 −10 −9
Newton −5 −6 −6 −6 −6 −7 −6 −7 −6 −6 −7 −8 −9 −9 −9 −9 −9 −9
Green −3 −4 −5 −5 −5 −5 −5 −6 −6 −5 −5 −4 −5 −5 −7 −7 −8 −8
Graham −5 −5 −5 −5 −5 −5 −5 −5 −4 −4 −4 −5 −6 −6 −7 −7 −7 −7
Flori −6 −6 −6 −6 −6 −5 −5 −5 −5 −5 −6 −5 −5 −5 −5 −5 −5 −5
Snead −5 −6 −5 −5 −4 −4 −4 −4 −4 −4 −4 −4 −4 −4 −4 −3 −3 −3
North −4 −1 −1 −1 −1 −1 −1 −1 +1 +1 +1 +1 +1 E −1 −1 −1 E

Cumulative tournament scores, relative to par

Eagle Birdie Bogey Double bogey Triple bogey +