HUMBLE, Texas — At some point, Steve Stricker may have to turn down all the requests for putting lessons.

Since straightening out Tiger Woods stroke, Stricker has somewhat facetiously become known as the tour’s resident expert on the greens. He’s still taking grief for it and a handful of players asked him for instruction on Wednesday in advance of this week’s Houston Open.

“I’m hearing it all over the place,” Stricker said. “Some of them are joking and I think some are serious.”

Stricker is happy to help, but doesn’t want to be distracted from his own game. He talked about balancing the two with Dave Stockton Sr., who developed a reputation as a putting guru when he was on tour and now coaches several players.

“He said, what you have to do is, if you’re going to help a guy, just tell the guy, `You never got help from me, so the word doesn’t get out,”’ Stricker said. “That’s not the way I am, I guess. Makes sense that you still have to pay attention to what you’re doing. Otherwise, you get caught up in everybody else and what they need to fix in their game and your game goes by the wayside all of a sudden.”

Maybe more than ever, Stricker seems to have his focus in the right place.

The 46-year-old Stricker is scheduled to play only 11 events this year.