I’ve worked out who is going to win the 2024 Masters

Who will be slipping on a Green Jacket come Sunday night at the 2024 Masters Tournament?

I pored through the Augusta history books and latest tour statistics to identify what previous Masters winners have in common and who’s ticking the key boxes this year…

The debate about who will slip on the Green Jacket is always one of the biggest Masters talking points as we count down the days to the honorary starters getting the tournament underway.

To work out who defending champion Jon Rahm will be helping into the famous jacket come Sunday night, I’ve trawled through Augusta’s archives, listened to the experts, and picked apart hundreds of stats to narrow down the field and identify who has the right credentials to triumph at the 2024 Masters.

Do you have any past experience?

No matter how many times you’ve watched the Masters on TV or played it on the PlayStation and think you know the course inside out, very few people crack the Augusta code on their first visit.

The slopes are a little bit steeper than on TV, the greens a little bit faster, and the entire experience makes them a little more light-headed than they expected.

Not only do first-timers have next to no chance – a debutant hasn’t won since Fuzzy Zoeller in 1979 – history suggests you need to come fairly close at Augusta at least once before you get over the line. Nine of the last 10 winners had already registered a top-22 finish at the Masters, with Danny Willett (previous best: T38) the only exception.

Can Jon Rahm win back-to-back Masters?

What’s harder than winning the Masters? Doing it two years in a row.

Only three men have ever managed it. They are Jack Nicklaus (1965-66), Nick Faldo (1989-90) and Tiger Woods (2001-02). The first and last of that trio are the sport’s two greatest-ever players and the middle man was arguably the most singled-minded in history (he’s also alone in defending his first Green Jacket).

Is it because returning a Green Jacket to Augusta requires all kinds of supplementary hoopla, not least schmoozing with the greats of the game and feeding them a Champion’s Dinner? Who knows? But, intriguingly, no less than seven Masters first-time winners went on to win again two years later, perhaps because the good vibes remained, but they were less distracted by all the formalities.

Do world rankings matter?

Historically, yes, given the last 10 Masters winners were all ranked inside the top 25 going into the tournament and only two winners this century came from outside the world’s top 50. The average world ranking of the last 10 winners is 10.5, suggesting we shouldn’t look too far down the pile to pick a likely winner.

Of course, there is the question of whether the world rankings actually provide an accurate reflection of who really is at the top of the game anymore.

The Official World Golf Ranking’s refusal to grant LIV Golf events any ranking points has seen the likes of Cam Smith plummet from world number two to 54^th since switching allegiance, while Dustin Johnson is now officially the 284^th best golfer in the world, which seems unlikely.

Until a solution is reached, the ‘Data Golf Rankings’ (datagolf.com) might provide a more accurate picture. They are determined by averaging the field-strength adjusted scores of each golfer across professional and amateur tournaments, with more recent rounds receiving more weight. Not dissimilar to the OWGR, then, but including LIV events.

Their top 25 only includes three LIV players – Jon Rahm, Tyrrell Hatton, and Joaquin Niemann – two of whom are in the OWGR top 25 anyway, having only recently joined LIV, so we can still rely on world rankings as pertinent – at least for now.

Does form matter?

The Masters appears to be an event where winners capitalize on good form, rather than capturing it. Nine of the last 11 champions had recorded a win in their previous six tour starts, and the two exceptions had a recent runner-up finish, so they were ticking along nicely too.

It also pays to have recent experience of being in the heat of Major battle. Eight of the last 10 Masters winners registered a top-12 finish in a Major during the year before their Augusta success.

What are the key attributes to win the Masters?

What is the recipe for a golfer built to conquer Augusta?

Augusta favors big hitters

Augusta is one of the longest courses on tour and plays longer than its yardage as the fairways are mown towards the tee boxes to minimize roll. That, combined with the width of the fairways, lack of thick rough or water hazards to worry about on tee shots, and generous recovery options from the manicured pine straw, make Augusta a bomber’s paradise.

Fourteen of the last 15 winners ranked inside the top 50 for Driving Distance in the season leading up to their win.

Wedge wizardry

Augusta’s greens are so hard to hit and hold that only 61 percent are found in regulation, which puts lots of pressure on the short game. The last 11 winners were all gaining at least 0.25 strokes per round around the green in the lead-up to the Masters.

Iron it out

Even if your short game is firing, you can’t afford to rely on it too often. Approach play reigns supreme at Augusta, which is famed as a second-shot course. Over the past nine Masters, the winner has finished 1st, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 1st, 5th, 4th, 6th and 6th in Strokes Gained: Approach.

That’s good news for Scheffler, Xander Schauffele, and Collin Morikawa, who have ranked inside the top 10 for Strokes Gained: Approach over the last two seasons on the PGA Tour.

‘Drive for show, putt for dough’ is a myth

Everyone knows that Augusta boasts the toughest putting surfaces in golf, so it’s the best putters in the world who come out on top, right? Actually, no.

