Masters

W here: Augusta National Golf Club, Augusta, Ga. TV: Thursday-Friday, 4-7 p.m. (ESPN); highlights 11:30-11:45 p.m. (CBS). Saturday, 3:30-7 p.m. (CBS). Sunday, 2-7 p.m. (CBS). Course facts: 7,435 yards, par 72. The 1933 Bobby Jones/Alistair Mackenzie design finally has stabilized since its expansion period of the last decade, allowing both players and club officials to understand the nuances of the layout. Format: 72 holes, stroke play. Field cut after 36 holes to top 44 and ties, plus all within 10 strokes of the lead.

A proposal to reshape City Dock in Annapolis is drawing criticism from traditionalists, who say taller buildings and other ideas to spur economic development could spoil the Colonial-era character and Chesapeake Bay views of the historic waterfront. The dock is among the most prized pieces of real estate in Annapolis. But as the city considers the draft master plan for the area, the question of how to blend its past with the present-day desire for economic vitality is sparking controversy.

You won't find this on MapQuest, but the road to Augusta actually goes through Houston. For those who dream of playing the 2010 Masters but have yet to get a postmarked invitation, this weekend's Shell Houston Open represents a final hope. The winner gets in. Last week the Masters field added Louis Oosthuizen and K.J. Choi. The South African-born Oosthuizen won a European Tour event to move into the world's top 50; Choi tied for 17th at the Arnold Palmer Invitational to remain in the top 50. For Masters purposes, that top-50 list is now frozen.

The 2013 Pulitzer Prizes were announced today, and among the winners is "Devil in the Grove," a non-fiction account of Baltimore native Thurgood Marshall's fearless work for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund in a Florida case. As we all know, Marshall went on to bring the nation's landmark school integration case, Brown vs. Board of Education, and later became a U.S. Supreme Court justice. The winners: FICTION -- "The Orphan Master's Son" by Adam Johnson, DRAMA -- "Disgraced" by Ayad Akhtar, HISTORY -- "Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam" by Fredrik Logeval l (Random House)

Won't be a contender Teddy Greenstein Chicago Tribune Last I checked, Tiger Woods is not a faucet. He can't simply be turned on (pun intended) or off in a matter of seconds. So given the length of his absence, the sense that his personal life remains a mess, the fact that Augusta National is one of the world's most difficult courses, the reality that he has not won here since 2005 and the difficulty he has had during practice rounds (he has hit some nasty hooks)

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- Of the players who made the cut in the 58th Masters, Jeff Maggert finished tied for last. His 3-over-par 75 yesterday put him at 17-over 305.But Maggert went home to Houston last night with something no else in the field -- not even the champion, Jose-Maria Olazabal -- had.A double eagle.And a place in Masters history."It was exciting," the low-keyed Maggert said after he became only the third player ever to double-eagle a hole at Augusta National.Gene Sarazen did it in 1935, Bruce Devlin in 1967.

On August 30, 2006, MILDRED ARNETTE MASTERS (nee Robinson), beloved wife of Emory Masters, loving mother of Larry Masters and his wife Sandy, devoted grandmother of Erin and Courtney Masters, dear sister of Marie Coop, Doris Bowman, Eloise Jessop and her husband Kenneth, Charles Robinson and his wife Barbara and Lottie Stewart. Friends may call at Gonce Funeral Service P.A., 4001 Ritchie Highway on Friday from 3 to 5 and 7 to 9 P.M. Service will be held on Saturday at 1 P.M. Interment Glen Haven Memorial Gardens.

ORLANDO, Fla. - Within an hour of Tiger Woods' announcement last week that he would return to play the Masters, a prominent British bookmaker installed him as the 4-to-1 favorite. Four-to-1 for a guy who hasn't been fitted for a green jacket since 2005, who has not played a competitive round in four months, who just might be reminded of his personal flaws as he takes back the blade on a hellacious 6-footer? (TIGER is a CHEETAH T-shirt sold separately.) Seems absurd to me - and to a chunk of players on the PGA Tour.

What passed for a juicy storyline last year was whether Masters officials had sapped all the joy from Augusta National with the addition of trees, a second cut of rough and 400-plus yards. Turns out, they hadn't. Chad Campbell, for one, played his first 16 holes in 9-under-par. This year's top storyline does not involve alleged Tiger Woods mistresses named Jamie and Jaimee or Rachel and Raychel. Not directly, anyway. But the major question heading into today's opening round is simple: How will Woods play?

IN ITS 67th year, the tradition-soaked Masters tournament, held annually at the exclusive Augusta National Golf Club, will be a bit different. Rain drenched the splendid Georgia course this week, so it may not play so hard and quick. Tiger Woods is going for an unprecedented third straight victory. And oh yes, there's that flap about women not being welcome as members of the club. That shouldn't be a problem, and ultimately it won't: Women will join the club's elite ranks - of rich executives - sooner rather than later.

