For ex-Bulldog, long drives are just elementary

LA JOLLA, Calif. - The biggest word resonating on the PGA Tour these days isn't Tiger or Phil or Finchem or FedEx. It's Bubba.

Yes, there is a whole lot of Bubba Watson going on and on and on, like one of his prodigious drives. The former disgruntled Georgia Bulldog is the hottest thing to hit professional golf since massive titanium drivers.

Whether he's the flavor of the month or the next big thing remains to be seen.

"It's kind of sad, isn't it?" Watson said of all the attention since his booming PGA Tour debut in Hawaii. "Nobody cared about me three weeks ago."

What was there to care about, really? Watson hasn't won anything since turning pro in 2001 after being benched his final season at Georgia. All he's ever done is hit the ball a freakishly long way.

Then he got his PGA Tour card, thanks to Jason Gore getting an early promotion in 2005, making room for one more Nationwide Tour graduate. In short order, Watson got hot overseas, lost in a playoff to Robert Allenby at the Australian Masters and finished fourth in the Sony Open in Hawaii.

"It's a little overwhelming," said his wife, Angie, a former Georgia and WNBA player.

Watson himself is overwhelming. Suddenly, that Bubba style - a 398-yard drive among four that cleared 360 at sea level in Hawaii - is all the rage. He's been featured in every major golf publication and newspaper, and his fellow pros can't stop talking about him.

"This guy can play ... and he's a character on top of that," said Tiger Woods, no slouch with the long ball himself.

"I can't even come close to the unsightly distances that Bubba Watson hits it," said Phil Mickelson, who got his first taste of Bubba-ball at University Golf Course in Athens, Ga. "I couldn't hang with him."

Bubba is pretty proud of that. He relishes being the show, and he won't hesitate to throw his length in everyone's face.

When the show took the first tee Thursday on the Torrey Pines North Course, a large gallery flocked to see him.

He immediately duck-hooked a driver into a tree 160 yards away.

The next hole, he flew a driver green high right on a 345-yard par 4.

Watson - dubbed Bubba by his dad on the day he was born because "I was real big and ugly" - boasts of never having a formal golf lesson in his life and teaching himself how to work a golf ball by beating wiffle balls around the house for hours as a kid.

"If it ever comes to where I need a lesson, I'm retiring," he said.

The only teacher he's ever had was his father, Gerry, who gave him his first club and said "hit it as hard as you can and then you can learn to hit it straight."

He's 6-foot-3 and 180 pounds, but with long arms and a backswing longer than John Daly's, he produces such a wide arc that his ball speed has been clocked at 195 mph - about 10 mph faster than that of Woods.

He averaged a whopping 334 yards off the tee on the Nationwide Tour in 2005 and holds the record on that tour with a 422-yarder in 2004 at the Gila River Golf Classic.

Despite his two-year Georgia pedigree, Watson isn't too fond of his experience in Athens. He's proud of being one credit shy of a diploma there.

"I didn't want to graduate from Georgia; I'm not happy about that school," he said.

It's really the golf program Watson didn't like; a rift with coach Chris Haack that left him not playing his last year. But as good-ol'-boy as he seems, Watson didn't really fit in with the college party culture.

He calls himself a "new-age redneck."

"I don't fish. I don't hunt. I don't drink beer. I've never partied and NASCAR is not my thing," Bubba said.

Even so, he's already endeared himself to the same fans that elevated a true bubba like Daly to blue-collar cult status. He doesn't lift weights or spend much more than a few minutes on the driving range, but fans are already flocking to see him hit it as hard as he can.

"A guy named Bubba should be the future of the tour," Watson said, proudly acknowledging the raucous support he now hears whenever he pulls out a driver. "It's good to hear, but until I win and prove myself, length doesn't get you the record, it doesn't get you in the Hall of Fame, doesn't get you anything."

For now, it gets him noticed. And in a button-down PGA Tour world, that's a big step for a Bubba from Bagdad, Fla., via Athens, Ga.

Reach Scott Michaux at (706) 823-3219 or scott.michaux@augustachronicle.com.