KEY POINTS:
The Masters and New Zealand golfers just do not gel. Kiwi efforts on the verdant fields of Augusta National have been uninspiring.
Frank Nobilo was fourth in 1996, but in 32 other starts by New Zealand players, nobody has been in the top 10. Of the 33 appearances
our players have made at the Masters, they've missed the cut 20 times.
So Michael Campbell's record of seven missed cuts from seven attempts falls easily within that pattern, but it's not really what you'd expect from a player who won a major championship only two years ago and is ranked among the 50 best players on the planet.
He was gutted at missing by one shot yet again this year. But, after watching him play most of those 36 holes, I came away thinking he was fortunate to be as close to the line as he was.
The issue is his driving. Because he's undergoing a change in his swing, he's prone to hitting some awful cut shots. You and I might call them rank slices.
"At the start of the year we [Campbell and coach Jonathon Yarwood] decided to tackle a few things in my swing and it's taken longer than we thought to get it right," said Campbell.
"It's a common fault that I do. I slide my hips too much. So we're trying to get it all on one axis."
There were some terrible outcomes at Augusta. His very first drive of the tournament, on a hole where the fairway is at least 40m wide in the landing area, finished under a tree outside the rough. On the same day down the long 10th, his ball came to rest 70m from the middle of the fairway, ridiculously deep in the loblolly pines.
With typical Cambo panache, he somehow hacked out under an overhanging branch, and then over another tree, onto the green.
On the 9th hole on the second day, his tee shot was again deep in the trees. Somehow, he again played a brilliant shot with a long iron up onto the green, pin high. His playing partners, Rory Sabbatini and Lucas Glover, used short irons from the bottom of the hill.
When he did hit it straight, he too often made mistakes with the distance control of his irons or had a nightmare incident in his short game.
In round two he made two double bogeys from the middle of the fairway, and a third when he got too cute with a chip shot and actually chipped into a bunker. He didn't look as good or as consistent a player as Glover or Sabbatini, and the scores reflected that.
Campbell is going through one of those patches he's become famous for. He's consistent in his inconsistency.
So far this year he has played seven tournaments. Five of them had cuts and he made only two. Then he had to withdraw from the Malaysian Open with a self-inflicted neck injury.
It's all so familiar.
In his stellar year of 2005, the win at Pinehurst came out of nowhere. Until then he'd made the cut just six times in 12 tournaments, although there had been three top 10 finishes.
Two years before it had been even more dire. That year, 2003, he won the Irish Open at Portmarnock. In his five prior tournaments, he had only once been in the top 50.
These are snapshots of the way he's played most of his life. I still have memories of a New Zealand Open at Paraparaumu when he was an amateur, circa 1989, when he took 11 on the 11th hole on the Saturday, and still shot 74.
The man is the most brilliant and charismatic golfer this country has produced. But, as of now, Campbell can never be on the same pedestal as Sir Bob Charles because he's never produced the year-in, year-out results the veteran lefthander returned - not only in his prime but in his subsequent Champions Tour career.
Campbell is the first to acknowledge that, when it comes to results, he's the ultimate streaky player.
"You know me with my form, it always fluctuates. That's the way I play golf. I've always had these patches where I've performed poorly, and all of a sudden I've won."
So does he know why it happens like that?
He looks wistfully towards the graying Augusta sky and shakes his head. "No... dunno... I shouldn't do it, should I... not at my level..."
His voice tails off as he thinks about why that huge reservoir of natural talent can't manifest itself more often, or at least more regularly.
Some Campbell watchers wonder about his light playing schedule. He's played a lot of tournaments late in the year since that US Open win. That's when the big appearance cheques are available, especially in Asia.
The downside is that come the New Year, his tournament commitments are light. He went into the Masters having played just six tournaments in the first three months of the year. He played 72 holes in only two of them and lasted just 13 holes in the first round of the WGC Matchplay in Arizona.
Now he's back in Sydney and won't play again until the Players Championship in Florida starting May 10 - a full month after the Masters. Then he finally goes to Europe for his first events of the year in that part of the world.
One imagines that appearances will be more regular as the Northern summer kicks in but he'll still probably play little more than 20 tournaments all year.
He's proud of being a genuine world player. He appears in Europe, Asia, the US, as well as Australia and New Zealand every year. So would he be a more consistent performer if he concentrated on just one part?
Campbell says no. He's always been a truly international player and he likes it that way.
But the fact remains the best Australian, South African and English players are based in the US, concentrating more on the US Tour.
Of Campbell's commitment to play all around the world, the most serious commitment is to the New Zealand Open, and to the future of New Zealand golf.
His testy relationship with the governing body seems to have improved dramatically since significant changes of personnel at NZG.
Now he's excited about what he can put in place at Gulf Harbour in the next few years, not just on the course, but around the practice and training areas as well.
He has the financial wherewithal to make a serious commitment to coaching elite players, and those just below it, at his proposed Michael Campbell Golf Academy.
His personal coach, Yarwood, wants to bring some new coaching ideas into the country. They appear absolutely genuine in their desire to make New Zealand players better.
Campbell is due back in thecountry at the end of the month, hopefully to make announcements about the field and the venue for the New Zealand Open in November.
He's not prepared to divulge much at this time, but he's excited about the event, and says he's been working hard trying to convince some of the world's top 50 to play.
That's still eight months away. In the interim, his followers just want him to recapture some of the old Cambo magic.
