PGA Masters Tournament Begins Thursday

Spring is finally here, and it's time for the official kickoff of the PGA golf season.  The first major championship of the 2011 season is coming up this week - the 75th Masters Tournament, scheduled to be played from April 7–10 at Augusta National Golf Club.

The Masters has the smallest field of the major championships. Officially the Masters remains an invitation event, but there is now a qualification process. In theory, the club could simply decline to invite a qualified player. Each player is classified according to the first category by which he qualified, but other categories are shown in parentheses. Dates when a qualifying category will be completely determined are indicated in italics.

Golfers who qualify based solely on their performance in amateur tournaments (categories 6-10) must remain amateurs on the starting day of the tournament to be eligible to play.

1. Past Masters Champions
Ángel Cabrera (2), Fred Couples (11), Ben Crenshaw, Trevor Immelman (11), Zach Johnson (14,15,16,17,18,19), Sandy Lyle, Phil Mickelson (11,12,15,17,18,19), Larry Mize, José María Olazábal, Mark O'Meara, Vijay Singh, Craig Stadler, Tom Watson, Mike Weir, Tiger Woods (2,3,4,11,12,18,19), Ian Woosnam

(Past champions not expected to play: Tommy Aaron, Seve Ballesteros, Jack Burke, Jr., Billy Casper, Charles Coody, Nick Faldo, Raymond Floyd, Doug Ford, Bob Goalby, Bernhard Langer, Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, and Fuzzy Zoeller.)

This year's field will be named later today, and 710 KEEL will have full coverage of this year's Masters here on the website.