Pencil Wreck

Destined to be remembered for his Masters scorecard blunder, Roberto De Vicenzo deserves so much more.

- John Garrity

“All that I lose at the Masters is the green jacket,” Roberto De Vicenzo once said. “The prestige, no. My name is in the Masters forever.”

Which is not to say that the hurt ever went away. Almost a half-century later, at his home outside Buenos Aires, De Vicenzo’s thoughts still stray to that Sunday in 1968 when he absentmindedly signed for a final-round score a stroke higher than he had actually shot, handing the title to Bob Goal by.

All my life, if I make a mistake on the golf course, the next day I forget. I have a chance to recover.Thismistake,no chance to recover.

He knows that no other golfer—no other athlete—ever signed away a hunk of his legacy as easily as you’d endorse a check. And with a pencil! Where, outside the ancient game, is such a signature binding?

The ending is legal, but there is something missing. The winner hasn’t yet emerged.

De Vicenzo is 93. It was his birthday on that Masters Sunday in 1968. His 45th.

When he holed a 9-iron for a deuce on Augusta National’s par-4 first hole, the gallery sang “Happy Birthday.” They sang it again at the end of his round, a stunning 65 that ranks among the greatest finishes in the history of major championships. But Roberto wasn’t happy. He had hooked his 4-iron left of the green on No. 18 and then missed a six-footer for par. There might have to be an 18-hole Monday playoff.

When Bob Goal by and I meet in heaven, we are going to end this duel left unfinished on Earth.