Associated Press
Wednesday, March 8

CORAL SPRINGS, Fla. -- Sandwiched between some of the PGA Tour's premier events, the Honda Classic entices few of the tour's top players.

The schedule causes many of the elite players to skip the Honda, taking a week off before playing in the Bay Hill Invitational, The Players Championship and the BellSouth Classic -- all tuneups for The Masters, the first of the four majors.

It also doesn't help that many players find the Honda Classic course, the TPC at Heron Bay, somewhat boring.

"The golf course is, if you ask anyone over here, not one of the top 10s," said Vijay Singh. "But the conditions are very difficult when you play."

The course is flat with few features. No scenic mountains. No ocean views. Not even a big clubhouse.

All Heron Bay has is wind.

Though challenging, strong winds that seem to disrupt almost every shot are hardly a draw.

"I like it a lot better than what I thought I was going to like it," Davis Love III said. "The stories, the opinions, have gotten blown out of proportion. Everybody made it worse than it really is.

"It's a flat piece of land, and no matter what you do, it is going to be basically a pretty flat golf course. And until stuff gets built up, there's not much view around it."

The Honda, which begins Thursday, has perhaps the weakest field in its 28-year history and maybe the weakest on the PGA Tour this year.

Only three of the top 10 players in the World Rankings -- Love (4), Singh (5) and Jim Furyk (9) -- are participating. The 144-man field includes just 11 of the top 50.

Though the course's design has drawbacks, the PGA Tour schedule is the biggest factor keeping players like Tiger Woods, David Duval and Phil Mickelson from playing at Heron Bay this week.

Coming off the long, West Coast swing that started the season and following the historic Doral Open, many players are taking time off before gearing up for The Players Championship and The Masters.

Most of the PGA's elite will play in the Bay Hill Invitational, Arnold Palmer's tournament, next week in Orlando. Then, continuing the East Coast swing, they will play in The Players Championship in Jacksonville.

Bay Hill has Palmer, and The Players Championship has a $6 million purse, one of the biggest on tour. The winner of The Players Championship also gets a five-year exemption on tour.

The Honda Classic, meanwhile, offers a $2.9 million purse and plenty of wind.

"Long term, it's something we have to look at," PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem said. "There are some issues we need to look at from a scheduling standpoint. We're working on Honda to improve things."

Stuart Appleby, Carlos Franco and Hal Sutton join Furyk, Love and Singh as the most notable players in this week's field.

Furyk is looking for back-to-back wins. He birdied five of the last seven holes last week in the Doral Open to overcome a six-stroke deficit and beat Franklin Langham.

Love is looking for his first win since 1998. And Singh, the defending champion, is looking for a repeat win at the Honda.

"If you look at the field over here, it is not as strong as what other tournaments are," Singh said. "But it's going to be a pretty good test of golf if the wind blows like it did last year."