ON THE FRINGE

By Doug Ferguson

updated 9:00 p.m. ET Aug. 21, 2007

HARRISON, N.Y. - Tiger Woods has played four straight weeks on the PGA Tour only five times in his career, and two of those stretches came in 1996 when he was a 20-year-old rookie trying to avoid going to Q-school.

So his absence from the first of four playoff events in the FedEx Cup should have come as no surprise.

Nor should it be a problem.

Once the inaugural “PGA Tour Playoffs” head toward a conclusion, no one will remember that Woods skipped The Barclays. Even if he doesn’t win the FedEx Cup, odds are he’ll be in the running. And that beats any interest golf used to have in the fall, which was next to nil.

Truth is, Woods might have done the tour a favor.

Considering how he has been playing lately (two straight victories), and how he finished last season (six straight PGA Tour victories), it was conceivable the world’s No. 1 player could have wrapped up the FedEx Cup and gone home before the Tour Championship.

Which would have looked worse: Woods skipping what amounts to a wild-card game or sitting out the Super Bowl?

“Maybe he figured he had a first-round bye,” Woody Austin said Tuesday on a dreary day of rain at Westchester, which seemed to set the mood for those who believe the playoffs already are a bust because one guy didn’t show up.

Woods, of course, cares more about himself than an organization he could have supported by showing up in New York.

Nothing wrong with that, either.

The tour is bringing a team concept to golf with these playoffs, but it’s still an individual sport.

PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem must have come to the same conclusion Sunday during the final round of the Wyndham Championship, the last tournament to qualify for the playoffs. Yes, he was disappointed that Woods decided not to play The Barclays, especially after the tour was banking on all the stars playing the final four weeks of the FedEx Cup.

Special coverage Complete coverage of Woods’ life and career

“On the other hand,” Finchem said, “I can’t second-guess Tiger about what he thinks he has to do to win.”

History shows that Woods plays his best golf when he paces himself, just as Jack Nicklaus did before him.

The best example might have been in 1996, when he played four straight weeks while trying to earn enough money to get his PGA Tour card. With a job secured and his energy drained, Woods unceremoniously pulled out of the Buick Challenge, then won two of his next three starts to qualify for the Tour Championship.

The most he has ever played in a row on the PGA Tour was five weeks in early 1999. His lone victory during that stretch came at the Buick Invitational, where he flirted with missing the cut before a 62-65 weekend.

Of his 59 tour victories, Woods has won only 10 times while playing his third consecutive week.

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He has a formula, and it seems to work.

Contrast that with Brandt Snedeker, who won in Greensboro to improve his seeding in the playoffs from No. 32 to No. 9. The tour rookie also played in the PGA Championship, so he could finish the season playing six straight weeks.

“Some guys play their best golf after weeks off. That’s just the way it is,” Snedeker said. “Everybody is different. I seem to play my best golf when I go on stretches like this where I play a lot on the road for some reason.”

K.J. Choi once closed the 2000 season by playing six straight weeks. He missed the cut five straight times before a tie for 29th in the Southern Farm Bureau Classic.

“By the fifth week, I was so worn out,” Choi said. “All my shots were weak and I had no energy.”

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