KAPALUA, Maui » The same child Zach Johnson held in his hands moments after winning the Masters on Easter Sunday in 2007 was among the first to greet him as he walked off the 18th green on Monday afternoon with as unlikely a victory as he procured in Augusta all those years ago.

Since the Tournament of Champions left California in 1999 and found a new home on the wide-open spaces of Kapalua’s Plantation Course, the prevailing wind here was you had to be like Bill Murray’s Dalai Lama, a big hitter — long, in order to win a car and a million dollars.

Little Zach Johnson has a lot going for him in his golf bag, but a 300-yard driver isn’t one of them. When you talk to Johnson, a Midwesterner body and soul, you don’t find yourself wanting to take a selfie with him as you might with Tiger Woods or Phil Mickelson.

You’re as likely to run into him at the Maui Taco stand as you are on the practice range at Waialae Country Club, not something you would expect from the game’s greats, who transcend the ardent followers and casual viewers alike. Johnson is an everyman, a deacon at the church, a 160-pound family guy who women want to marry and men want to emulate.

The fact he can strike a golf ball with the precision of a silversmith etching Johnson’s name on a trophy is just a bonus for those who know him best. He can hang out at the Sunday Bible school one minute and knock in a 10-foot putt for par the next with the ease of slipping in and out of your favorite slippers.

But what’s inside this man whose faith guides him every step of the way is a bulldog-like tenacity that doesn’t really match up with his tenor-like voice and casual demeanor once he’s outside the ropes. He’s approachable, happy to share his moment in the spotlight with those around him as if he were just named county commissioner in a small town in Iowa.

At Monday’s press conference when it appeared the questions were winding down, a reporter had one more thought he wanted to share before Johnson was ushered out the door to some other commitment. As he put it, "I’m in no hurry. I’ve got no place to go."

You won’t hear Woods or Mickelson make a statement like that in a media room. You’ve got five minutes mister, make the most of them.

Johnson won the TOC with a Steve Stricker wedge shot that frustrated playing partner and defending champion Dustin Johnson, who was often in a different time zone after Johnson and Johnson’s drives off the tee. Dustin averaged a million miles and Zach was like your wife picking food off your plate at a restaurant one precise bite at a time, leaving you only a piece of salad here and a bit of potato there.

The steak was in Zach Johnson’s stomach at day’s end. And for the life of you, you can’t figure out how he did it without you really noticing. At one time or another, PGA Championship winner Jason Dufner, U.S. Open champ Webb Simpson, rookie of the year Jordan Spieth and even Dustin himself were making runs at the $1.14 million check that waited for all of them at the end of the rainbow.

But when the ball-striking was done, there was Zach Johnson greeting sons Will and Wyatt, daughter Abby Jane, and the love of his life, Kim, who celebrated his 11th PGA Tour win as if it were a Little League game in Cedar Rapids.

Now, he turns his attention to a course tailor-made for him, where precision prevails over length, and patience pays more than aggression. The Waialae Country Club course at this week’s Sony Open in Hawaii is right in his comfort zone, a throwback to an era where Big Bertha was your neighbor’s wife and a 56-degree wedge was a head of lettuce in the fridge.

When Johnson won the Masters by two shots over Woods, Retief Goosen and Rory Sabbatini, one of the first things he was asked to do was go on the "The Late Show with David Letterman." In the green room with him were Oscar winner Halle Berry and some political wunderkind named Barack Obama.

Fitting, somehow, that little Zach Johnson, who started out on the Prairie Golf Tour would be trading war stories with Berry and Obama, sitting proudly in his brand-new green jacket that none of them, no matter how famous, would ever get the chance to wear.

He can walk the streets of New York City, if he has to. But you have a better chance of finding him at the First Baptist Church in Anywhere USA, helping set up communion for those who share his beliefs. It’s what makes him tick and why winning when he shouldn’t is the order of the day.