Westwood not the only player who can take No. 1 on Oct. 31

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Martin Kaymer could take the No. 1 spot instead of Lee Westwood by winning the Andalucia Valderrama Masters.

Come to terms yet with Tiger Woods falling out of the No. 1 spot?

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If not, you have two weeks. Really. Not kidding.

It's happening on Halloween. Done deal. Run the numbers. He doesn't play, he won't stay there. And since there are no tournaments on his schedule, he's out. After what will be a mind-numbing he's-never-leaving-the-top-spot-or-so-we-thought 280 consecutive weeks -- and 622 weeks total.

What isn't certain is who'll replace him.

For the longest time now -- or at least since Phil Mickelson, Steve Stricker and Jim Furyk faded away -- we've assumed it would be Lee Westwood.

But not so fast.

It could be Martin Kaymer.

The kid -- he really looks like one, doesn't he? -- has stepped up. Four wins this year. Three in the last four weeks -- 3 ½ if you count the Ryder Cup. Or would that be 3 1/12?

One minute the 25-year-old German was bouncing around the 10th spot in the world, the next he was climbing. And now he's No. 4 with the Andalucia Valderrama Masters on his schedule and his finger poised on a button to leap into hyper space. A win there and -- yes -- he would pass Woods, Westwood and Mickelson all in one fell swoop.

He would also open the way for a weekly who's-on-first run at No. 1. Not to mention set up a showdown of all those top-10-type seriously big guns at HSBC Champions event in China the following week.

Can you see it now? A different No. 1 every week or month... well, certainly more often than we're used to.

Now that would be a ranking. That would be close to a who's-playing-the-best-at-present ranking.

Right now, we have a two-year formula that's confusing enough that we simply let those folks behind the OWGR door do the math. The formula had Tiger so far in front for so long -- he was winning and earned it, too -- that we didn't think too much about another tweak.

Now, perhaps, we should.

Westwood has played phenomenal golf for the last two years. But he has played just one individual event since mid-August and that was last week's Dunhill Links Championship. Had he finished second -- even in a three-way tie -- he would have grabbed the top spot Monday morning. Instead, the calf injury that has kept him in the gym instead of on the course acted up and he finished T11. He won't play now until at least the HSBC event in China, but because of what he's done over the last two years, he could be No. 1 by not playing.

Another asterisk? If he does get to No. 1, he would be only the third player who had yet to win a major to hold that title. Fred Couples and David Duval were the other two and they got their majors after their stays at No. 1. No one blinked then. No one should now.

Does he deserve it? Absolutely. He's bounced back from an abyss -- resilient is the word his manager Chubby Chandler chose -- to regain his form as one of the best in the world. He was playing like No. 1 before the injury and, well, we play by the current formula.

And Kaymer? He absolutely deserves it too. His win at the Dunhill Links -- he always wanted to win at St. Andrews, he just hoped it would be a British Open -- was his third in as many events. The last person to do that was Tiger. The last European was Nick Faldo back in 1989 when he won the European PGA, British Masters and French Open. Perhaps, not coincidentally, Faldo was the last European to hold the No. 1 ranking and that was in 1994. The only other German? Bernhard Langer was No. 1 for three weeks.

Kaymer has played brilliantly this year. With four wins and a strong Ryder Cup, he's a lock for someone's player of the year and, if nothing else, world player of the year. He's humble, honest, down-to-earth and he has that major, the Wanamaker Trophy, which he won in a playoff in August for the first of his run of three wins.

Which one will grab it? Who knows?

The only thing we know is it will seem strange not to have Tiger in that spot. Stranger still is that it's come down to who's not playing more than who is.

This isn't the first time Tiger has been deposed as No. 1. He's lost that ranking more than once. He got it from Greg Norman, who held it for 331 weeks total -- second only to Tiger. Duval took it from Tiger, Tiger took it back. Ernie Els took it, Tiger took it back. The only year he didn't hold it at the end of the year was 2004 when Singh grabbed it. Tiger took it back in 2005 just before the U.S. Open.

You remember back then. The Dow was soaring, the recession was something that happened to other folks. John Roberts was named Chief Justice and Steve Jobs was about to apply for a patent on something named the iPhone, which was just entering Apple's developmental pipeline.

No one had tweeted. Facebook was a year old and still reserved for university campuses. Barack Obama was best known as the rising political star who delivered the keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

Hard to believe, huh? Since then, the OWGR formula has been tweaked several times, but no one has made a serious run at No. 1. It's been Tiger's domain. No matter how much Mickelson -- he's had the chance since May -- or Els or Stricker tried. No matter who won what major.

Now, Europeans hold five of the top nine spots in the world ranking. The No. 7 player on the list, Paul Casey, didn't even make the Ryder Cup team.

Colin Montgomerie is chortling about the global shift. A changing of the guard to Europe, he said. For the moment.

"Knowing Tiger as I do, Tiger will probably go out and win the HSBC world event," Monty said. "He won't like being No. 2 at anything."

He's so right. Whoever does take over No. 1 may be a short-termer.

We're already wondering when Tiger will put it all together and win it back.

And when the OWGR folks will make their next tweak.

Melanie Hauser is a columnist for PGATOUR.COM and can be reached at melaniehauser@gmail.com. Her views do not necessarily represent the views of the PGA TOUR.