It’s Another Tiger Hold at the Top

Tiger Woods hadn’t been on top of the world for six months, but Monday he began another term as golf’s top-ranked player, a distinction he has now held for a record 335 weeks.

All it took for Woods to return to his familiar perch and end Vijay Singh’s 26-week reign was a tournament-record 24-under-par total, weekend rounds of 63-66 and a one-shot victory Sunday over Phil Mickelson at the Ford Championship in Miami.

Being No. 1 isn’t so complicated, he said:

“The ranking will take care of itself with wins. I’ve said that from the very beginning. That’s how I got there. That’s how Vijay got there, that’s how [David Duval] got there [before Woods]. It’s just nothing but winning golf tournaments.

“So far, I’ve gotten two this year, which is a nice start.�

Woods, who held the top ranking for 264 consecutive weeks before Singh supplanted him with a victory in September at the Deutsche Bank Championship, has won two of the three official stroke-play tournaments he has played this year and tied for third in the other.

The Tiger factor, though, isn’t all about rankings. It’s also about ratings.

Woods’ going head to head against Mickelson -- and winning -- was a smash TV hit. The rating for the tournament Sunday on NBC was a 5.9, an 84.4% increase over last year’s 3.2 rating when Craig Parry defeated Scott Verplank in a playoff.

And all 35,000 Sunday tickets for Doral were sold out for the first time in 44 years.

Woods figures to hang onto his newfound No. 1 for at least a week.

He isn’t playing the Honda Classic this week at Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., but Singh is. Singh probably will have to win to become No. 1 again, although that’s difficult to determine because of the complicated ranking procedure.

One of the factors is the strength of the field, which won’t be determined until play begins Thursday. And the Honda tournament loses rankings points because it doesn’t have the top-ranked player.

Whatever way the Honda shakes out, the first full-field confrontation of the year involving golf’s Big Four -- Woods, Singh, Ernie Els and Mickelson -- probably looms in a little more than a week at the Bay Hill Invitational, where ratings points will pile up in drifts.

Els won the European Tour event at Dubai last weekend but hasn’t played a PGA Tour event since the Sony Open at Honolulu in mid-January.

Mickelson has won twice this year, at Scottsdale, Ariz., and Pebble Beach, and come close at Doral, but Singh has mostly struggled since his breakthrough, nine-victory season of a year ago and his mid-January victory at Honolulu.

Singh led the PGA Tour in scoring average and birdie average last year and was second in greens in regulation. This season, he is a respectable 11th in scoring but only 33rd in birdie average.

Plus, he’s driving the ball about six yards shorter than he averaged a year ago and his putting average has plummeted from 37th to 89th.

Woods seems to be moving in the other direction.

Second in scoring average, third in driving distance, third in greens in regulation and fifth in putting average, Woods said his game had come around since his highly scrutinized swing changes the last year and a half.

But with Woods, it’s putting that alters his mood, elevates his game and wins tournaments.

His 27 birdies at Doral matched his previous best in a PGA Tour event, the 1997 Pebble Beach tournament.

Woods said Sunday he felt as good about his game as he has in a long time.

“There’s no doubt about that.�

There also may be no doubt that his schedule may become more complicated next year after his victory at Doral.

He is in the midst of playing six tournaments in eight weeks, a situation he usually tries to avoid.

He played only 19 PGA Tour events last year.

Something may have to go next year, something like the Nissan Open, which he came close to omitting this year. Woods tied for 13th at Riviera in what went into the books as a rain-shortened, 36-hole, non-official tournament.

In the meantime, Woods is rebuilding his reputation as someone to fear.

During his 63 on Saturday, he drove the 347-yard 16th. His second shot at the par-five 12th hole Sunday, a three-wood, carried 280 yards, rolled another 20 yards and stopped 25 feet from the hole, from where he made an eagle.

The three-wood is a new Nike model, replacing his old Titleist three-wood and leaving his Scotty Cameron putter by Titleist as the only non-Nike club in his bag.

By the way, Woods said he “thinned� that 300-yard three-wood. Whatever. He’s fattening up in the rankings.

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Major Malfunction

Tiger Woods has won eight major tournaments, but none since the 2002 U.S. Open. How he has fared since (SB is shots behind):

*--* Event Winner Woods SB 2002 British Open Ernie Els T28 6 2002 PGA Rich Beem 2 1 2003 Masters Mike Weir T15 9 2003 U.S. Open Jim Furyk T20 11 2003 British Open Ben Curtis T4 2 2003 PGA Shaun Micheel T39 16 2004 Masters Phil Mickelson T22 11 2004 U.S. Open Retief Goosen T17 14 2004 British Open Todd Hamilton T9 7 2004 PGA Vijay Singh T24 6

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