BUBBA Watson is your typical all-American guy.

Take him out of the good old US of A for any length of time and he will burst into tears at the first sight of a Star Spangled Banner fluttering in the breeze of a foreign country.

When the reigning Masters champ-ion made a rare foray on to European soil in 2011 for the French Open, he was hardly gushing with praise about the monuments and grand edifices of Paris. There was, as he said "a big tower", which certainly wasn't Blackpool, "an arch, or whatever I rode around in a circle" and then something "that starts with an 'L' ... Louvre or something like that? One of those." It was hardly an application for a job with the French Tourist Board.

He would not get a post with Visit Scotland either. "I still feel like a kid when I get to Augusta; it's the home of golf, it's the mecca of golf," said Watson, with little regard to the small nation that bequeathed the game to the world. When he pitches up in the real home of golf for this year's Open Championship at St Andrews, he will probably be greeted by an angry mob of historians brandishing mashie niblicks and copies of "The Pictorial Guide to a Royal & Ancient Game".

Watson has made Augusta National his own home of golf, of course. This week, the 36-year-old from Florida will be aiming for a third Masters victory in four years. He may be the defending champion but Watson has, in many ways, been relegated to the margins as the build up to the opening Major of the 2015 campaign intensifies. The small matter of Rory McIlroy, the world No 1, attempting to complete the career Grand Slam at the age of just 25 has grabbed all the attention of an increasingly rabid media while the 'will he, won't he' saga surrounding Tiger Woods' appearance was the talk of the golfing steamie until Friday when he confirmed he would indeed compete.

Having donned golf's most sought-after jacket two times, Watson is in distinguished company with the list of multiple champions reading like a who's who of golfing greats.

"I never thought I would win it twice, so I can't believe that we are talking about it three times," said Watson of the prospect of a hat-trick of Masters triumphs. "It would be crazy to do that. Some of the names that I'm already with, and some of the names that I could be with if I did win it a third time, would be unheard of and something I've never dreamed of. You know, I'm from a small town, a guy named Bubba, who never had a lesson. It was a dream to just play on the PGA Tour. Somehow now, I've managed to get two Masters jackets. It's pretty wild and pretty crazy stuff."

Wild and crazy? That just about sums up Watson's golf game at times. Thunderous thumps off the tee and bold, boisterous recovery shots are Bubba trademarks. In 2012, when Watson claimed his first Masters crown, his audacious, hooked wedge from the pine straw that arced up, over and around the trees to the right of the 10th hole and plonked itself down within 15-feet of the cup set up his remarkable play-off win over Louis Oosthuizen. That particular spot, tucked away in the kind of deep, wooded area that those well-kent Teddy Bears would have a picnic, has now become a place of worship for eager spectators. Like the Ganges or Graceland, it is a site for an annual pilgrimage as they stand there in wonderment and ask themselves "how the hell did he pull that one off"?

"It's Augusta National, so my juices start flowing," said Watson, as he mulled over that spectacular salvage operation that was a chart topper on Bubba's hit parade. "And sometimes I've been able to pull off some of the shots that you shouldn't be able to pull off just because of my energy level and I get pumped up and become a kid again. Who doesn't want to be a member there? Who doesn't want to be able to play there? And who doesn't want to put on that Green Jacket? Everybody gets excited there."

The excitement is certainly building around McIlroy and his quest to win all four Major prizes. Speak to anybody in golf and they will say it is only a matter of time before the young Northern Irishman wins at Augusta on a course that suits his game perfectly. Whether it comes this week, next year or the year after, there is a general consensus that a Green Jacket will be hanging in McIlroy's wardrobe one of these days.

"He's so young, he's going to have year after year after year to try to win a Grand Slam," said Watson. "He's 25 years old, so for him to do it at that age, or even have a chance of doing it at such a young age, is unheard of. At 25, I was barely keeping my tour card. What a talent he is. He's got years, he's got his whole life to try to win the Masters but obviously he's going to put pressure on himself to do it. Who doesn't want to do that?"

Of course, in this fickle pursuit of wildly fluctuating fortunes, nothing is guaranteed and the only certainty is the uncertainty.

"Now, am I going to wake up feeling my best," pondered Watson ahead of his title defence. "Am I going to wake up thinking my best? Am I going to wake up performing at the top of my game that week? Who knows, I don't know that, I can't tell that, you and I can't tell you who is going to do that."

A week tonight, we will all know the answer.