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By Brett Avery
The Fantasy Insider
PGATOUR.COM Contributor

The Fantasy Insider fell into one of his anguished moments this past week while watching the idle top member of his League Championship match-play squad fall to ninth in the Official World Golf Ranking.

Vijay Singh has won in Tampa Bay before. (Grayson/WireImage)

INSIDE THE NUMBERS

Vijay Singh's record in what is now the PODS Championship

Year To Par Score Finish 2006 -3 281 T19 2005 +3 145 CUT 2004 -18 266 1st 2003 -9 275 2nd

The way the Champion Course at PGA National was set up for The Honda Classic was ready-made for his game: long, brutal rough, some wind and stingy scoring.

Now, the guy's got the right to take off the occasional week. Even TFI isn't heartless enough to prevent him from spending quality time on the practice tee at home.

But there were two reasons Singh landed on the match-play roster: 1] He plays a lot, which means TFI will have a reliable top man for at least 20 tournaments and 2] He's a consistently solid performer, which means TFI should win a lot of those No. 1 vs. No. 1 points in the match-play format.

Nearly three months into the season, however, TFI isn't feeling as much love as he'd like.

He's wondering if he should cut Singh loose.

And he's wondering if the one-eighth of the League Championship team owners who own Singh feels the same.

Singh just celebrated his 44th birthday, an awkward age for a professional golfer. There aren't many players who have dominated in their mid to late 40s and Singh is suddenly showing signs of slowing.

Last year Singh won the Barclays Classic, his first one-win season worldwide since 1999 (The Honda Classic). He had 13 top-10 finishes on the PGA TOUR, his lowest output since 2002 (11). In fact, he had fewer top threes last year (three) than in 2002 (four).

So far this season it looks as if the wobble in Singh's orbit is intensifying. He won the limited-field Mercedes-Benz Championship in Hawaii to start the season but that was the week before League Championship opened for business.

Strip away that win and his next-best finish is a seventh in the FBR Open in Phoenix. In fact, he's been outside the top 25 three times -- and played poorly enough in his second-round loss at the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship that it probably would have made outside-the-top-25 No. 4 had it been a stroke-play tournament.

Three other players in the FedExCup top 10 equal Singh's low output of outside-the-top-25s. But they're all streaky, freaky winners (Paul Goydos, Charley Hoffman and Mark Wilson). Only Goydos is in the World top 50 (47th) while the other two are on the fringes of the top 100.

Making the picture even more dismal, Singh has arguably the worst record among the World top 10 players competing regularly in the U.S.

Luke Donald, the No. 10 player, comes close with a pair of missed cuts (too many interviews about ancillary business interests?).

No. 3 Phil Mickelson's numbers look shaky with a pair of outside-the-top-25s and a missed cut, but those were the first three weeks of the year. Since then he's piled up a win, a playoff loss and a tie for 17th (too many In-N-Out burgers early in the year?).

This past week got TFI to thinking about Singh's place in the lineup. With a 12-man roster he could bury the guy for a month or two, play someone else in the top spot and try to stay a few ticks above .500.

After all, TFI is 4-3 and a game out of first in the West Division of Public League 3359. If the playoffs began this week he'd be the No. 4 seed.

But Singh is stuck on his roster, an undroppable player with a potentially droppable record, and for the moment that's sticking in TFI's craw.

Deep in the League Championship rules are the paragraphs on Adding and Dropping Players. To wit:

Undroppable Golfers

To maintain the integrity of your league, you will be prevented from dropping certain star Golfers throughout the season. The administrator, as commissioner of all League Championship Fantasy Golf leagues, will decide -- in its sole discretion -- which Golfers are undroppable. If there are Golfers we've deemed undroppable on your roster, they will not be displayed on the Transactions, Add/Drop page.

TFI would like to know what you think. Everyone can play this game by sending an email to TFI:

• If you own Singh, rate your happiness on a scale of 1-to-10 (with 10 being happiest) and state whether you want to keep him or ditch him.

• If you don't own Singh and he became available in your league, would you pick him up? Who would you offer from your roster as trade bait?

As usual, please include your name, format (rotisserie or match-play), name of the league and your team. And, also per usual, detailed comments are welcomed.