Forget what you’ve been told. It’s not always the most consistent putters who rise to the top. The expert view is that Augusta’s greens are so devilish they actually serve as a leveler.

“Severely sloped greens with speed are a great equalizer of putting skill,” says former caddie Brian Mull. The facts back up his theory. Fifteen of the last 16 winners sat outside the top 35 for Strokes Gained: Putting in the season leading up to their win, with an average ranking of 97th!

Who will win The Masters? Our picks

Who is the smart money on? These five men tick the boxes of a recent win, a previous Masters top-18, and being in the mix during a Major last year. But we’d only back two of them…

Scottie Scheffler (our top pick)

Driving distance: 310 yds (31st)
SG: Around-the-Green: 0.4 (5th)
SG: Approach: 1.19 (1st)

If Scheffler’s putter works, he wins. The 27-year-old is the best golfer on the planet right now.

Yes, his putting stats have been a concern, but a putter switch helped him to a dominant win at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, and Augusta tends to reward those who scramble well and hit their targets. Scheffler excels at both and is a proven performer at the Masters, having never finished outside the top 20 in three starts.

Seven first-time winners have repeated the feat again two years later – a further tick against the 2022 champion’s name.

Rory McIlroy

Driving distance: 326 yds (1st)
SG: Around-the-Green: 0.3 (14th)
SG: Approach: 0.721 (8th)

Every year we do these Masters previews, every year Rory McIlroy crops up as one of the standout contenders, and every year he finds a way not to win it. It’s unfortunately become a question of if, not when, the Northern Irishman completes the career grand slam.

He’s in good form, with a win at the Dubai Desert Classic and another snatched out of his hands at the Dubai Invitational, although his recent Masters record is a curate’s egg. He’s finished in the top five in two of the last four, but missed the cut in the others. 2022’s T2 was his best-ever finish at Augusta, but he was never genuinely in contention.

25 of the last 26 winners made the cut at the Masters the year before they won, which isn’t a good omen.

Viktor Hovland

Driving distance: 308 yds (44th)
SG: Around-the-Green: 0.06 (86th)
SG: Approach: 0.61 (11th)

The Norwegian has had a quiet start to 2024 after winning three times last summer, with a T22, T58, T19, and T36 in his four starts so far.

He recorded his best Masters finish last year, tying for 7^th, helped largely by a marked improvement in what had historically been the only weakness in his game. “I suck at chipping,” he famously remarked. And he was right. In his early years on tour he ranked near the bottom for Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green. Last season he seemed to have solved those issues, ranking around the middle of the pack, but this year he’s back to losing 0.445 strokes per round in short game, which won’t cut it at Augusta.

Tom Kim

Driving distance: 298 yds (121st)
SG: Around-the-Green: 0.05 (93rd)
SG: Approach: 0.66 (10th)

Kim is an elite iron player, which helped him to a top-16 finish in his Masters debut last year, but the stats suggest he lacks the power off the tee to keep up with the big hitters, or the short game to compensate for having to hit longer clubs in.

He has three PGA Tour wins already and finished T8 at the US Open and T2 at The Open last year, proving this is a young man capable of performing on the biggest stages in golf.

But the fact 18 of the last 21 winners were aged 27 or older, while 20 of the last 25 had played in at least three Masters before their win, suggest this year may be too soon for a 21-year-old making just his second appearance. 

Joaquin Niemann (our outsider pick)

Driving distance: 309 yds (34th on PGA Tour in 2022) / 306 yds (2nd on LIV)
SG: Around-the-Green: 0.2 (35th in 2022)
SG: Approach: 0.53 (19th in 2022)

Mr 59’ has continued his fine form since joining LIV, winning the first event in February to add to the Australian Open title he bagged in December.

He’s on an upwards trend at Augusta, having finished T40, T35, and T16 in his three appearances.

He’s been willing to travel the globe in a bid to gain entry into the Majors this year, securing top-five finishes in Dubai and Australia. We fancy the Chilean to make the most of what is currently his only guaranteed Major start.

Masters 2024 betting odds

All odds from bet365.com and correct at 12.30pm GMT on March 13.

READ MORE FROM THE MASTERS

– How you can play Augusta
– With anonymity guaranteed, the caddies reveal all about Augusta
– What does the Masters champion win?
– Inside Augusta National’s clubhouse

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About the author

Rob McGarr – Contributing Editor

Rob has been a writer and editor for over 15 years, covering all manner of subjects for leading magazines and websites.

He has previously been Features Editor of Today’s Golfer magazine and Digital Editor of todays-golfer.com, and held roles at FHM, Men’s Running, Golf World, and MAN Magazine.

You can follow him on YouTube where – depending on what day of the week it is – he’ll either be trying his best to get his handicap down to scratch or shoving his clubs in a cupboard, never to be seen again.

Rob is a member at Royal North Devon, England’s oldest golf course, where he plays off a three-handicap.