OVER THE NEXT TWO SEASONS, Weir's continued success fed Canada's expectations. He ended 2000 and 2001 with significant victories at the World Golf Championships-American Express in Spain and the Tour Championship in Houston. He was a member of the 2000 Presidents Cup team and among the top 10 players in the world rankings by 2001.

But Weir's climb stalled in 2002. It was a season Weir described as irritable and no fun - as if he were "trying to reinvent the wheel."

His confidence sagged in a year when he posted zero top-10 finishes in 25 events. The short game and putting that had characterized his ascent lost their sharpness. He slipped to 78th on the money list and 35th in the world rankings.

Meanwhile, fellow Canadian Ian Leggatt won a PGA Tour event and started siphoning some of the adulation that had been all Weir's. He was disappointed as much for Canadian fans as for himself.

"I felt like I kind of let them down last year," he said. "I did have to do a little soul-searching and rededicate myself and motivate myself to get back to where I wanted to be."

In his second event of 2003, Weir rallied to win the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic. Playing with Gretzky - now a familiar friend - the next week, Weir finished third in the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. Two weeks later, he rallied again to beat Charles Howell in a playoff at the Nissan Open.

The first Canadian since George Knudson to win twice in one PGA season came to the Masters brimming with confidence. After all, he had built a special coat rack in his new basement office just in case he had a green jacket to hang on it.

"All of those little small victories kind of pay off in big-time situations," Weir said. "So when I was there at Augusta with the chance to do it on the last four or five holes, I felt comfortable trying to execute it. It's not always going to happen that way, but I felt like I was able to do it, and there's a big difference there."

Weir says being in the hunt at a major and pulling it off "was better than I thought it would be."

"It was a long road, and it took me six years just to even get on the tour out of college," he said. "It's an unbelievable progression that I've finally gotten here, but I think even back then I believed that I would get here somehow."

Sometime between Woods' slipping the green jacket on Weir's shoulders and his contingent's failed quest to scrounge up some Canadian beer on a Sunday night in Augusta, another post-major phone call arrived. This wasn't Prime Minister Jean Chretien, who caught Weir earlier in the Butler Cabin.

It was Gretzky again, with a message that was much different and even more welcomed than in 1999. This time Gretzky shared a story about the aftermath of Canada's gold medal Olympic triumph.

"I kind of didn't understand it in some sense because I was so close to it," Gretzky said of the country's reaction. "But when he won the Masters, I understood what Canadian fans felt like. I felt like I had won the Masters myself."

Rich Weir congratualtes his son, Mike Weir (Stats | Bio) , after he won the playoff during the 2003 Masters Tournament. (Chris Thelen/Augusta Chronicle)

AT THAT 1999 PGA CHAMPIONSHIP, Weir was asked how he thought Canadians might react if he were to become their first major golf champion.

"That's a good question," he said. "I don't know how it would be. It might not be much at all, but it might be crazy. I hope I can do it and find out."

Four years later he found out, and the reaction was indeed crazy.

On the Monday after the Masters, he flew from Augusta to Toronto for a prearranged commitment to sign autographs at a Sears department store launching his new golf equipment line.

Wearing his green jacket, he signed autographs in front of the store's sporting goods section. The crowd formed a line that could wrap around a city block.

"Mike! Mike! Mike! Mike!" they chanted before Weir was finally introduced to a thundering ovation. Shrieks of "Leftyyyyy!" and "Go Canucks!" echoed throughout the department store.

Fans climbed atop display tables filled with dishes and stemware and stood on top of riding lawn mowers just to get a peek at the Masters champion, whose autograph only a fraction might receive.

"They were climbing over clothes and china and all over the place," his mother said. "They figured the place was going to be destroyed. They did not expect it."

"It was destructive," said Weir. "It was a crazy day. That's where it kind of hit me how big it was to everybody. People were lined up the escalator. People couldn't move it was so jam packed."

After that scene, Weir was invited to the Maple Leafs playoff game at the Air Canada Centre to drop the ceremonial puck. Still wearing the green jacket, he received a rousing 90-second standing ovation from the 19,000 fans.

"They just went wild," his father said. "He was a little embarrassed by it, honestly. He doesn't care for it too much. Well, he's just modest and uncomfortable in situations like that."

"To get that ovation was really special," Weir said. "I never expected that kind of support."

THE REACTION IN SARNIA was incredible.

Ron Dann, the operations manager at Radio Sarnia/Lambton, watched "every second" of Weir's win at home with his two children. After the playoff, Dann said, the whole town erupted.

"You could hear the cheers," he said. "People were driving around honking car horns. People went outside and started talking to each other about it."

Weir's hometown was still abuzz about its Masters champion in September as the Bell Canadian Open geared up two hours east in Hamilton. The local Brights Grove post office still stamps letters with a postmark commemorating its hometown hero.

"People are still talking about Augusta and Mike winning," Bennett said. "It's a hockey community, but now we're noted as where the Masters champion comes from. People now know where Sarnia is."

The Zehr's grocery store up the road from Weir's St. Clair Secondary School still had a giant "Congratulations Mike Weir (Stats | Bio) " sign painted on its window long after Weir came home for his annual charity golf tournament.

Strangers come up to Weir's parents all the time and tell them how special the Masters win was to them.

"One man came up and told us his wife would never watch golf before, but now she never misses a tournament on TV," said Rosalie Weir. "An 80-year-old woman was upset that Mike doesn't play every week."

At the Huron Oaks club lounge, they advertise food and draft beer specials and prizes every Sunday "if Huron Oaks' own Mike Weir (Stats | Bio) " is within eight strokes of the lead in any tournament. On Masters Sunday, the lounge was overflowing with about 150 O Canada!-singing fans.

