Woods, who clinched Player of the Year with his win last week, is not one to rest on his laurels, of course, and is also mindful of records---long and short term. If he can win the two remaining Tour events, you’d have to figure that well-rested he has a good chance to win four to start 2007 and tie Byron Nelson’s consecutive PGA wins record.

In any case, he’s blown some excitement into the final couple months of the season, making every tournament he plays “major” in terms of interest, and for that I owe him thanks because this is the time of year I wait for the Tour Championship like it’s the second coming of The Masters.

Last week: With the outright and head-to-head win (Adam Scott wasn’t close to contending all week and finished T50, 21 shots behind Tiger), I finished with $625 (half a unit at 5-4 in the outright) and $400 (one unit at 2-5 in the head-to-head) for a total of $1025, a shade more than a unit. It was my fourth straight winning week, each one netting a unit on average. My season total is now at -21 units.

At this week’s Canadian Open, Take Billy Andrade (80-1), 1/6 unit: It was a slow start for him in ’06, making just two cuts in his first seven tournaments. But he’s missed only one since. In June he followed up a T3 (Barclays) with a T2 the next week (Booz Allen). There was a T6 a month later, end of July in Milwaukee, and he hasn’t missed a cut since then (last week, T22). My thing with Andrade is this: He’s a good player with four wins in a good career. He’s not the most talented guy on the course, but he’s solid, doesn’t make many mistakes, and therefore makes his share of cuts---makes a very good living doing what he does. He seems to be a real nice guy and has fun out there, often smiling when he makes long putts. I just wonder if he’s got quite the killer instinct to win, which is what you want in an outright pick. That said, he’s obviously playing well lately and he won this tournament back in ’98.