Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
So the desert swing is over, and some of the Tour's superstars are taking a couple of weeks off to fine tune their game and spend time at home before the next high profile period of the golfing year really kicks in to the lead up to Augusta and the first major championship of the year, the US Masters.
For many of the Tour's new faces, journeymen and Asian tour affiliates, the prospect of a field or two without Garcia, Harrington, McIlroy, Stenson and the like will give them a much needed boost as they look to improve their rankings and climb the money lists.
The next big events on the fast approaching horizon for the world's top 50 players are the first two WGC World Golf Championship events of the year.
One of the big talking points at the moment in clubhouses, locker rooms and press offices all over the world is will the great man, Tiger Woods, return to action in the WGC Accenture Match Play on February 25?
Hopes that the world No. 1 will return from a knee injury at Dove Mountain later this month have been raised following the birth of his second child, Charlie, a couple of weeks back. But the likelihood of Tiger changing his plans for this reason is a long shot; he'll be back when he's ready!
Woods is keeping pretty quiet about his plans for the time being, but he is back practicing at full throttle eight months after he defied serious injury to win the US Open at Torrey Pines.
He is working with his coach Hank Haney and in a recent interview said that the recovering knee was posing no restrictions, the swing was the same and he just needs to get his golf endurance up before he returns to competition. Practicing is a very different prospect than a tournament week; practice rounds, a ProAm and four competitive rounds in a matter of six days would prove to be a major workout for anyone!
Woods is targeting the Masters in April as his first priority but he is likely to want to play competitively before then.
Should Tiger decide to play in Arizona at the Match Play, standing in his way in the first round will be the Japanese sensation Ryo Ishikawa. Ishikawa is a member of that group of players that is a new phenomenon in golf. The group includes Camillo Villegas, Anthony Kim and Rory McIlroy.
Although many of you will not yet have heard of Ishikawa, he is a teenage sensation and a household name in his native Japan; teenage sensations don't have any fear but they do have great golf technique and an ability to win. Tiger might want to avoid this potential banana skin and take an extra week off!
Whenever Tiger decides that he is ready to compete again it will be for no other reason than he will think he can win the tournament. That might be next week; it might be at Augusta in April or not until the US Open in June.
For golf supporters worldwide, the return of the game's biggest draw cannot come quick enough and it definitely can't come quickly enough for the health of the US Tour.
No one wants him back more than Tim Fincham, the chairman of the Tour over there, because not only are they struggling to attract sponsors in light of the global financial problems, but without Tiger, the viewing figures are just appalling.
