MCKINNEY, TEXAS • Hideki Matsuyama has the simple goal of getting his game back in shape at the AT&T Byron Nelson, his first tournament since becoming the first Japanese player to win the Masters.

Local favorite Jordan Spieth didn’t intend to be away just as long but ended up getting COVID-19, while four-time major winner Brooks Koepka is ready for another test of a balky right knee that had him hobbling at Augusta National.

For all three major champions, the return of the Nelson after a coronavirus cancellation in 2020 — and now the second relocation of the event since 2018 — comes with eyes on next week’s PGA Championship.

Matsuyama returned to Japan after winning the Masters and had to quarantine for two weeks before getting to celebrate the victory in his golf-loving home country.

“Not picking up a club very much over there, I didn’t get to practice very much at all,” Matsuyama said Tuesday through

an interpreter. “And then coming back here, and I’m just, really one of my goals now is just to try to find my game again.”

When defending champion Sung Kang won his first PGA Tour event at the Nelson two years ago, it was the first time the Dallas-area tournament was played the week before the PGA, which Koepka won for his fourth victory in a span of nine majors.

Koepka played this year’s Masters less than a month after surgery to repair a dislocated right knee cap along with ligament issues. The 31-yearold says he is on the mend.

“Still be a while before I’m 100%,” said Koepka, who has finished in the top 16 three times in five previous Nelsons. “It’s dramatically better than it was at Augusta. I’m ahead of schedule.”

The TPC Craig Ranch course in Mckinney, about 30 miles north of Dallas, is the 10th venue in the history of a tournament that dates to 1944.

Top-ranked Dustin Johnson withdrew, citing knee discomfort. The remaining top 10 players in the field are Jon Rahm (No. 3), former SMU player Bryson Dechambeau (5) and Koepka (10).