In odd season, maybe Tiger considers Las Vegas stop

First things first: Tiger Woods ever again agreeing to play in the annual PGA Tour stop here is still more of a long shot than Justin Timberlake arriving on time for a news conference at his own golf tournament or the UNLV football team going 13-0 this season.

Those odds.

Silly odds.

But nothing has been normal about Woods since the moment he crashed his SUV into a tree in November and seemingly every woman from that pancake house waitress in Orlando, Fla., to pick-a-party-girl in Las Vegas surfaced with steamy details about affairs with him.

He shot 18 over par and tied for 78th place at the Bridgestone Invitational last weekend. He has broken par just once in 13 rounds since Saturday at the U.S. Open in June. He's having a tougher time finding fairways than LeBron James is finding a friend in Cleveland.

None of this is normal.

What if Woods' struggles continue at this week's PGA Championship in Wisconsin? What if his play remains garbage by Woods' standards at Whistling Straits and he doesn't qualify for the first event in the FedEx Cup at The Barclays?

Even if he does, Woods needs to jump 25 spots in points to make the second event or risk missing the series' final three tournaments as its defending champion.

The news around Woods today is about the PGA and if he will either make the U.S. Ryder Cup squad on points or be one of four at-large selections when the 12-member team opposes Europe from Oct. 1 to 3 in Wales.

But should his season be cut short by not qualifying for FedEx events or if he misses out on a Ryder Cup spot, how realistic would it be for Woods to continue trying to recapture his game during the Fall Series?

Probably not very.

UNLV going 13-0 not very.

But it doesn't mean a local tournament director can't dream.

"Obviously, we'd love to have him," said Adam Sperling, in charge of running the Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open at TPC Summerlin. "Having him here would be wonderful in terms of what it could mean for the public and our sponsors and shareholders.

"Realistically, there are probably a number of players who simply play where they want to play, Tiger being one. If I thought a call to certain players would help motivate them to come, I'd have the largest cell phone bill in the state and be happy for it. But my words don't have much sway in my own house, let alone at that level."

I like Sperling. He is young, talented, creative, the sort of director a Fall Series event needs to remain viable in its community, because it's always a tough sell.

This year's tournament runs Oct. 21 to 24, a time when players such as Woods and Phil Mickelson have traditionally ended their respective seasons and retired to family yachts or local youth soccer fields.

Some terrifically talented golfers compete here annually, but the average fan who strolls around TPC Summerlin couldn't pick them out of a lineup if his life depended on it. Great golfers play here every year. Just not many with household names.

None with the drawing power of Woods.

His presence in the event where he won for the first time as a professional would overnight turn what has been a nice but sparsely attended tournament into the kind of circus that Sperling would more than welcome.

Woods at your event means a different level of security, different means of shuttle transportation, a different swarm of media coverage, a far different number of spectators. All great problems to own.

It's not often in the last decade -- try never -- that Woods' game has been such that even considering Las Vegas as a stop made sense. It still might not, but what is the harm of those running the local tournament making every last call to gauge any possible interest?

If not Sperling, what about Timberlake? With as many people as he has running around taking care of his every need here each October, I have to think he has the juice to reach Woods and inquire about any potential interest in playing this year.

"I'm not sure Tiger ever decides where he's going to play based on how he performed the previous week, so I'm not sure where that would put us," Sperling said. "But I would love to be calling 11 p.m. meetings to go over Plans B and C in anticipation of him playing.

"Our goal is to have a tournament where every player wants to be here. We are getting pretty close to that."

Tell you what: Tiger Woods plays here, and the Timberlake kid might even buy a watch and be on time for everything.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ed Graney can be reached at egraney@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4618.