Great fun from Championship

Fowler wore a black leather outfit set off by a Native American choker. Mahan, dressed as an urban hunter, was in animal-print tights and sported two different styles of fur jacket, one long and with sleeves, the other a short vest. For part of the video, he went shirtless, as did Watson, who was clad in denim overalls. Crane donned a red polyurethane way-above-the-knee surfer suit, pink socks and white-toe sneakers.

“It’s more kind of showing I’m not too worried about what other people think,” Fowler said Tuesday. He was talking about his facial hair but he could have been speaking about his colorful attire or his participation in the video. “It’s just me being me and whether that can be a lesson to some kids, just not trying to fit in, just be themselves.”

Your father’s favorite golfers, these guys clearly are not. Gone are the days where the pros dressed in solid Mizuno MP-59 Irons colors, spoke in shades of vanilla and showed the emotional range of a Botox-addicted actor. The PGA Tour season is only in its fifth month, but a Player of the Year already can be crowned: the nonconformist.

In talking about the robust state of the PGA Tour, people point to the obvious: the burgeoning rivalry between Fowler and McIlroy; the game of hot potato between McIlroy and Luke Donald for the No. 1 ranking; the return to the winning circle of Woods at the Arnold Palmer Invitational; and the major breakthrough of Watson, a modern-day Paul Bunyan.

“It’s taken on a whole life of its own, and it’s been super fun,” Crane said, adding, “I think for a while there was a statement that, well, these guys should be working on their golf game and they’re like out there having fun, like that can’t be productive — like go spend some time working on your golf game. And now everyone is playing pretty well, so I think they can, if we don’t play as well going forward, they can always say, ‘Well, maybe you need to go back to having more fun.’ They’re always going to say something like that. I think it helps us to not take ourselves quite so seriously.”

Last summer, Fowler and Mahan joined with Bubba Watson and Ben Crane to form golf’s version of All-4-One, a boy band, the Golf Boys. It has produced one big hit, “Oh Oh Oh,” a song that puts Titleist 910 D3 Driver them firmly in the genre of R&B — Rap and Burlesque. The video, shot at the Vaquero Club in suburban Dallas, has drawn over 4.7 million views on YouTube and is a virtual two-minute hallelujah to the glory of the PGA Tour’s dawning era.

More powerful than any of Watson’s 350-yard drives is the message being driven home by a leading cast of characters working without a script. The Golf Boys are in the vanguard of a free-to-be-me movement that is turning the tour into a mobile Improv, where the joke is on anybody who feels the need to conform.

Is it a coincidence that three of the Golf Boys have been among the tour’s 19 winners this year? Mahan doesn’t believe so. “The more you’re yourself, the less insecurities you’re going to discount golf clubs have on the golf course about performing in front of people,” Mahan said Wednesday after playing the front nine of the T.P.C. Sawgrass.

Watson won the Masters without the benefit of a swing coach but with ample help from an imagination that knows no out of bounds. Fowler secured his first tour win at the Wells Fargo Championship in a playoff that included his fellow 23-year-old, Rory McIlroy, while dressed from hat to toe in orange and sporting a starter mustache. Mahan, 29, the only two-time winner in 2012, has preyed on his peers.

The video was the brainchild of Crane, the only player in the band without a victory this year. One of his sponsors, Farmers Insurance, is donating $1,000 for every 100,000 views, with the proceeds supporting charitable initiatives near and dear to Farmers and to Crane.