Augusta National and the Masters Tournament have seen much change and a good deal of controversy already this century. Starting in 2000, winning a PGA Tour event no longer meant automatic qualification for the first major of the year, as it had done since 1972. J.L. Lewis, who won the 1999 John Deere Classic and, he thought, a trip to Augusta, wasn’t pleased. In 2004, it was past champions’ turn to feel slighted when the club stated anyone older than 65 or not entering a minimum of 10 events a year would no longer be invited to play. Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, and Gary Player weren’t impressed and eventually the decision was retracted.

In 1999, a second cut of fairway, known everywhere else in the world as “rough,” appeared for the first time, seemingly contradicting club founder Bobby Jones’s ideal of strategic, rather than forced, target lines from the tee. Again, many voiced concerns. For the 2002 tournament, major changes were made to nine holes, extending the layout from 6,980 yards to 7,270 yards. Tees were moved, and bunkers were altered in the first part of the course’s modernization, a process that four years later saw it grow another 185 yards. Now, with an intimidating 7,445 yards to negotiate, short hitters talk of making up the distance and having even less chance of ever donning a green jacket. Purists, including Nicklaus and Palmer, said the club had gone too far and the course no longer played as Jones originally intended.

Martha Burk, head of the National Council of Women’s Organizations (NCWO), made a spirited, but ultimately fruitless, attempt in 2003 to force Augusta National into accepting female members. Not wanting the tournament’s four major corporate sponsors — Coca-Cola, Citigroup, Cadillac, and IBM — to have to deal with the potentially negative implications of being associated with an allmale organization, the club dropped them for the next two years’ telecasts. In addition to all that, TV coverage had been extended in 2002 to show all 18 holes of the leaders’ final round.

Hootie Johnson’s eight-year chairmanship of the club and tournament, during which all of the above came to pass, certainly was eventful, and it’s a wonder he never did introduce a standard Masters ball, something he talked about on several occasions. There’s no doubt he is a respected man — a banker by trade with a history of civil rights activism (he helped desegregate South Carolina’s colleges and universities in the late 1960s) and three honorary doctoral degrees. But when, last May, he stepped down making way for Billy Payne, the man behind Atlanta’s successful 1996 Olympic Games, a number of people let out an almost audible sigh of relief.

Payne, the club’s sixth chairman, headed the tournament’s Media Committee prior to his selection and is a master of diplomacy, regarded as a self-assured change-maker who won’t be afraid to alter the status quo should he, and the members, see fit. His rather low-key appearances so far, however, appear to have halted the steady flow of stories that deflected some of the attention away from the actual golf, shifting the focus of this year’s buildup from the course (just a few minor changes to the 11th and 15th holes), women’s rights (he skillfully deflected questions about Burk at a press conference last year, pushing the issue behind the back burner for the time being at least), and qualification categories (mention has been made, quietly, of inviting all PGA Tour winners again) back squarely to the players and the all-important question of who is going to win.

Johnson’s course modifications may have angered those who pine (no pun intended) for the days of wound, rubber balls and wood drivers, of all things, but there’s no denying the course needed beefing up. To win nowadays, you need to strike your solid-construction, urethane-covered bullet with a combination of power and precision that only a select group of genuinely world-class players are capable. Their number includes the likes of World Matchplay champion Henrik Stenson, 2006 U.S. Open winner Geoff Ogilvy, European Ryder Cup stars Sergio Garcia and Paul Casey, Ireland’s Padraig Harrington, and last week’s winner, Adam Scott, as well as the game’s established noblesse — Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh, Ernie Els, Retief Goosen, Jim Furyk, and defending champion Phil Mickelson, who controlled his game superbly in the final round last year, shooting a 69 to win by two, but who comes into this year’s tournament not firing on nearly as many cylinders as he was in 2006 when he was coming off a 13-shot victory at the BellSouth Classic.

After winning at Pebble Beach and losing out to Charles Howell in a playoff at the Nissan Open in February, Mickelson’s game has gone further South than Augusta. In an effort to get it back, he arrived on Sunday and has been working hard with swing coach Rick Smith. Similarly out of sorts are Furyk, who had wrist surgery in New York a month ago and closed with a 78 at the WGC-CA Championship, Goosen, who hasn’t finished higher than T-17th on the PGA Tour all year, and Garcia, whose ball striking gets better and better, but whose putting, particularly from short distances on Sundays, continues to let him down.

The weather forecast for the tournament looks good: mostly sunny with light winds and highs in the mid- to high 60s, which means the 2007 Masters promises to be the first since 1997 without a rain delay and the first time the players get to see firm, fast fairways since the course was lengthened. Firmer conditions might give moderate hitters a few extra yards, but overall scoring well will be trickier as only perfectly struck, high-flying, soft-landing approach shots will hold the greens, the opposite of what happened during the first round at Bay Hill, for example, when the rain softened course produced an average score of 70.35.

If the weather stays fine and the course remains dry, Woods probably will prosper as he did 10 years ago when he shocked the world with a record four-round total and a 12-shot victory. His fairly shambolic defeat to Nick O’Hern at the World Matchplay and disappointing finish at Bay Hill are bad but distant memories, and the world no. 1 looked sharp when winning at Doral two weeks ago. And with the added incentive of surpassing Palmer’s four Masters titles, Tiger will again be the man to beat. Even at Augusta, some things never change.

tonydear71@comcast.net