The Formula In Predicting the 2018 Masters Champion

The greatest 4 days in sports are almost here, as everyone who enjoys watching golf cannot wait to hear the melodious voice of Jim Nance utter: "Hello Friends." As before any sporting event, we fans try our best to predict a winner. When it comes to the unpredictability that is competition, we are usually far from correct. (Just see March Madness, and my pick of Virginia to win it all this year)

I am taking my crack at predicting the 2018 Masters Champion, through numbers, recent form, a little intuition and the old eyeball test. I'll perform this exercise by ruling players out, until we get down to few golfers that will then take a little more finessing. Here we go!

To begin the process of elimination, I gathered information on the previous 10 green jacket recipients at Augusta. The first bar that I ran the field through was their World Golf Ranking. Of the previous 10 winners, only one was ranked outside the top 30, (Angel Cabrera - 69), and 7 out of the 10 were ranked in the top 16. To me this stat suggests that to win at Augusta, you've played well over an extended period of time around the world, and should be somewhat experienced in playing on a large stage. Both Trevor Immelman and Charl Scwartzel were ranked 29th in the world when they won their green jackets, so I'm moving forward with the fact that 7 out of 10 past winners were ranked 16th or higher, and that being the first eliminator. Below are the current top 16 players in the World Golf Rankings, with the 2018 Masters winner (hopefully) being among them.

With Koepka being out with an injury, we are then down to 15. The next eliminating factor I chose was looking at each players' past 5 tournaments, coupled with their past 5 tournaments at the Masters. In looking at the past 10 winners, 7 out of the 10 champions had recorded a top 10 finish within their last 5 tournaments, as well as a top 10 in their last 5 outings at Augusta. This combines recent form, with knowledge and a track record at the Masters. Of the 15 players that remain in this drill, 6 were eliminated, several of which are heavy favorites. The players eliminated are Thomas, Rahm, Fowler, Fleetwood, Noren, and Stenson. Fowler has failed to record a top 10 in his last 5 outings, whereas the other five, have not scored a top 10 at any of their last 5 Masters appearances. Recent form is important for any tournament, but former success at a an event is usually a big key for a golfer. There is without a doubt no course that requires previous knowledge and experience of its peculiarities more than Augusta National. Now we are down to 9.

Let's eliminate a few more golfers by saying this years champion must have either won this year or had multiple high finishes. That removes Spieth, Matsuyama and Leishman from the equation.

3 of the past 5 winners at Augusta won in the weeks leading up to the Masters, so that eliminates Rose and Garcia.

Now we have to get picky as we are down to Dustin Johnson, Rory McIlroy, Jason Day and Paul Casey. I am going to remove DJ from being this years winner. Last year coming in to Masters week, he was on fire. Then he fell down the stairs in his rental house in his socked feet. I don't think his putting will be solid enough to capitalize on his length this week.

Paul Casey has had his fair share of success and high finishes at Augusta, but since Sergio got the monkey off his back last year, I doubt we see another European with tons of worldwide success win his first major this year. Sorry Paul.

That leaves us with two guys who have won a major before in McIlroy and Day. Both looking for their first green jacket, Rory for the career grand slam. Despite McIlroy looking like he's rounding into form, I won't let one really good week blind the fact that his game has been far from sharp the last year. So in saying that, I predict the 2018 Masters Champion to be: