This year’s Shell Houston Open during the first week of April is shaping up to have its best field in over 20 years. The Chron’s Steve Campbell reports:

Tournament director Steve Timms announced another flurry of player commitments Monday that includes No. 13 Paul Casey, No. 15 Steve Stricker, No. 22 K.J. Choi and former British Open champions Justin Leonard (No. 25) and Ben Curtis (No. 32).

With nearly a full month until the April 2-5 event at the Redstone Golf Club Tournament Course, the SHO has commitments from four of the world’s top eight players (Sergio Garcia, Padraig Harrington, Henrik Stenson and Robert Karlsson) and 13 of the top 30. And that’s not even taking into account former No. 1 Greg Norman making one of his infrequent appearances to tune up for the Masters. [.  .  .] What’s more, Timms has plenty reason to hope No. 3 Phil Mickelson, No. 4 Geoff Ogilvy and defending Masters champion Trevor Immelman (No. 29) will submit their entries by the March 27 deadline. That trio of major champions teed it up at Redstone last year, after all. 

The SHO is one top-30 player away from having the most in its field since 1986 — the first year of the world rankings.  .   .   . Just three years ago, only four top-30 players teed it up at the SHO.

In the era of the Tiger Chasm, that’s a darn good field. It’s looking as if the SHO’s recent move to the week before The Masters, coupled with The Players Tournament moving to mid-May, is really paying dividends. The Houston Golf Association’s attention to good conditioning of the Tournament Course at Redstone hasn’t hurt in attracting top players, either.

But think of the quality of the field that the SHO might attract if it was played on a golf course that the Tour players really enjoyed.

Another consequence of bad decisions?