Butch Harmon: Dustin Johnson the player to beat at the Masters

The No. 3 player in the world arrived at the Masters this week with the health of his mother, Dening, weighing heavily on his mind.

Butch Harmon laughs at the notion that Johnson lacks the right intelligence to be a major force.

It may have been only a practice round, but Jordan Spieth proved on his return to the site of his US Masters collapse that he has moved on from the disastrous sequence that cost him a win previous year.

Rory McIlroy has turned Augusta into a second home over the last few weeks, twice flying in for marathon practice rounds that allowed him to play 99 holes in his preparation for the Masters.

That started Tuesday with a simple event of skipping the ball off the pond at Augusta National.

“The thing I am most excited about is teeing up and getting on that first hole Thursday and hitting some shots for real”. But he’s in some pretty elite company at the moment with how he’s playing. He was eventually joined by former rivals Nicklaus and Player, reconnecting a Big Three that combined to win 34 major championships.

“I know that we take it for granted”, he said about his profession.

Rickie Fowler referred to Johnson this week as “just insane”. “It’s time now for him to move on and challenge himself to the next level”, said Scott.

Johnson chuckled at that reference during his appearance in the Masters interview area Tuesday.

“And I think it showed from how well I’ve been swinging the past few weeks and then heading [in] the right direction coming into this week”, he said.

“They are also such nice guys”. “If you want to win, you ve got to drive it well, you re going to have to hit your irons well. Some days I would wake up and I would feel really, really bad and sad about what’s going on with my mom and other days I would wake up and then I would start feeling guilt because I don’t think — I didn’t feel like I was feeling bad enough for the situation that my mom was going through”. “I’ve been working hard on it”. I feel selfish being there playing and I was stuck between two worlds. It s a lot of fun.

While everyone walks on eggshells not wanting to focus on what happened previous year, Spieth just needs to go back playing his game.

He certainly looks like one of the players to beat this week, even though he ceded the No. 1 spot in the world rankings to Dustin Johnson. That was Tiger Woods in 2002. But that has not stopped oddsmakers from making them the top two betting favorites to win their first green jacket on Sunday with first-round play starting Thursday.

But his emotions were admittedly confused when he drove up Magnolia Lane the first time he returned after last year’s collapse. He missed the cut and finished the year at No. 51. “Past couple of years, I think I’ve been in the top 10 for a while”.

Jason Day had a tough time both on and off the course at the WGC match play tournament in March.

Even the weather is on Johnson’s side this week.

Augusta National was also forced to close Monday because of heavy rains.

Players like world number one Dustin Johnson, McIlroy, Day and the likes of world number four Hideki Matsuyama are playing golf “as good as we’ve ever seen this year”, he said. “My short game is going to be very important around here”.