Feb 24, 2018 By Mike Dudurich for The 4 min read

We have arrived at that antsy time of year for recreational golfers in western Pennsylvania.

We’ve been watching professional golf since the first of the year from showy, sunny places starting in Hawai’i, moving to California and currently in Florida. That’s part of the natural process of nature every year and have grudgingly accepted that process.

And then comes a day like Tuesday when the temperature hits 80, the sun shone brightly and there were golfers on golf courses all over the place. Conditions weren’t exactly perfect with the ground being so soft, but that didn’t matter to the anxious golfers.

Soft spikes and golf hats were exchanged for boots and rain jackets. Ark-building began later in the week in anticipation of the expected downpours of the weekend.

It is western Pennsylvania after all.

That’s why I don’t play until at least late March … unless of course I’m somewhere south of the Mason-Dixon line.

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I wonder what ever happened to Adam Scott.

I know he got married and is now the father of a couple children.

But that’s the extent of my knowledge other than since his win at the 2013 Masters, he’s won three times in what will be five years in April.

That’s not very many wins for a guy as talented as Scott is.

His wins since getting his green jacket came at the 2014 Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial and the 2016 Honda Classic and the World Golf Championships-Cadillac Championship.

Scott never was a slave to the PGA Tour, but since the start of the tour’s wraparound season, he played just twice last fall and twice this season.

He’s playing this week at the Honda Classic, shooting rounds of 73-72, good enough to make the cut on the number.

I don’t know, he just doesn’t seem like that intimidating guy who came out of that 2013 season. The clock is ticking on the chances the 37-year-old Australian becoming the dominating player he was expected to be.

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This is what can happen when a golf tournament is contested on a golf course that’s very susceptible to wind (but then aren’t all Florida courses?) and there’s water everywhere.

The Honda Classic is this week’s offering on the PGA Tour and it’s played on the Champion Course at PGA National. The winds gusted to 30 miles per hour on Friday and the co-leaders, Luke List and Jamie Lovemark, are at 3-under par.

You have to go down to T7 to find one of the name players and that would be Justin Thomas, who shot 67 in the first round and came back to 72 in the second. Rickie Fowler made six birdies on the front nine and shot 77 to miss the cut.

If you watch any of today’s final round, you’ll probably see some putting surfaces that look more khaki than green, and combine those with the wind and the water and you’ve heard a fair amount of grumbling about how difficult the course is.

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This week’s Tiger update: Woods shot 71 on Friday, which might have been better than Thursday’s 70, given the conditions. His accuracy from the tee and with his approach shots were still somewhat erratic, but he did scramble fairly well. He bombed a tee shot on the 10th, one that measured 361 yards when it came back to earth and stopped rolling.

Progress continues to be made, but plenty of work remains until he’s ready for the Masters. Woods needs more reps, competing and getting rounds in. Traditionally, he’s not played very much leading up to Augusta, other than some appearances at the Arnold Palmer Bay Hill Invitational.

He’s always coy about when his next appearance might be, but perhaps he might play in the World Golf Championship event in Mexico in the beginning of March.

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Do you have an interesting story about your club or course or an individual who has done something special? Let me know. Send your story ideas to mike.dudurich@gmail.com.