AUGUSTA, Ga. – In most ways, Cameron Young feels the same. He still takes his family, including his three kids, to mass on Sunday mornings, even before final rounds on the PGA Tour. He still hangs with the same small group of friends on tour, and the rest of his peers don’t treat him any differently. Sure, he was asked to be among a select few Masters competitors invited into the interview room for a pre-tournament press conference, but he experiences no more discomfort in the spotlight than before.
The only difference now is the number next to his name: 3.
Young enters his fifth start at Augusta National ranked behind just two players in the world rankings, Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy. Before this recent skyrocket, Young hovered for a while in the high teens and low 20s, then dipped at the start of last year. He missed the cut at the Masters a year ago, but caught a spark at Oakmont, tying for fourth at the U.S Open, his sixth career major top-10. Then came his breakthrough win at Wyndham, followed by five straight finishes of 11th or better, his strong Ryder Cup debut, then most recently, a validating triumph at The Players Championship, which has Young on a very short list to not just win a green jacket this week but every time he tees it up.
With Scheffler recently welcoming his second child and looking to rediscover the total ball-striking that for years was significantly better than anyone else and McIlroy coming off a minor back issue and now faced with a few extra tasks bestowed upon past Masters champions, one could argue that Young is the most logical favorite heading into Thursday’s opening round.
“If anything, it’s where I feel like I want to be within the game of golf and where I feel like I can be,” Young said.
Young is a spitting image of his dad, David, a PGA master pro and his son’s instructor. He’s prone to not say a whole lot, though in the right setting, like Tuesday morning, he can produce some surprising depth. The Masters is a bucket-list moment, even for the world’s best, but as Young contends, “It’s just another week.”
“My attitude generally has been, 51 weeks of the year, it’s the Masters and it’s Augusta National, and this week it’s my job,” Young said. “I’m going to do what I feel is best for me to prepare for Thursday.”
Since last year’s Masters, Young’s iron play has been noticeably more consistent. He’s studied more about how wind affects approach shots, and it’s no wonder he arrives this week ranking second on Tour in proximity to the hole. The power, of course, is still there, and with Augusta National expected to play firm and fast, Young could give himself even shorter clubs into the par-4s and -5s.
Most competitors will tell you that Augusta National is a second-shot golf course. Young believes that the driver sets up those potential rewards. Absolute precision isn’t required, Young says, but angles and finding good spots in the fairway are important.
“It’s really a matter of, for me, being in a place where I feel like I can make a good free movement of the golf ball,” Young said. “If my swing feels like that mechanically, that’s where I’m going to hit a lot of shots really out of the middle of the face.”
That breeds confidence, which Young possesses in spades. He always has; it’s just all those close calls never went his way until the last few months. Young did admit that the Ryder Cup was a big step.
“There’s no real greater pressure or sense of gravity of a situation than you get at a Ryder Cup,” Young said. “It’s kind of unlike anything I’ve felt before in a sense. I don’t feel that physically I respond to the pressure any differently, but it’s really good practice being in that moment because there’s just more of it. You might be nervous on Sunday at a major coming down the back nine, but it’s rare that you’re just at full nervousness from the first tee shot. So, I think it’s good preparation in that sense. You learn to deal with pressure right off the bat, and it kind of doesn’t go away throughout the whole day. So, you do feel like it’s just constant preparation for being near the lead at The Players or in a major.”
He put that to the test at TPC Sawgrass and proved himself on one of the game’s biggest stages.
Now, it’s his turn to handle the Masters as one of the guys to beat – and maybe come Sunday afternoon, the name that everyone is chasing.