AUGUSTA, Ga. — If there was such a thing as natural order when it comes to who deserves to — and should — win the Masters, Justin Rose is your man this week at Augusta National.

But, of course, there is no such thing.

Augusta National owes no one a damn thing.

Just ask Greg Norman, who had his heart mercilessly ripped from his chest not once but two or three times at Augusta and never won a green jacket.

Scars or belief?

This is a question that faces Justin Rose as he embarks on his 21st career Masters this week at Augusta National.

To be sure: Rose has done everything but win a green jacket in his first 20 tries, finishing second three times, including last year in a playoff to Rory McIlroy. In all, he has seven finishes inside the top 10.

The Masters has also represented significant heartbreak for Rose.

He lost to Sergio Garcia in a playoff in 2017 after shooting a final-round 69. And his loss to McIlroy last year came after Rose posted a 6-under-par 66 on Sunday to force a playoff, playing beautiful golf.

Scars from defeat or belief, based on his close calls, that he can finally cross the line and have that coveted green jacket slipped over his shoulders in Butler Cabin on Sunday night?

These are things Rose, at age 45 and understanding his realistic chances are dwindling with each year, ponders. He chooses to live on the positive side of the tracks.

“I hope it only boosts my belief that I can go ahead and do it,’’ Rose said Monday. “I feel like I’ve pretty much done what it takes to win. I just haven’t kind of walked over the line. I feel like I’ve executed well enough to have done the job.

“I’m very aware that I’ve been close here,’’ Rose went on. “I’m very aware that I’ve had tough, tough losses here. I also am aware that I enjoy this place. So I don’t want to feel that those three second-place finishes need to create a different sort of feeling for me.’’

He was asked whether he falls in the “desire’’ or “obsession’’ camp in wanting a Masters.

“I’d say firmly in the desire camp, just because I know that the latter is not going to help me,’’ Rose said.

This is a player who missed his first 21 cuts to start his professional career. So, don’t ever question Rose’s mental toughness.

“I’ve realized that you can’t skip through a career without a little bit of heartache and heartbreak,’’ he said. “If you’re going to be willing to win them, you’ve got to be willing to kind of be on the wrong side of it as well. The key is showing up. The point is you’ve got to put yourself there.

“The better player you are, the more chances you’re going to have and the more you’re going to win. I don’t feel like [the Masters] owes me anything. I come here with a good sort of attitude. I come here with it [being] a place that I enjoy being.

“There’s certain places you get to and you take a deep breath and go, ‘Right, it’s nice to be here.’ Augusta still is one of those places for me.’’

Rose, who played a practice round with Jersey Shore native Chris Gotterup on Monday, said he’s “always trying to learn’’ around the place.

“Listen, you can know everything in the world, but when it comes to execution, if you’re not playing well, it doesn’t matter how well you know anything,’’ he said. “It’s an execution-based business, and the golf course doesn’t know what I know.

“From my point of view, I don’t think, ‘Oh, I know how to play this golf course. It’s going to be fun. It’s going to be easy.’ I turn up every day I play this golf course knowing it’s a new body of work.’’

Rose, who won the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines earlier this year, breaking the tournament record and becoming the first wire-to-wire winner of that event since 1955, is an absolute sentimental favorite here this week.

Three runner-up finishes and handling those with pure class, which has always been Rose’s calling card, will do that.

“I’ve already experienced it this week,’’ Rose said. “A lot of people are wishing me well or thinking it’s going to be my year, whatever, just based around sentiment. So, I’m going to have to manage that a bit this week, and that’s going to be part of my week this week for sure is people remembering what happened last year.

“That’s fine, but I’ve got to kind of be aware of that, be ready for that, and I’ve got to have my own narrative and not kind of buy into everyone else’s narrative.’’

AUGUSTA, Ga. — A look at some of the anniversaries this year at the Masters:

75 years ago (1951)

Winner: Ben Hogan

Score: 70-72-70-68—280

Margin: 2 shots

Prize: $3,000

Runner-up: Skee Riegel

Key to win: Hogan started the final round one shot behind Riegel and Sam Snead and shot 68 without making a bogey.

Noteworthy: Hogan won his second major after his near-fatal car accident. The following year, he wrote a letter to Augusta National co-founder Cliff Roberts suggesting a dinner for all the Masters champions.

AP story: “Icicle-nerved Ben Hogan added a sensational flourish to one of the great comeback sagas in sports Sunday when he won his first Masters golf championship with a near-record 280. The gristly little man from Texas subdued Augusta National’s treacherous acres with a grim and meticulous last round 68, four under par golf that burned off all opposition. The 38-year-old National Open champion, winner of that crown twice and the PGA as many times, thus completed his slam of major American pro championships.”

50 years ago (1976)

Winner: Raymond Floyd

Score: 65-66-70-70—271

Margin: 8 shots

Prize: $40,000

Runner-up: Ben Crenshaw

Key to the win: Floyd made birdie or eagle on every par 5 through 54 holes in building an eight-shot lead. He tied the 72-hole record held by Jack Nicklaus.

Noteworthy: Floyd joined Craig Wood, Arnold Palmer and Nicklaus as the only wire-to-wire winners of the Masters. There would not be another one until Jordan Spieth in 2015.

