This will be a weird week. For the first time since World War II, a green jacket will not be handed out on the second Sunday in April. For golf fans, it’s necessary, but still sad. In the meantime, we hope to make your (original) Masters week a little more fun by acting as though 94 of the best players in the world actually teed it up at Augusta National this week. How exactly would it play out?

That’s what we asked DataGolf to help with. The wizards at DataGolf (check them out here) use statistics from the golf world to do all kinds of things: determine win percentages, aid golf gamblers, rank which players are actually the best in the world, etc. Much of that work reacts to players’ recent showings and analyzes what has happened and how it happened. But they have impressive predictive powers, too, so we asked them to turn their sights on golf’s ultimate target: Augusta National.

DataGolf’s Masters modeling accounted for player skill and recent form, but also factored in historical performances at Augusta. That means a Sunday charge just might happen on the back nine with some tasty pin positions. (Hint: get ready!) Is there an element of randomness to the process? Of course! The first time you run a simulation, for example, will produce different results from the 7th or 23rd time you run it. But it’s still a ton of fun to see how things shake out. For what would have been the 84th playing of the Masters, we asked for the 84th single-run simulation of how DataGolf’s system would predict this year’s event.

The 2020 (simulated) Masters kicked off as usual with Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player hitting ceremonial tee shots in front of giddy patrons. And we’re off!