How some of our columnists and editors feel about the two-stroke penalty given to Tiger Woods at the Masters Saturday: Peter Schmuck, columnist: By most accounts, the ruling was correct and penalty appropriate, which is a sign that professional golf has evolved from the time when a player could have days of honorable competition wiped out by some subtle violation he wasn't even aware he committed. I'm still disgusted over the silly ruling that knocked Dustin Johnson out of the PGA Championship in 2010.

The union representing 14,500 East Coast and Gulf longshoremen and the representative of 43 port operators and shipping companies completed negotiations on a six-year deal, a federal mediator announced Wednesday afternoon. The terms of the Master Agreement will now go to the respective memberships of the International Longshoremen's Association and U.S. Maritime Alliance for ratification, said George Cohen, director of Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service. The Port of Baltimore has about 1,200 dockworkers represented by four locals.

Reading in Thursday's post that few journalism programs offer much training in editing, Sean Smyth asked, "What is the best training to be an editor?" There are things you can do to prepare yourself to be an editor, the best of which is to read widely and acquire as broad a store of general knowledge as you can. It is through wide reading that you acquaint yourself with the kinds of prose, good and bad, that are past and current. It is through wide reading that you come to recognize allusions and cliches.

The draft of the 2013 Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan is available for public review and comment on the department's website, http://www.harfordcountymd.gov/planningzoning, and at the Department of Planning and Zoning office at 220 S. Main St. in Bel Air. The plan is an important step in helping Harford County become a truly multi-modal community by identifying needed facilities and presenting actions for implementation. It is also an important step in helping Harford County become a healthier community.

The black-and-white photo hangs unobtrusively on a back wall in Andy Nelson's barbeque joint in Cockeysville. But the picture, taken 53 years ago, captures a pivotal play in the Colts' second world championship, a 31-16 victory over the Giants at a packed Memorial Stadium in 1959. There is Frank Gifford, New York's Hall of Fame halfback, poised to catch a pass. And there is Nelson, the Colts' All Pro safety, swooping in with arms outstretched, ready to intercept. Steal it, Nelson did. The play broke the Giants' backs.

Good news for jazz aficionados and connoisseurs: Concert impresario Elana Byrd has announced that she will continue the Joe Byrd jazz concerts in 2013. Joe and Elana Byrd had chosen the full 2012 slate of artists before his death March 7 in an auto accident near his Edgewater home. Elana Byrd decided to continue the planned season, bringing major jazz musicians to Annapolis. Downtown Annapolis is in its 40th consecutive year as a showcase for jazz — a legacy of local guitarist Charlie Byrd, his brother, bassist Joe, and entrepreneur Paul Pearson, who in 1972 opened the King of France Tavern at the Maryland Inn, where jazz royalty was featured for nearly 30 years.

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- He has never won a major in a fairly distinguished 18-year career; flirting but never finishing, a perennial people's choice who somehow has stayed on the periphery. He has had his close calls here, too, at Augusta National.But now Jay Haas finds himself in position to do what he has never done before, something that only one American -- Fred Couples in 1992 -- has accomplished in the past seven years: take home the most coveted jacket in sports.With a stunning round of 8-under-par 64 yesterday, a round that ended with a string of four straight birdies and left him one shot off the course record, the 41-year-old Haas charged into the lead at the 1995 Masters.

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- Golf is the perfect sport for the obsessive personality, a giant gray area. You can't shoot a perfect round because there is no such thing. You can't have the perfect swing because there is no such thing. Even the best golfers find fault with their best rounds. Compulsive characters thrive in the vague climate. Everyone always thinks there is room to do better.The game is populated by those so single-minded, men who spend hundreds of hours hitting practice balls and talking elbow adjustment, men who die with their cleats on. Such tunnel vision is a part of every sport, of course, but it is suited to golf like Augusta to spring.

J. Ernest Green's masterful conducting of the Annapolis Chorale, Chamber Orchestra and soloists in two performances of Richard Einhorn's "Voices of Light," an oratorio set to Carl Dreyer's 1928 silent film "The Passion of Joan of Arc," brought a unique experience to near-capacity audiences last weekend at Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts. Having heard Einhorn's 1994 work in Green's January 1999 regional premiere, and again this March when Marin Alsop conducted it with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and Baltimore Choral Arts Society at Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, I was aware of its relevance and profound emotional impact.

This, according to Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, is how Joe Bryce made his name in state government: Mr. Bryce, who is leaving his job as Gov. Martin O'Malley's chief legislative officer for the lobbying firm Manis Canning and Associates, was hired by Senator Miller right out of Georgetown Law School, where he had been a top student. Mr. Bryce had been friends with Senator Miller's son at the University of Maryland and worked one summer at the Miller family store, and Mr. Miller had been impressed with him. Mr. Bryce had "unbelievable writing skills," Mr. Miller says, and the Senate president was quick to take advantage of them when he got into a dispute with then-Gov.