AP story: “Ray Floyd — never pressured, never pushed — took a casual little stroll through the Georgia piney woods this sunny Sunday, paused to strike the golf ball 70 times and ambled home with perhaps the easiest Masters victory of all time. Floyd, a 33-year-old one-time playboy turned solid, sober family man, won this 40th renewal of golf’s annual spring rite with a 271 total, 17 under par and matching the tournament record for 72 holes set by Jack Nicklaus in 1965. Only handsome young Ben Crenshaw — who gave a flock of giggling girls a little thrill when he hiked his britches above his knees to wade into the pond on the 16th hole — could generate any challenge at all and that was much too little, much too late.”

25 years ago (2001)

Winner: Tiger Woods

Score: 70-66-68-68—272

Margin: 2 shots

Prize: $1,008,000.

Runner-up: David Duval

Key to the win: Woods was locked in a thriller with his two chief rivals, Duval and Phil Mickelson. They each made bogey on the par-3 16th and never caught up to Woods, who didn’t drop a shot over the last six holes. His second Masters title allowed him to hold all four majors at the same time.

Noteworthy: Woods swept the four majors with a combined score of 65-under par and had at least a share of the lead after 13 of the 16 rounds.

AP story: “Slam or not, Tiger Woods was simply grand. With a heart-stopper at Augusta National punctuated with a birdie at the end, Woods claimed the greatest feat in modern golf Sunday by winning the Masters, giving him a clean sweep of the four professional majors in a span of 294 days. Woods closed with a 68, steady down the haunting back nine of Augusta National as David Duval and Phil Mickelson failed to harness the magic that has carried Woods to five of the last six majors. The only thing left to debate is what to call this remarkable feat. Purists argue that a Grand Slam is accomplished in a calendar year. Woods, emotionally drained after a relentless battle from start to finish, stayed out of the argument. “I won four,” he said.”

20 years ago (2006)

Winner: Phil Mickelson

Score: 70-72-70-69—281

Margin: 2 shots

Prize: $1,260,000

Runner-up: Tim Clark

Key to the win: Mickelson had a one-shot lead and didn’t make a bogey until the final hole. Fred Couples had a 4-foot birdie putt on the 14th to pull within one shot and three-putted.

Noteworthy: After going more than a decade before winning a major, Mickelson won three of the last nine.

AP story: “Phil Mickelson is a Masters champion again, and now he’s making it look easy. Once known as a lovable loser who needed a dozen years to figure out how to win golf’s biggest events, Mickelson captured his second straight major Sunday at Augusta National, and this one was hardly a nail-biter. He closed with a 3-under 69 for a two-shot victory over Tim Clark, and his second green jacket in three years. There were no thrills for Phil, rather calculated shots that forced Fred Couples, Tiger Woods and Vijay Singh to try to catch him. Instead, they stumbled along with three-putts and a litany of other mistakes that allowed Mickelson to stroll up the 18th fairway already knowing how this major would end.”

10 years ago (2016)

Winner: Danny Willett

Score:70-74-72-67—283

Margin: 3 shots

Prize: $1,800,000

Runner-up: Jordan Spieth and Lee Westwood

Key to the win: Willett was five shots behind on the back nine when Spieth made bogeys at Nos. 10 and 11 and twice hit into Rae’s Creek to make a quadruple-bogey 7 on the par-3 12th. Willett shot 33 on the back with birdies on the 13th, 14th and 16th holes.

Noteworthy: Willett became the first Englishman to win the Masters since Nick Faldo in 1996. Willett played the final round with Westwood, who also would play the final round with the U.S. Open champion (Dustin Johnson) two months later.

AP story: “Jordan Spieth couldn’t bear to watch, turning his head before another shot splashed into Rae’s Creek. Moments later, Danny Willett looked up at the large leaderboard at the 15th green and couldn’t believe what he saw. This Masters turned into a shocker Sunday, right down to the green jacket ceremony. Spieth was in Butler Cabin, just like everyone expected when he took a five-shot lead to the back nine at Augusta National. Only he was there to present it to Willett, who seized on Spieth’s collapse with a magnificent round that made him a Masters champion.”

5 years ago (2021)

Winner: Hideki Matsuyama

Score: 69-71-65-73—278

Margin: 1 shot

Prize: $2,070,000

Runner-up: Will Zalatoris

Key to the win: Matsuyama might have won this Saturday with a bogey-free 65 to build a four-shot lead. He led by as many as six shots but effectively sealed it when Xander Schauffele hit into the water on the 16th and made triple bogey. Matsuyama bogeyed three of the last four holes.

Noteworthy: The victory came 10 years after Matsuyama made his debut at Augusta National as the Asia-Pacific Amateur champion. Matsuyama was the first Masters champion since Trevor Immelman in 2008 to be over par in the last round.

AP story: “Hideki Matsuyama delivered golf-mad Japan the grandest and greenest prize of all. Ten years after Matsuyama made a sterling debut as the best amateur at Augusta National, he claimed the ultimate trophy Sunday with a victory in the Masters to become the first Japanese winner of the green jacket. Matsuyama closed with a 1-over 73 and a one-shot victory that was only close at the end, and never seriously in doubt after Xander Schauffele’s late charge ended with a triple bogey on the par-3 16th. Moments before Dustin Johnson helped him into the green jacket, Matsuyama needed no interpreter in Butler Cabin when he said in English, ‘I’m really happy.’”