Two players TFI might pick up/trade for to get onto his roster this week:

K.J. Choi. He's a two-time champ and the defender in the PODS Championship so he's a natural at Innisbrook Resort. But TFI already has him on the short list for the Masters. At every level of professional golf it has taken him a year or two to become acclimated to the surroundings before advancing to tougher competition. He's proven himself as a consistent performer on TOUR and the majors are the last frontier. PS: Asia's the last continent without a major championship winner.

Justin Rose. Three consecutive years between 20th and 30th at Innisbrook show he can handle the place and his quarterfinalist finish in the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship and solo third at the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic show he's got the recent form. He's third in putting (1.701) and 11th in par-4 birdie leaders (19.32 percent), both crucial this week at a tough track.

Two players TFI might waive/drop/trade away to get off his roster this week:

Jeff Quinney. Notwithstanding what he wrote in last week's column about the transition from West to East, this guy seemed out of his comfort zone in The Honda Classic. Way out of it. Time to thank him for the early bonanza and cut him loose.

Bob Tway. Three missed cuts in his last four starts and a tie for 18th in the lesser-field Mayakoba Golf Classic at Riviera Maya-Cancun, played opposite the Match Play. He's 155th in the all-around stat and 94th in scoring average before the cut (71.07).

Rotisserie results for Expert League at The Honda Classic: 58.0 points (second. 0.5 behind T.J. Auclair). First in putting and birdies, second in scoring, tied second in eagles. Overall: 55.5 points (2.5 behind Greg Vara). And to think TFI left Steve Stricker (tied fifth) and Anders Hansen (tied 22nd) on the bench. Sheesh!

Rotisserie lineup for Expert League at PODS Championship: Cameron Beckman, K.J. Choi, Kevin Stadler, Steve Stricker. Active but not in lineup: Ryan Palmer, Kevin Sutherland, Bubba Watson. Alternate: Anders Hansen. Not in field: Tim Clark, Padraig Harrington, Geoff Ogilvy, David Toms.

Match-play results for Public League 3359 at The Honda Classic: Da4 Skinz 14, TFI 4. Record: 4-3 (second place in West Division). TFI lost four matches 1 down and had four finish all square, so the score was about the worst possible. Still, pathetic.

Match-play lineup for Public League 3359 at PODS Championship: Vijay Singh, Daniel Chopra, Zach Johnson, Craig Barlow. Reserves: Mark Calcavecchia, Troy Matteson, Johnathan Byrd. Alternate: Anders Hansen. Not in field: Andrew Buckle, Ernie Els, Davis Love III, Nick O'Hern.

Salary Cap Cup results for The Honda Classic: The main lineup of Padraig Harrington (429 FedExCup points, tied 13th), David Toms (313 points, tied 20th), Fred Funk (0 points, withdrew), Matt Kuchar (98 points, tied 39th) and Jose Coceres (1,867 points, tied second, lost playoff!) earned 2,707 points and placed 1,122nd. Through Week 8 it totaled 28,535 points and ranked 956th. And TFI's heart sank when Coceres missed that putt on the third playoff hole and lost those 2,700-odd points.

The "Hey, buddy" backup lineup of Davis Love III (429 FedExCup points, ited 13th), Robert Allenby (913 points, tied fifth), Peter Lonard (53 points, tied 62nd), Kevin Stadler (57 points, tied 53rd) and Anthony Kim (67 points, tied 46th) earned 1,769 points and placed 5,368th. Through Week 8 it totaled 14,925 points and ranked 13,921.

Week 8 winner: Drawetswj1 7,435.

Segment 1 leader: Let The Big Dawg Eat 43,449.

Salary Cap Cup lineup for PODS Championship: Main lineup, K.J. Choi $280,500, Justin Rose $270,750, Camilo Villegas $186,250, Daniel Chopra $127,750, Ruyji Imada $75,000. Total: $940,250. "Hey, buddy" backup lineup, Vijay Singh $300,000, Charles Howell III $290,250, Troy Matteson $202,500, Boo Weekley $131,000, Charlie Wi $75,000. Total: $998,750. Tiebreakers: 274, 1.

Have a question or comment for TFI? Send it to him at brettavery@aol.com. Please be sure to include your name, where you're from, the name of your team and, if it relates to League Championship, the name of your league and whether you're competing in the rotisserie or match-play format.