Don't Be Shocked If Dufner Tees Off Early Saturday

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Nice use of Twitter by Jason Dufner to lobby for a shortened Northwestern Mutual World Challenge so that the famous Auburn grad can watch the team he spoke to earlier this year play in the SEC Championship game.

And nice use of Twitter by Tiger Woods to quickly shoot down Dufner's request for an Auburn-shortened 36-hole event.

PGATour.com with all the details.

Bad news for Duf: cold temperatures make frost delays almost inevitable this week. That's not stopping him from an onslaught, later Tweeting a cryptic warning that Saturday at Sherwood could be a "Caddyshack Saturday."

Adam & Rory Set For Australian Open Weekend Duel

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After a second round 65 at Royal Sydney Rory McIlroy has moved to within two shots of leader Adam Scott, reports Martin Blake.

Scott is making his final start of 2013 and attempting to win the Australian triple crown after capturing the Australian Masters and Australian PGA.

Also of note: U.S. Amateur semi-finalist Brady Watt is tied for fifth at six-under par and 15-year-old Ryan Ruffels, who was discussed on this week's State of the Game, also made the cut. Mike Clayton reports on Ruffels' impressive second round 68.

State Of The Game Podcast 31: David Eger

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A lot about David Eger was learned in his recent Golf Digest My Shot, but we decided to have the Champions Tour player and former USGA/PGA Tour executive on to talk about a variety of subjects. Yes, the Tiger drop at the Masters is revisited, as are the usual State of The Game issues. Eger is one of the more interesting figures in the game and certainly a player who has the experience and knowlege to back up his opinions. I think you'll enjoy hearing from him.

As always, you can listen and subscribe via iTunes, download the MP3, download prior episodes here or hit the play button below:

Video & Roundup: Lyle's Emotional Return

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From Martin Blake's account of Jarrod Lyle's return to golf:

And tear up he did. "It was nice to get out there and see everybody that I love standing around the tee, and even people that I've never met before,'' he said later. "The crowd at the first tee was something that I wasn't expecting. To hear Lusi (his infant daughter) call out 'Daddy' ... I turned around and thought 'I'd better give her one last cuddle'. That was the end of me once that happened. I was an absolute mess. I hit that first tee shot with tears through my eyes. Normally I would've backed off but I thought 'I just want to get it over with'.''

Bruce Matthews in the Herald Sun includes many photos and video.

Brent Read in The Australian documents Lyle's return and reports the first tee moment proved emotional for his playing partners.

Even his playing partners were battling to contain their emotions.

"It hit me harder than I thought it might," said Geoff Ogilvy.

"I felt myself wanting to look away. I didn't really know how it was going to be. Two years ago the Presidents Cup first tee, the atmosphere was incredible.

"This was more moving. Everyone feels like they're part of the whole story."

The story only got better from there. Lyle walked off the first with par and then lashed another drive down the fairway at the 2nd. Among the gallery was jockey Glen Boss, who has become friends with Lyle during his fight with cancer. Lyle made a beeline for the hoop to shake hands.

And Matt Murnane in the Sydney Morning Herald:

On the second hole, a former world No.1 and three-time major winner was getting set to drive and the layout of this course means he have right of way.

There were 28 people in the gallery following the legendary Vijay Singh.

Why so many? Oh sorry, go on...

Too many to count had their eyes fixed on Lyle.

The Victorian two-putted for a par, picked up his ball and raised it to his supporters.
As he headed to the second, a fan with impeccable timing summed it up nicely: "Welcome back, Jarrod."

Welcome back indeed.

Golf Channel, which resumes coverage tonight at 9 pm ET, has posted the entire video of Lyle's first tee shot and it's definitely worth a couple of minutes of your time:

Sergio Believes The Days Of Fried Chicken Jokes Are Behind Him

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Shane O'Donoghue got Sergio for a one-on-one to talk about the state of all things Garcia and to find out what exactly he learned from uttering a racially insensitive joke at Wentworth last May, which subsequently led to embarrassing remarks from European Tour Commish George O'Grady.

"I didn't mean it in a bad way. When I was driving back to the hotel, I started thinking about it," Garcia told Shane O'Donoghue.

Nice to know the dead silence in the room took that long to sink in! Oh, and it's still Steve Sands' fault.

"Obviously, I didn't expect that question at all and you try to be funny and it comes out the wrong way I guess," he added.

And Mr. Contrite:

"It was horrible, but what's done is done. Everybody knows how I feel about it, so I think they should be fine with it and if not, it's kind of their problem," he said.

"The most important thing is learning from all those things.

"I'm making sure that all those experiences make you stronger, a better person and things like that. I think that I've learned from those things and I just need to keep getting better at it, and hopefully keep making people happy."

If you have sixty seconds or so of your life to never to enjoy again: