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By John Maginnes
PGATOUR.com Contributor

Monday morning I flew from summer to spring. As my plane was on final approach over central North Carolina, I was greeted by a collage of pastels. The dogwoods and azaleas smiled up to greet me in an array of beauty. Moving from the summer heat of Miami in late March to the beauty of the blooming Tar Heel state got me thinking.

Our John Maginnes prefers spring golf in the southeast. (Messerschmidt/WireImage)

For years the Greater Greensboro Open, now the Wyndham Championship, was the prelude to Augusta National and the Masters. But the weather in the southeast can be fickle in springtime. Seventy degrees and sunny one day can give way to 45 and raining the next. The old-timers on TOUR will remember snow that halted play in Greensboro a couple of decades ago.

In recent years, the AT&T Championship in Atlanta was the warm-up to the year's first major. The weather in Atlanta was always a bit suspect, as well. But that is what we came to expect from this time of year on the PGA TOUR in the southeast. The good days are the best days of the year. For some reason it is the bad days that get all the publicity.

Now things are different. The new PGA TOUR schedule keeps the players in perpetual summer. From Hawaii in January to Atlanta in September the forecast is for sunny skies and 80 degrees. Seeing the guys in Houston break out the sunscreen is nice. And as a broadcaster I love the fact that there haven't been any significant weather delays this year. But I miss springtime on the PGA TOUR. Augusta will certainly keep its plumage in bloom for the Masters next week but that is about it.

Don't get me wrong. I think that the new schedule is great for players and fans alike. I never particularly enjoyed playing in rain and wind when it was so cold you couldn't feel your fingers. But I think that there is a place for that in the game. When a player can fight through the bad days in spring and hold it together, he feels an incredible sense of accomplishment. On those days there is no time to stop and smell the flowers. But, oh on those good days...

There is nothing more beautiful to me than the bursts of color on a golf course in spring. In contrast to the glorious and brilliant blaze of colors in the fall, spring is more like a slow gradual warming of muted shades.

If the Wyndham Championship were played this week the players would have found conditions less than desirable. Although Wednesday was a picture-perfect day in full bloom, Thursday morning brought rain and cold to the Piedmont region of North Carolina. There's not much chance that it will be cold when the TOUR does come to Greensboro later this summer. The tournament, which has moved around the schedule for the past couple of years will be played in August.

I suppose the players prefer Texas in March to the southeast. I know that I would prefer to play in a golf shirt with my rain gear tucked snuggly in the belly of the bag -- just in case. The Shell Houston Open is a special event with a long and rich history. The week before a major is not the ideal spot on the schedule for any tournament. However, the Houston Golf Association has done an incredible job this week once again. The field is stronger than one might have expected. In addition to the PGA TOUR regulars, there is a strong international contingent this week trying to keep their games in shape for the year's first major.

Perhaps Houston should be the week before the Masters. In the early days of the TOUR, Greensboro flourished in that slot. More recently the AT&T Championship has put together a strong field in its pre-Augusta time slot. In addition to the great weather and sponsor, the golf course this week will win over a lot of players.

I suppose it is alright to sacrifice the purples of the red bud tree (don't ask) and the brilliant yellows of the forsythia for the blue skies of Texas this time of year. But let's not get started on the barbeque debate. For you folks up north, the word barbeque is a noun -- not a verb. In Texas they have beef barbeque that is good but in North Carolina we have pork which is out of this world.