Rick Reilly has covered the Masters 26 times between his stints at Sports Illustrated and ESPN, and though there have been plenty of memorable tournaments in the bunch, the longtime Colorado resident will never forget his first one.
Of course, when you start with the 1986 Masters, the bar is set a bit on the high side.
That remains one of the great major championships ever — and sporting events in general — but what burned the tournament in Reilly’s memory goes beyond the fact that Jack Nicklaus shot 30 on the back nine the final day to win his 18th and final major at age 46.
“That was my first one ever. I was so scared,” Reilly said in a phone interview last week, before he made his usual early-spring trek to Augusta National for this week’s Masters. “I’d only gotten on the magazine (Sports Illustrated) the year before. They gave me the golf beat because Dan Jenkins left to go to Golf Digest.
“I had to ask Jack Nicklaus on Wednesday if he was broke. I had never met Jack Nicklaus. My dad and I used to sit and watch him; he was our hero. And the first thing I’ve got to say to Jack Nicklaus is, ‘Mr. Nicklaus, we hear you’re broke.’ I just wanted to crawl, but we had this great tip that he was broke. He said, ‘come with me,’ and he takes me up to the Champions Locker Room (at Augusta National).
“I can barely hear him talk because my knees are knocking together so loudly. I’m just gagging. I’m looking at all the (champions’) lockers and it’s amazing. And he said, ‘I’m not broke, I’m just overextended.’ He explained it all to me. But then, he goes on to win the thing (after being six shots behind with 10 holes remaining). I’ve never seen anything like it since.
“That might be the greatest thing I’ve ever witnessed in sports in terms of just sheer ‘slap your own face, spit out your dentures’ amazing. It was (like) North Carolina State dunking the ball to win the (1983 NCAA basketball) title in Albuquerque on an airball. For sheer amazement, there’s Tiger (Woods) in ’97 at the Masters beating people by 12 when he was 21 years. And probably the most amazing achievement I’ve ever seen in sports was him winning four (majors) in a row. Nothing matches that, I don’t think.”
Reilly — who grew up in Boulder, graduated from Boulder High School and the University of Colorado, and remains a resident of Denver — said he received a letter this year from Billy Payne, Augusta National Golf Club chairman, saying that the writer had reached the 25-Masters-covered milestone. That, the letter said, entitled Reilly to one free pass for the week, in addition to his media credential. So for the first time, Reilly’s twentysomething son Jake will accompany him to Augusta National.
Reilly has covered about every sports event imaginable over the last 35 years. He’s been a sports writer for the (Boulder) Daily Camera, Denver Post, Los Angeles Times, Sports Illustrated and ESPN. Along the way, he’s been named national sports writer of the year 11 times.
In June, he’ll be inducted into the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame, with John Elway being his presenter at the ceremony. That puts the 56-year-old Reilly into some elite company, joining the likes of legendary sports writers Grantland Rice, Damon Runyon, Ring Lardner, Red Smith, Jim Murray, Dick Connor, Jenkins, Frank Deford, Bud Collins, Will McDonough, Peter Gammons and Mitch Albom. Oh, and guys named Ronald Reagan and John Wayne have also been enshrined.
At his request, Reilly will go part-time at ESPN on July 1. He’ll no longer write his popular ESPN column, but still will do TV work for the sports network and possibly write more books and screenplays.
Though Reilly has made a name writing about all different sports — besides his work for newspapers, magazines and web sites, he’s penned 11 books (not counting a few he co-authored) and a screenplay (Leatherheads, starring George Clooney) — he has a special place in his heart for golf. Five years ago, he and son Jake spent two days at Hyland Hills in Westminster while Rick hit 694 shots on the nine-hole, 673-yard, par-3 North course, trying for his first hole-in-one. Jake, who once made an ace barefoot during tryouts for Denver East High School at City Park Golf Course, was along to snag missed shots with a baseball mitt. Rick sometimes hit 20 shots per hole.
It wasn’t until day 2 and shot No. 694 that Reilly hit pay-dirt. It came on a less-than-demanding 52-yard hole.
“So when people say, ‘What are the odds of making a hole-in-one?’, I know: 694 to 1, not counting the rest of my life. In the same way that a woman who can’t get pregnant for years and years, then the couple adopts, and a month after they adopt they get pregnant … a month after (the Hyland Hills ace), on the way to Augusta, I made a hole-in-one.”
And it’s probably no coincidence that several of Reilly’s books are centered around golf. Asked which was the most fun to write, he doesn’t hesitate:
“‘Who’s Your Caddy’ is by far the most fun,” he said. “If that didn’t sell a single book it still would have been the most fun book I ever did. First, I love caddies. They give you the best quotes, they have the most fun, they find the best bars. I just love caddies. So to be a caddie for 12 different people — Jack Nicklaus, Tom Lehman, David Duval, Donald Trump, a blind guy, a $50,000 nassau guy, Jill McGill, John Daly … It was so fun.”
That said, it’s not surprising that the Masters is one of Reilly’s favorite events to cover.
“After 26 of them, it’s like you know every inch of it, you know?” he said. “Every year is amazing, though. I remember after Jack won in ’86, me and Jaime Diaz (now editor-in-chief at Golf World) were so pumped up and we had a bunch of stories still to write, but we had our golf clubs in the trunk of his car. And we got out just outside the gate (of Augusta National) and there was this big gravel parking lot with a big water tower there and we hit drivers off the gravel parking lot. I don’t know what we wanted to do, but I’ll never forget hitting drivers and trying to hit that water tower. Then we had to go back and write all night. I wrote until 7 a.m., I remember that. That was crazy.”
Then after finishing a 3,500-word “game story” for SI, Reilly tried to be one of 20 lucky media folks to get to play Augusta National on Monday, the day after the Masters ended.
“They said, ‘Get here on Monday; the list goes up at 7:30 a.m., and the first 20 guys to sign up get to play,'” he said. “I got there at 7:30 a.m., and 101 Japanese guys were in front of me. I think they spent the whole night out there. And I just went back and went back to sleep.”
