Sam Burns teed off at 8:19 a.m. Friday in his fifth Masters, opening the 2026 majors season with a spot that says as much about where he has settled in as where he still wants to go. He arrived at Augusta National ranked 33rd in the Official World Golf Rankings and 35th in the FedEx Cup standings for 2026, a position built on steady results and a game that has kept him inside the conversation at golf’s biggest events.
Burns was one of fewer than two dozen golfers to make the cut in all four major championships in 2025. He tied for seventh at the U.S. Open, finished 19th at the PGA Championship and tied for 45th at Augusta National in April. His best Masters finish remains a tie for 29th in 2023, when he opened with a 68 and finished at 1-over par.
This week matters because Burns can cross a financial marker as well as a competitive one. He has earned $1.25 million this season and entered today with career earnings of $35,985,076; if he makes the cut, that total will rise above $36 million. He also comes in with form that has not always shown up in his Masters record. Burns ranks 13th on the PGA Tour this year in shots gained putting and 17th in driving distance, and he has made four of seven cuts this season.
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The contrast is the part that hangs over the week. Burns has been good enough to make every major count lately, finished seventh in the 2025 FedEx Cup and made his second Ryder Cup appearance for the USA, but Augusta has not yet produced the same return. His career average score at the course is 73.67, almost 2-over, and the numbers from this season suggest the tools are there for a better result than the place has usually given him.
Burns, a Shreveport native and Calvary Baptist graduate who plays out of Squire Creek Country Club in Choudrant, is paired with Cameron Smith and Jake Knapp in the first two rounds. He has three top 10 finishes in his last 10 starts and five top 10s in his last 20 tournaments. The question is no longer whether he belongs on the game's biggest stages. It is whether Augusta National finally gives him a finish that matches the rest of his year.
