Just as Ken Griffey Jr. had an eye for the baseball during his Hall of Fame MLB career, it looks as though he’s got the eye for the perfect snapshot in his new, post-baseball career.
The 13-time All-Star retired back in 2010, and now at 55-years-old, he’s focused all of his energy on being a sports photographer. Though he feels the most comfortable shooting baseball games, he’s also been spotted snapping professional photos at football and soccer games. And this past weekend, he shot the sport of golf for the very first time at the Masters.
Pretty good tournament to choose as your first ever time photographing golf.
It actually appears that the Masters asked Ken Griffey Jr. if he’d be interested in working as a photographer during the tournament. He might feel as though he’s best – and most comfortable with – baseball, but Ken Griffey Jr. wasn’t going to miss out on the opportunity to walk around Augusta National Golf Club with a camera for the weekend, as he told the AP:
“I’m not here to take anybody’s job, but I am here to learn about as much as I can about sports photography as well as the history of the Masters. To be able to sit here and really soak it in for four or five days has really been absolutely unbelievable.”
As luck would have it, Ken Griffey Jr. got to photograph one of the most exciting, dramatic and monumental Masters tournaments in recent memory.
Rory McIlroy somehow simultaneously did everything he could to win and lose the 2025 Masters, giving up a big lead during the final round and bogeying his final hole to go into a playoff with Justin Rose with a green jacket on the line. But on the first playoff hole, Rory finally exercised his demons and completed his career grand slam – something he’s been trying to do for over a decade.
Ken Griffey Jr. just so happened to be working for the Masters official website was in just the right place to capture Rory’s cathartic moment of victory, and before we get to the picture, I thought I’d point out another quote that Griffey Jr. provided to the AP about capturing the perfect picture:
“I can go out there and rattle off 30,000 pictures – anybody can – but it’s about so much more than that. The lighting is a big thing, the background, so many things. You can have a good picture of someone, but if the background isn’t right it can turn out terrible.”
Lighting. Background. So many things. Got that?
Ken Griffey Jr. certainly understood the assignment, because as Rory McIlroy dropped to the 18th green after realizing he had achieved his ultimate goal, the former MLB star framed the strike zone of the photograph perfectly:
Photo of Rory McIlroy winning #TheMasters taken by…KEN GRIFFEY JR!?! pic.twitter.com/qWqBSJ06j0
— Jeff Eisenband (@JeffEisenband) April 14, 2025
Ken Griffey Jr. captured a photo that will live on in sports history forever. How cool is that?
If you ask me, the fact that an all-time athlete was the one that took the picture of another all-timer completing a feat that only five other golfers have ever completed in the history of the sport might just be the coolest thing I’ve ever seen. Recency bias? Maybe. But it all certainly seems like everything lined up for a perfect, full-circle sports moment.
Here are some other breathtaking photos that Ken Griffey Jr. is credited with capturing:
Photo credits: Ken Griffey Jr. 📸
His camera work on Masters Sunday was incredible. pic.twitter.com/rr3vJN26ne
— NBC Sports (@NBCSports) April 14, 2025
