Good Afternoon. Welcome to Caddyshanks. We're like that hardly employed friend who's always available for a tee time and a stiff drink. Oh, and if you haven't heard, it's 2023 Masters week, which means we're pretty fired up around here.

Here's what we've got for ya today:

• Doin Lines: The Masters

• Some Masters History

• Golf Shots Heard Round Augusta

• Getting Drunk Masters Style

• For The Group Chat

• Golf Thing We'd Buy If We Weren't Broke

There's so much aura and atmosphere around The Masters, one could simply just "enjoy it", but that's not what we do around here. We gamble, we have a few pops, and we enjoy some legendary golf in the process.

🚩 Location: Augusta National, Georgia

💰 Purse: $15,000,000 ($2.7 million to the winner)

👑 Previous Winner: Scottie Scheffler 👩‍🍳

⛳️ Field: 88 Golfers

👀 Watch On: Masters.com and the Masters App will have all-day coverage Thursday through Sunday. Also, ESPN and OF COURSE JIM NANTZ ON CBS.

⛅️ The Weather Forecast:

⛳️ Notable Pairings & Tee Times:

• 10:18 a.m. ET: Viktor Hovland, Xander Schauffele, Tiger Woods

• 10:30 a.m. ET: Patrick Cantlay, Kurt Kitayama, Adam Scott

• 10:42 a.m. ET: Jon Rahm, Justin Thomas, Cameron Young

• 10:54 a.m. ET: Sungjae Im, Hideki Matsuyama, Cameron Smith

• 12:24 p.m. ET: Tom Hoge, Si Woo Kim, Phil Mickelson

• 1:12 p.m. ET: Corey Conners, Dustin Johnson, Justin Rose

• 1:24 p.m. ET: Matthew Fitzpatrick, Collin Morikawa, Will Zalatoris

• 1:36 p.m. ET: Sam Bennett, Max Homa, Scottie Scheffler

• 1:48 p.m. ET: Sam Burns, Tom Kim, Rory McIlroy

• 2 p.m. ET: Tony Finau, Tommy Fleetwood, Jordan Spieth

Masters Bets

We're going to separate our picks into three categories; Big Brain Picks, Fanboy Picks, and Sleepers.

Big Brain Picks

Okay, let's dive into some data here.

First, the nerds over at Data Golf did their thing "putting some narratives around Augusta to the test" and made a pretty cool post about it. You can see the post here.

Using skill, experience, and nationality, they grouped players' rounds into 1 of 7 categories and plotted the averages to see if performance varies across groups.

Their conclusion: "When grouping players by skill, elite players have out-performed their expectation by 0.37 strokes per round. This supports the narrative that Augusta favours "in-form" players more than a typical tournament. Unlike the group averages, Rory McIlroy has performed better (relative to expectation) as a sub-elite player than he has as an elite player—perhaps he enjoys the ride down Magnolia Lane more when he's flying under the radar.

Turning to experience we see that performance tends to improve as the number of Masters appearances increases—a rare occurance of an old adage actually showing up in the data. The benefit of additional experience appears to flatten after 9 appearances.

Nationality does not appear to have a significant impact on Masters performance—Europeans struggle slightly while South Africans perform well. Exploring the Americas (Excl. USA) group suggests that Augusta may have a soft spot for Canadians."

Also, in line with "in form" narrative is this tweet:

Big Brain Picks: People may hate it because they say he's "boring" or whatever, but the data seems to support Scottie Scheffler +700.

If you think Scottie is boring, may we interest you in a healthy serving of vanilla ice cream? Patrick Cantlay +1800

Fanboy Picks

Here, we dive into the compelling storylines and make some picks based on pure emotion. Gambling in it's purest form, some would say.

Rory McIlRoy to complete the career grand slam +700.

Jordan Spieth always wins on Easter +1800

Brooks Koepka is back? +3300

Cam Smith steals souls? +2000

Max Homa wins his first major? +2800

Tiger Woods "Men only want one thing and it's disgusting" bet? +6600

Long Shots

Sahith Theegala winning his Masters debut? +10000

Patrick Reed a.k.a. the “I hate myself” bet +6600

Tom Kim winning his masters debut +8000

Some Masters History

Only three golfers in history have successfully defended their Masters title.

Jack Nicklaus 1965-1966

Nick Faldo 1989-1990

Tiger Woods 2001-2002

With a win this week, Scottie Scheffler could become the fourth.

Golf Shots Heard Round Augusta

Silent Phil: Reports from last nights Masters Dinner indicate that Phil Mickelson hardly said a word. 

Anticipation: The word of the week at Augusta, according to Shane Bacon.

Yes Sir: The 50 Greatest Masters Moments.

Nantz Ranked: A ranking of Jim Nantz's best final putt calls.

1 Day: Until the 2023 Masters.

Get Drunk on Azaleas

Pour 2 oz good vodka (or gin if you prefer), 2 oz pineapple juice, 1 oz lemon juice (not lemonade) and a spoonful of grenadine into a cocktail shaker filled with ice.

Shake, shake, shake, then pour through a strainer into a tall glass filled halfway with rocks.

Note: A lemon garnish on your Azalea is lovely. Just don’t use actual azalea leaves — they’re highly toxic.

For The Group Chat

Golf Thing We'd Buy If We Weren't Broke

If you've got Masters passes and you've got enough cake, you can rent a house for Masters week about a half mile from the course.

So, what qualifies as enough cake?

About six figures for the week.

That's all folks! See you Friday where we check in LIVE FROM AUGUSTA.

Just kidding, they'd never let us on the grounds.