AUGUSTA, Ga. — Caddies are supposed to show up, keep up and shut up. But they contribute way more than that to their bosses. At Augusta National Golf Club, a caddie is essentially the only other person inside the ropes with the players. It's a big responsibility, but over the years we've seen the likes of Ted Scott, Jim "Bones" Mackay and Steve Williams be part of the story of some of the great Masters. Along the way, caddies are part of the story of the Masters and these are some of pros' favorite stories involving their caddies.
Adam Scott
My buddy caddied for me in the Par 3 Contest and while he was changing into the overalls and stuff we loaded the front pocket of the golf bag with like 200 range balls and my buddy carried that heavy bag around for the entire nine holes without figuring it out.
Billy Horschel
Scotty Vail. He had a certain amount of cash in his jumpsuit from one day and let's just say it was a considerable amount. It just wasn't like a couple dollars. It was more than a couple hundred dollars. And he goes into the caddie area the next day and he doesn't have it. He lost it. He forgot to take it out of the caddie bib. My caddie Micah had just put his jumpsuit on and he's hearing Scottie talk about it and he happened to reach into one of the pockets and there was Scotty's wad of cash. Micah goes, 'Is this your money here?' There was his wad of cash. That was pretty funny.
Corey Conners
I remember my first time, my caddie tried to skip it at 16 and didn’t get much water. He hit a laser over the green.
Gary Player
When I arrived in 1978, my caddie Eddie McCoy said, “Gary, you got to win, man, I need a roof on my house.” I said, “Eddie, consider it done.” And when I hit my second shot on 17 to 6 inches from the hole, you should have seen the look on his face. Still makes me smile to this day.
Jack Nicklaus
Probably how I got Willie Peterson. You know that one, right? It was 1960, and the caddiemaster was asking who wanted to caddie for me. Pond, who caddied for me in 1959, said, “I don’t want Mr. Jack.” He went on to say, “Mr. Jack works too hard.” So, then he asked, “Does anybody here want to take him?” And Willie says, “I'll take him!” Willie took me and went on to win five Masters Tournaments with me. Willie was a character. He was a good man, and he became a good friend. When I found out in 2020 that Willie’s grave site in Augusta didn’t have a headstone – which sadly was the case for many Augusta caddies through the years – we made sure to right that wrong.
Gary Woodland
I took my dad with me before the first time I played there and we both showed up in shorts. That doesn’t fly there. We were both in the pro shop buying pants.
Scottie Scheffler
Last year, we were on 13, I hit it in the rough through the fairway and it was one of those areas where you could maybe go for it, maybe not. I had a 2- or 3-shot lead at the time and I asked Teddy, Are we going for this? And he's like we're sticking with what we're good at. And I was like, OK. I think Teddy said something along the lines of if it was somebody else, he would consider laying up, but he said you’re the ...
