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Tiger Woods is a lock to win the TOUR Championship at East Lake next week, breaking a win gap that goes back to the 2013 World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational. Wait. What? Why? Yeah, Woods is playing well, his T6 at the BMW Championship at Aronimink marking his fourth top-10 finish since July. He’s 20th in the FedExCup, and has won at East Lake before, in 2007. But forget about all that. More importantly, a Woods win is the only result that would make sense at the end of a year in which so many people broke dry spells it was hard to keep track. “I didn’t know if I was going to be able to get back to this spot,� Keegan Bradley said after he beat Justin Rose in a playoff at the BMW Championship on Monday, when he notched a fourth PGA TOUR victory a scant six years and 160 starts after his third. “And today I did it.� I didn’t know if I was going to be able to get back to this spot, and today I did it. Maybe that wouldn’t fit on a bumper sticker or a T-shirt, but it nicely sums up the 2017-’18 season. Alternatively, if you imagine many of this season’s winners as the Tom Hanks character from Castaway, that’s a lot of guys who had time to grow a prodigious beard and learn how to spearfish in between victories. For a while the TOUR’s longest gap between wins was by Butch Baird, who triumphed at the 1961 Waco Turner Open and then, 15 years later, the ’76 San Antonio Texas Open. Long gap. Good for him. But Robert Gamez was winless for 15-plus years when he won the 2005 Valero Texas Open (since the 1990 Nestle Invitational at Bay Hill) to break it. Lesson: If you want to get your act together, go to San Antonio. Lesson II: It’s never too late.   If you imagine many of this season’s winners as the Tom Hanks character from Castaway, that’s a lot of guys who had time to grow a prodigious beard and learn how to spearfish in between victories. Jason Day went 33 starts between his win at THE PLAYERS Championship in 2016 and the Farmers Insurance Open in early 2018. Day later won the Wells Fargo Championship, going for a two-win season just a year after he enjoyed a no-win season. Speaking of THE PLAYERS Championship, when Webb Simpson waltzed to victory in May it was his fifth TOUR win but his first since the 2013 Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. Speaking of children, Gary Woodland’s wife, Gabby, and their son, Jaxson, surprised him on the 18th green at TPC Scottsdale after he shot 64 and won a playoff over Chez Reavie at the Waste Management Phoenix Open, his first victory since the 2013 Barracuda Championship.  On the subject of surprises, Phil Mickelson ended the longest drought of his career, which went all the way back to the 2013 Open Championship, a span of 96 starts, when he won the WGC-Mexico Championship in March. A week later, Paul Casey ended a gap of 150 starts between the 2009 Houston Open and his second TOUR win at the Valspar Championship, denying Woods. A week after that (trend alert!), Rory McIlroy shot a final-round 64 to win the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard, breaking a dry spell of 19 TOUR starts that dated back to his victory at the TOUR Championship in 2016. He took just 100 putts, the fewest of his career for a four-round event, and was +10.027 in Strokes Gained: Putting. He also ended the talk about 2017 being the first year since 2008 when he didn’t win on any tour. While we’re talking Europeans, McIlroy’s Ryder Cup teammate Ian Poulter’s third TOUR victory, his first of the non-WGC variety, at the Houston Open broke a win drought that dated to the 2012 WGC-HSBC Champions and spanned 93 starts. That’s a long gap, even factoring in Poulter’s 2016 foot surgery. Having slipped all the way to 207th in the world after The Honda Classic last season, Poulter is now 34th and set to play on his sixth European Ryder Cup team. Speaking of players returning to Cup-worthy prominence, Bubba Watson went 43 starts between his win at THE NORTHERN TRUST in 2016 and the Genesis Open at Riviera earlier this season. Then the floodgates opened, as he notched his 11th TOUR win, at the WGC-Dell Technology Match Play, six weeks later, and kept on going at the Travelers Championship. Kevin Na, who in July won A Military Tribute at the Greenbrier, was making his 158th start since winning the Shriners Hospitals for Children in his hometown of Las Vegas in 2011. All of these stories should more than inspire Woods, to say nothing of Tony Finau, whose last win came at the 2016 Puerto Rico Open. Finau, of course, has nevertheless risen all the way to FedExCup No. 3 with 11 top-10 finishes this season, tied for the TOUR lead. Inspiration at East Lake could go a long way. And if not? Well, there’s always San Antonio.

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PORTRUSH, Northern Ireland – J.B. Holmes won the Genesis Open in mid-February. Since then? A dozen starts. Seven missed cuts. One WD. Failed to get out of group play at the World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play. A couple of finishes outside the top-60. Other than his previous start, a T-21 at the Rocket Mortgage Classic three weeks ago, it’s been, well, not pretty. Related: Leaderboard | Tough day for Tiger | Rory struggles in opening-round 79 “I played great that one tournament, had a win,â€� Holmes said of his victory at Riviera, the fifth PGA TOUR of his career. “You take that away, it’s probably actually been one of my worst years I’ve played.â€� So naturally, he has the first-round lead at The Open Championship, shooting a 5-under 66 at Royal Portrush on Thursday to lead Irishman Shane Lowry by a stroke. It’s Holmes’ first lead in any round of a major since the 2008 PGA Championship, which he led through 36 holes at Oakland Hills. Such as the vagaries of golf. A player can find something, a spark after months of struggling, and turn it into an opportunity of a lifetime. “I’ve really struggled with my swing kind of after I won,â€� said Holmes, who opened with a bogey, bounced back with a birdie and remained bogey-free for the rest of his round. “At Detroit I had been working on it and it clicked in there and I started hitting it better. “I’ve been practicing the last couple of weeks. I’ve been playing great. So actually felt great coming in. Like I said, my results didn’t show that. But I felt very confident coming in. I was hitting it great. Putted well. “I wasn’t really surprised — I mean, I played well.â€� He may have been one of the few not surprised at Royal Portrush. In 32 starts in majors (not counting two WDs), he’s finished in the top 10 just twice. Both came in 2016 – a T-4 at the Masters, followed later that summer by his best major result, a solo third at The Open. That came on the weekend that Henrik Stenson and Phil Mickelson eventually turned the tournament into a two-man duel, so it’s doubtful anybody remembers Holmes’ play that week at Royal Troon. But it was a confidence booster, showing that Holmes could fare well on links courses. “That was a great week for me,â€� he said. “And it teaches me I can come out and play. There were two guys that got really hot that week. Besides that, I pretty much had beat the field. So that’s definitely a boost. “I learned a lot playing in that event. And you try to take that to the next one.â€� It took him three years later, but through 18 holes at least, he’s got the field beat. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that it’s at Royal Portrush. While many in the field are getting their first look at the Dunluce course, Holmes actually played a round here during a collegiate trip with his University of Kentucky teammates. They also played another famous course in Northern Ireland, Royal County Down. Alas, there wasn’t much knowledge from that trip to Portrush that he was able to utilize on Thursday. “I don’t remember a whole lot,â€� Holmes said. “I had a couple of caddies over here. … At the time most of the caddies we had weren’t used to somebody hitting 315 or 320, so I got some bad lines. I think I was playing here I hit five or six shots exactly where they told me to and I lost the ball. “The score wasn’t all that great.â€� That changed Thursday. This time, the score was pretty great.

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