"The crowd up there was nuts," said former Huron Oaks pro John Limb.

Business is booming at the Holiday Inn course where Weir played his first round of golf at age 8. Tee times were booked solid on a Wednesday afternoon in September for the nine-hole executive course adjacent to a marina.

"I tell kids, 'Did you know this was where Mike Weir (Stats | Bio) first played golf?'" said Karen Baxter, who works at the Holiday Inn pro shack and likes to offer left-handed balls to naive youngsters. "Nobody knew before. More and more do now. It's more publicized."

Weir's magnetism was evident at the annual charity tournament he holds at Huron Oaks with Sarnia's own NHL star, Dino Ciccarelli. Eight years ago, the event drew crowds measured in the dozens. In July, more than 5,000 showed up, including 45 media members, raising more than $125,000 for the Dreams For Kids Foundation.

"The first couple of years it was kind of a struggle trying to get celebrities in here and even one or two cameras," said Ciccarelli, who has ceded his No. 1 star status at the event. "Obviously because of Mike this thing has gotten bigger and better every year."

Other than for his charity event and the occasional Christmas, Weir has a hard time going home to Sarnia. In Draper, Utah, they named the road leading to his former house after him, but he's generally left alone. The only fan to intrude on his residence and ask for an autograph after the Masters was Canadian, of course.It's different in Canada.

"Once the word gets out that he's in town it's just crazy," his mother said. "He can't relax. It's really too bad. We keep the drapes down. People come to the door and leave stuff for him to sign."

WEIR NOW HAS A TASTE of what life is like for Tiger Woods (Stats | Bio) . During the Bell Canadian Open, sellout crowds shadowed Weir's every move - even giving him an ovation when he exited a portable restroom. A six-man security team escorted him during practice rounds and to his car, doing the dirty work of saying "No" to thousands of autograph seekers.

"It's definitely a different vibe out there," Weir said. "There's more energy out there. People are really pulling for me."

"It's been interesting to watch his popularity evolve with his game," said Mike's brother, Jim Weir, who manages Mikeweir.com. "The galleries here think of him as a son, as part of the family."

During Thursday's first round, Weir teed off at 8 a.m. in front of teeming galleries that circled the entire first hole. They stalked him around the course until more than 15,000 were packed around the 18th green to see him finish and send him to the scorers tent with thunderous applause.

"That ovation he got on 18 kind of made your hair stand up," said Chris Riley (Stats | Bio) , one of his playing partners that day. "It was almost bigger (than Tiger). Don't get me wrong, fans love Tiger. But it was a definite different feeling with the Canadians and Mike Weir (Stats | Bio) ."

"It was tremendous," Weir said. "It was the first round of the tournament, and it almost felt like the final round of a major championship. We're blown away by it."

Weir's appeal in Canada and the comparison to Woods go beyond simple adulation. The reaction to his Masters win in Canada is similar to the reaction in America after Woods won in 1997.

Weir is the reason that 25 hours of live Canadian Open television coverage was shown in his home country. He is the reason the Royal Canadian Golf Association made an enormous investment initiative in its junior programs. He is the reason Canada is favored to be the next international host of the Presidents Cup matches, in 2007.

Weir may eventually be the catalyst that sparks more PGA Tour imports from Canada on a scale similar to other British commonwealth nations such as Australia and South Africa.

"His winning the Masters was the greatest accomplishment in Canadian golf," said Richard Scott, the reigning Canadian Amateur champion and a sophomore golfer at the University of Georgia. "It was inspiration for us younger guys in Canada to say we can go out on the tour and do great things just like Mike's doing right now."

Like Woods, Weir understands his success brings with it expectation and responsibility.

"I think the young kids coming up have something to get their hopes up about," Weir said. "That a kid from small-town Canada can win on the PGA Tour and win major championships. That's a great feeling."

Gretzky, who remains an inspiration to every Canadian who dreams of playing hockey, believes Weir will be that model for generations of Canadian golfers.

"What Tiger Woods (Stats | Bio) has done in the United States and worldwide is truly phenomenal for the sport of golf," Gretzky said. "By comparison, that's what Mike has done for golf in Canada. So many kids in our country grow up playing hockey and thinking, 'I want to play for the Toronto Maple Leafs or the Montreal Canadiens.' Mike has all of the sudden come along, and kids are saying, 'I want to be a golfer.'

"As time goes on here we're going to find over a course of years that the impact of him winning that Masters green jacket will go a lot longer in promoting the sport of golf. We won't know the impact Mike has had on the sport of golf for maybe 30 or 40 years because ... All of these young kids coming along now will say they want to be the next Mike Weir (Stats | Bio) ."

Big stuff from such a small source.

Top finish makes Top 10

The Late Show with David Letterman Top 10 list broadcast April 14, 2003:

Top 10 messages left on Mike Weir (Stats | Bio) 's answering machine:

10. Congratulations and, oh yeah, who the hell are you?

9. This is the Canadian Golf Hall of Fame. Want to be our first member?

8. It's Tiger Woods (Stats | Bio) . Finishing 15th would feel much worse if it weren't for my $62 zillion in endorsements.

7. Dude, I was so drunk when I was watching the Masters, I actually thought you won.

6. It's Tiger again. Seriously, give me the damn jacket.

5. This is President Bush. Today you made all of us proud to be Canadian.

4. Crap, must've misdialed. I was trying to reach Jose Maria Olazabal (Stats | Bio) .

3. Hootie Johnson here. Victory dinner is on me - but don't bring your wife.

2. I see you've used some of your prize money to buy an answering machine.

1. You seem to be good at sports - can you play for the Mets?

Reach Scott Michaux at (706) 823-3219 or scott.michaux@augustachronicle.com.