Paul Tesori, Michelle and Isaiah Tesori, with Bubba Watson, his wife Angie and their son Caleb. (Courtesy of Tesori family)

AUGUSTA, Ga. – Michelle Tesori was in the delivery room when a nurse snatched her son Isaiah, less than a minute old and already mid-seizure, off her chest. In a blink, a team of stern-faced doctors surrounded the tiny child and then immediately whisked him out of the room.

Soon Michelle and her husband Paul listened in stunned silence as a doctor explained the dire stakes and offered a list of potential reasons that Isaiah's brief life was in significant jeopardy.

"Blood on the brain … brain virus …" Michelle recalled through tears Thursday, reciting a laundry list of parental nightmare terms, each more chilling than the last.

Isaiah was headed to a new hospital, the doctor said, across Jacksonville, Fla., to Wolfson Children's Hospital, where the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit might be able to save him. First, they quickly wheeled Isaiah, laying in an incubator, back to his parents. Through a finger-sized hole in the side, Michelle was able to reach in and touch him.

Then he was off, out the door, with no promises, just prayers.

That was three months ago this week.

Paul and Michelle Tesori were always going to get their son Isaiah here to Augusta National – here to the Masters.

Paul is a caddie for Webb Simpson. He used to work for Vijay Singh. Michelle runs a company that operates non-profits for athletes. They are a golf family first though, so much of their life revolving around Paul's schedule.

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Sometimes on the PGA Tour it seems like all roads lead here, or start here, the first major championship of the season – the most hallowed grounds in the game where no matter how many times you've been, you appreciate getting to return.

This wasn't just a special place in the general way; it was a special place for them.

During a 2012 practice round, Simpson, Bubba Watson and Rickie Fowler, all close friends of the Tesoris, made a bet: If Michelle could find the only palm tree on the Augusta National grounds, she'd get the fancy wedding ring Paul had been saving up for.

Michelle didn't really care about a ring. She said the contest should be for a date to Paul's favorite restaurant, Subway. "That's all I wanted," she said. These are regular people.

Paul mentioned the wedding-band contest to Simpson, Watson and Fowler, though. Michelle and the players' wives were walking along with them. Watson decided to pull one on his friend by secretly pointing the palm tree out to Michelle. (It's easy to miss on the right side of the fourth green.) She told Paul she found the needle in the haystack.

"She had no chance without Bubba," Paul said this week.

"Paul pouted about it for two holes," Michelle said with a laugh. "Really pouted."

The whole thing was funny.

Then Watson and the other players made another bet. If any of them won the Masters that year, they'd pay for the Tesori wedding band. It was a comment that sort of floated off into the air, no one really paying attention to it.

"No one in the group is winning the thing and no one is buying a ring," Michelle figured.

Only Watson did win it, in dramatic fashion in a playoff. Later that night, surrounded by friends, he stopped a conversation and, according to Paul, said, "Do you know what this means?" Yes, a couple of them offered, you're now a major champion.

"No," Watson said, "it means I have to buy that ring for the Tesoris."

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