The last time that Brandt Snedeker was in a perfect position to win the Masters he blew up on Sunday in 2008 with a 77. Somehow I don’t think that will happen tomorrow as the 5th ranked player in the world goes into the final round at Augusta National in a tie for the lead with 2009 Masters champ Angel Cabrera the 43 year old Argentinian who’s fallen to #269 on this planet. El Pato (the duck) as he’s known back home has only finished in the top 10 four times in the last 4 years on tour but he always seems to rise to the occasion in the majors (especially at Magnolia Lane).

As for Sneds…he’s as good a guy as you’ll meet in sports just a regular Joe (or Brandt) who I’ve occassionally had the pleasure to connect with as in last year at The Open Championship where he was the midway leader at Royal Lytham and St. Anne’s and he talked about that experience with me afterwards…

Then this past December at the Tiger Woods hosted World Challenge event in Thousand Oaks. I chatted with Snedeker for a few minutes on the driving range where we talked about playing in So-Cal and how he sees what it will take to win his first major?

Snedeker with Sobel at Tiger’s World Challenge:

Coincidentally, the next time I ran into Snedeker he had just won at Pebble Beach where I asked him a few questions during his championship newsconference… I recall ending his day with one final question. Since his goal was to the be the #1 American golfer what about winning a green jacket to help him get there? Here’s that exchange:

Experience and confidence can be a deadly combo at Augusta…and then how it sounds to finally be called a major champion? All the best to Brandt Snedeker who told me that the color green suits him just fine…but it’s a long way to the finish line even with just one round left!