Green jacket would finish McIlroy's Slam.

• Author: Ferguson, Doug
• Position: Sports

Byline: Doug Ferguson

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- Tiger Woods was the exception. Ben Crenshaw was closer to the rule.

Woods joined up with Crenshaw to play the back nine Wednesday on the final day of practice for a Masters that is shaping up as a mystery in many ways. They are Masters champions with multiple green jackets. What separates them is how soon they got them.

Crenshaw had to suffer a little before he could celebrate his first major. He was a runner-up four times in the majors, including a playoff loss to David Graham at the PGA Championship, before he broke through in 1984 at Augusta National. He won another one in 1995.

Woods wasted no time. He won the first major he played as a pro by setting 20 records in his 1997 Masters victory, and that was only the start. He already had eight majors before he recorded his first runner-up finish. He had four green jackets before he turned 30.

More players have taken the Crenshaw route.

Tom Watson. Nick Price. Phil Mickelson. Adam Scott. The group even includes Jack Nicklaus, who was a 20-year-old amateur when he finished second behind Arnold Palmer in the 1960 U.S. Open. Nicklaus played that day with Ben Hogan, who also had a chance to win until he hit into the water on the 17th hole at Cherry Hills.

Hogan said after the round, ''Don't feel sorry for me. I played with a kid today who could have won this Open by 10 shots if he had known now.''

Nicklaus figured it out.

Also on that list is Rory McIlroy, who returns to the scene of his greatest lesson in a major.

He was a 21-year-old with a four-shot lead at the Masters in 2011, ready to be crowned the next big thing in golf, when he shot 80 in the final round. He handled the collapse with remarkable poise, said he would learn from his mistakes. And then he posted scoring records at Congressional two months later in the U.S. Open.

''A lot of that win has to do with what happened at Augusta,'' McIlroy said.

The Masters is even more meaningful now.

It the only major keeping him from the career Grand Slam, and McIlroy is the clear favorite as the Masters begins today.

''Everything I've done, all the work I've done gearing up for this week has been good,'' McIlroy said. ''I'm just ready for the gun to go off.''

The expectations are higher than ever for McIlroy, and lower than ever for Woods, who is competing for the first time since Feb. 5. That's when he walked off the course at Torrey Pines to work on a game that had become so bad that hardly anyone...