PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. – Relegated to the middle seat for a flight from Atlanta to San Jose, Calif., would seemingly rate as poor travel-planning.

But Jonathan Byrd said that was nothing when compared to the travel woes he experienced the day before as he forgot his passport and couldn’t go through with a flight out of the country.

That both travel negatives have been offset by a huge positive – a spot in the field at this week’s AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am – is just another page in the life of a PGA TOUR veteran trying to manage his career without full status.

“I’ve never done that before,” Byrd said of getting to the airport in Jacksonville, Fla., Monday morning and discovering that he did not have his passport. “I had to call my car service and ask the guy to turn around and give me a ride back (to his home in St. Simons Island, Ga.) But, in the end, it has worked out well.”

Byrd, who in 2018-19 is playing out of the past champion category, was not originally in the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am field, so he entered the Panama Championship on the Web.com Tour. The forgotten passport made Monday’s flight out of Jacksonville a moot point, so Byrd figured he’d return to Sea Island for some practice and decide whether to try the Panama flight Tuesday.

“When I got home, I had a call waiting from the TOUR, saying I was in the (AT&T) field,” said Byrd.

Hello, Monterey Peninsula, where Byrd will make his 13th appearance in the iconic pro-am and his fifth start on the PGA TOUR this season.

Had he remembered his passport and made the flight to Panama, then received word that he was in the field at the AT&T, Byrd said he would have likely stayed to play in the Web.com Tour tournament. So, clearly this week at Pebble Beach is a product of an unplanned mistake, which led to this Tweet by Byrd Monday afternoon: “God always had a bigger plan.”

As for the middle seat from Atlanta to San Jose, Byrd shrugged. He handled it nicely. Then he smiled and said it was probably rougher for his instructor, Daniel Gray. “He was in the last row,” laughed Byrd.

Then again, it’s Pebble Beach, so all is good.