GOLF MASTERS NOTEBOOK : This Time, Norman Can’t Cut It

AUGUSTA, Ga. —  It was believed that Australia’s Greg Norman was finally due to win his first major golf tournament in the United States.

He had been playing well, winning the Australian Masters and the Doral tournament.

Norman usually doesn’t post low scores in early rounds, charging into contention on Saturday and Sunday. However, he shot himself out of this year’s Masters with a 78-72--150. The cut was at 148, and there were 49 qualifiers. Norman was particularly frustrated by his six-over-par round Thursday. “It was just a bad day,” he said. “I felt great coming here and I hit the ball well in practice. I thought 77 was the worst I could do.”

Then he paused and added: “Can’t I play bad every now and then?”

As for his 72 Friday, Norman said: “I just made silly mistakes on the front nine. And I made a few more on the back nine. I three-putted the 13th. Nothing really happened.”

Norman wasn’t alone in his frustration.

Paul Azinger didn’t make the cut at 80-76-156, a 36-hole score matched by Arnold Palmer. Also out was the 1988 Masters champion, Britain’s Sandy Lyle, at 151.

Lyle led the field, though, in a negative category--most golf balls hitting spectators. He hit two Thursday and another Friday.

Walter Clay, a local restaurant owner, was temporarily knocked unconscious by Lyle’s drive on the eighth hole Thursday. Cheryl Lyn Gulley was the most seriously injured. She was hospitalized with a possible broken cheekbone after Lyle’s second shot on the second hole Friday shattered her glasses. Another man was hit on the leg at the fifth hole.

Tom Kite, Seve Ballesteros and Mark Calcavecchia, who are usually in contention in every tournament, barely made the cut. Kite was at 148, Ballesteros and Calcavecchia at 147.

Jack Nicklaus is 50, but his drives off the tee are 25 years younger.

“I haven’t driven the ball this far in a long time,” Nicklaus said after shooting two-under-par 70 Friday.

Nicklaus credits his renewed length to a graphite driver sent to him by Japan’s Jumbo Ozaki.

When Nicklaus played with Ozaki in Japan, he said the Japanese golfer was outdriving him by a considerable distance.

So, he asked Ozaki if he would be kind enough to send him a driver that is made by the Bridgestone Co., and Ozaki complied.

Nicklaus said the ball carries farther from the metal wood when it lands than it does from his regular driver. “With my other driver, the ball lands softly. This one just takes off after it hits the ground. It runs as much as 125 yards.”

Raymond Floyd, the second- round leader of the Masters at 138, also uses a version of the same driver.

“I’m very happy for Jack to have my driver,” Ozaki said through an interpreter. “I respect him, and if the driver serves a useful purpose, I’m happy.”

The driver carries the name J’s, representing the Ozaki brothers, Jumbo, Jet and Joe.

Famous-last-words Dept.: After Ken Green got a 10 at the 13th hole Friday, he said: “Golf is tougher than my first wife.”

Yes, he missed the cut with a 78-80--158.