Tour Scene News round-up: Not one major - or, at least, not one real one - has taken place yet, writes Philip Reid.
However, Padraig Harrington's mind, so often focused in the present, is cast forward to the season's fourth and final major, the US PGA, which takes place at Rochester in upstate New York in five months time. The reason for such forward thinking is his wife, Caroline, is due to give birth to the couple's first baby on August 18th, the day after the championship finishes.
Harrington, who, at number eight, is now the top European golfer in the world rankings, has no intention of not playing, however. Unlike Phil Mickelson, who withdrew from last week's Players' Championship after his wife gave birth to their third child on the Sunday beforehand, Harrington says, "anyone who knows Caroline knows she'll be kicking me out the door to play."
He expanded: "It's five months away and we will cross that bridge when we come to it but, as of now, the US PGA is included in my itinerary. If I start the tournament and am going well, I won't be flying home.
"You never can tell what the future holds but my intention is to travel, to play, and not to return home."
To understand his reasoning, you have to understand the unique partnership that exists between the two. In many ways, they are a team and Caroline is committed to Harrington's dedication that has seen him establish himself as one of the top players.
Sunday's joint-second place finish to Davis Love III in the Players' Championship at the TPC at Sawgrass, an event commonly called the "fifth major", contained further evidence that the 31-year-old Dubliner is on an upward graph.
For the first time, he is the leading European golfer in the world; his runners-up finish at Sawgrass - the 17th of his career in official European Tour and US Tour events - earned him enough points to leapfrog Spain's Sergio Garcia. Harrington moved from 10th to eighth position, but he isn't entirely happy with that. "I'm happy in that it is a new milestone for me. I hadn't got it in my list of goals for the season, but I'm going to add it on now. It's number 17.
"It is nice to be the top European player in the world but, to be honest, I would like to be the top European player at a higher ranking than this. That's what I want. The past few months have been tough watching the world rankings and I've been dripping, dripping, dripping points . . . it's good to be moving in the right direction again."
Yesterday, Harrington moved on to his next destination, Atlanta - where he will compete in this week's BellSouth Classic - and, then, he heads to Augusta for the tournament which has been the main focus of his early-season, the US Masters. "I'm looking forward to playing the BellSouth. Ultimately, I'll be trying to get my head in shape for the Masters, and I have a good bit of work to do preparation-wise for Augusta, but, hopefully, I'll have another good week to tire myself out even more," he said.
His tied-second place finish in the Players' - which earned him $572,000 (his three-wood tee-shot into the water on the 72nd hole, which he bogeyed, effectively cost him $148,000 for not securing the runners-up spot on his own rather than sharing with Jay Haas) - was achieved after a relatively slow start to the season, in which he had failed to secure a top-10 finish in his previous four tournaments.
Yet, Harrington insists he is "still a work in progress," and hasn't reached his full potential. "I take a lot of confidence from this. It is only when you get into contention that you can judge how your game stands. I know I need to improve certain things both on the physical swing and the mental game . . . but I can recognise those and work at them through this week and, hopefully, not inhibit my chances of playing well next week either.
"In all areas of my game, I would suggest I am ahead of where I was this time last year. My short game, putting, my mental game, my swing. That's nice and comforting. It doesn't always mean you are going to stay improved throughout the year and have better results, but at this stage of the year, when you've gone through your mental preparation and you're out playing again, all you can ask for is that you've improved," he insisted.
Harrington, though, has no intention of making a more permanent move to the US Tour. "All I can say is that I wish there were more weeks in the year," he said. "I really like playing over here (in America). It really suits me. I like the short game requirements, the conditions.
"And if you look at me, I've developed my game so I can play better over here. When I first came over five years ago, I saw the inadequacies of my game and set about developing my swing in order to prepare for the courses in the States.
"But it is very difficult to find the time to play more here than I intend. I'm playing more here this year than last year - I think up to 14 tournaments, if you include Tiger's Target world challenge at the end of the season and the World Cup - and that means that I am playing close to half my schedule here."
While Harrington moves on to the second event in a three-week stint in the States, Darren Clarke - who finished tied-sixth, earning $225,875 - flew home for a few days rest in London before returning to Augusta for the Masters on Sunday. "I'm moving in the right way . . . my swing is getting better, my ball-striking is getting better and I am definitely going in the right way. I've been hitting the ball really well and I just want to continue doing what I have been doing and, hopefully, the results will come," said Clarke.
