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The United States just doesn’t have the pull it once did.

Europe won the Ryder Cup this year. Players from the Old World claimed half of 2010s major tournaments. An Englishman holds claim to the top ranking in golf.

And now, some of their best players would rather stick to their side of the pond and forgo membership in the PGA Tour — once considered the world’s best.

They’re taking the “if you can make it there” part right out of the equation and opting to go straight to making it anywhere.

And judging from the schedule on the European Tour, those who ply that circuit are willing to play everywhere.

Graeme McDowell will play PGA Tour. Photo copyright USGA/Steve Gibbons

Westwood did not win on the European Tour this year, but ironically gained his lone victory in the U.S. in Memphis. With runnerup finishes in the Masters and the British Open, though, Westwood’s year was good enough to reach No. 1 on the Official World Golf Ranking as Tiger Woods struggled through his worst year as a professional.

That could easily be dismissed as a veteran player managing the second half of his career, but the reputation of the PGA Tour as a must-play circuit takes a bigger hit when a rising star like Rory McIlroy opts out and current PGA champion Martin Kaymer is slow to announce his primary affiliation for 2011.

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At least he was consistent.

Tiger Woods made it through his entire 2010 playing schedule without a victory — not a major, a mini major or some other relatively minor pedestrian PGA Tour event.

It breaks a string of 14 years that extends back to a point in time when Woods was just a celebrated amateur and not a worldwide icon of a sport — a phenom who would soon let the pros that tee it up for a living know that their world was about to change.

But it’s Tiger’s world that has changed now, nearly a 180-degree reversal of where he was. And put into moth balls until the 2011 season is his push to reclaim his considerable talents and harness them fully to produce another title.

“I just didn’t put it together this year; I didn’t play well. I had numerous opportunities to play well and I just didn’t do it,” Woods told Reuters. “I had my chances. It was one of those years where I didn’t put it together.”

Tiger Woods hits shot at 2010 U.S. Open, where he finished T-4. Photo copyright USGA/Mike Ehrmann

On Monday, Woods placed last in a four-man charity skins event in Thailand, a day after finishing T-6 at the HSBC/WGC event in Shanghai. But he managed to hold on to the second position in the Official World Golf Ranking, which reflects not only the quirky points system but his once-mammoth lead that was whittled away over the past calendar year.

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The road to No. 1 is best taken with your feet up.

Relax at home, catch up with the family and queue up a cold beverage, perhaps, with a bit of football on the telly.

Such it is for Lee Westwood, who was not in the field at Valderrama for the Andalucia Masters, where Graeme McDowell won.

Still, it was apparently enough for for Westwood to kick Tiger Woods from the perch he occupied about as long as a senatorial term.

The 281-week reign was a record for the Official World Golf Ranking, an accounting that began in 1986, and the toppling of Woods should come as no surprise. The man hasn’t won a tournament in a year and hasn’t been a real threat since his fall from grace last Thanksgiving.

That Woods held the top spot for so long after doing so little in recent months didn’t exactly provide a ringing endorsement for the OWGR.

Lee Westwood is the new No. 1. Photo by Steve Newton

And now, neither does its elevation of Westwood.

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Forgive Rocco Mediate, if he continues to channel Carl Spackler.

Excuse, too, those in future Mediate galleries who might yell: “It’s in the hole!”

Mediate earned the right to his own cinderella story and will enjoy the fit of his spikes for at least another two years in the form of a PGA Tour exemption with some golf that will certainly bring tears to his eyes.

With the help of no fewer than four hole-outs over the course of four days, Mediate won for the first time in eight years and as anyone in the sport will tell you, victories cure a host of ills.

“I have a job,” Mediate told reporters at CordeValle Golf Club after securing the Frys.com Open by a stroke.

Rocco Mediate at Heritage Classic. Photo by Keith Allison.

Mediate was that close to returning to Q-school, which at 47, has only slightly more appeal than learning a new trade or an annual exam.

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Let her play.

It’s the just thing to do; it’s the right thing to do.

And if you’re the LPGA, you need to put a positive spin on just about everything you do.

Lana Lawless is a 57-year-old transgender woman, who can hit a golf ball a long way. She is, in fact, a past long-driving champion.

But she was not able to challenge for another title this year and she’s taking her case to the courts.

She was barred from competing by the event’s organizers, the Long Drivers of America, which cited an LPGA policy that its players must be “females from birth.”

Now both groups are being summoned to court in a lawsuit filed in United States District Court in San Francisco. Also named as co-defendants are corporate sponsors Dick’s Sporting Goods, Re/Max and drug store chain CVS.

LPGA is facing legal challenge. Photo by John E. Kaminski

If this were an issue without precedent, it might be worth letting it run its course, but that is not the case.

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The word is the top ranking in golf will go to someone other than Tiger Woods.

Of course, that has been speculated for weeks but somehow the 0-for-2010 and one-time player-without-peer has held on to his No. 1 slot.

It’s enough to make even the casual golf fan weekender question the validity of such a list and it’s about to take another hit.

The baton will pass without little happening beyond the calendar flipping from one day to the next.

By Halloween, projections have Lee Westwood ascending to No. 1 on the Official World Golf Ranking without teeing it up in another tournament.

The Englishman is nursing a sore right calf and ankle and has said he will not play again until the HSBC event in Shanghai in early November and possibly wait until Dubai later in the month.

Lee Westwood could be new No. 1. Photo by Steve Newton

Woods, who finally displayed his talents at the recently concluded Ryder Cup where he was 3-1 in a United States loss, also has no immediate plans to play before the HSBC event.

Makes the BCS look like pure genius.

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There is no purse and no cut.

The field is smaller than the most exclusive of invitational tournaments.

Representatives from only a handful of nations will compete, but it packs more competitive emotion than most golfers will experience in a lifetime.

It is the Ryder Cup, a biennial event that takes turns on each side of the Atlantic Ocean and pits a squad from Europe against one from the United States.

The U. S. has a sizable lead in number of cups won over the years, but the Europeans have been the more powerful team for the last 25 years.

Staged this year at Celtic Manor in Newport, Wales, Europe’s captain Colin Montgomerie will have Lee Westwood, Ian Poulter, Graeme McDowell, Rory McIlroy, Martin Kaymer, Padraig Harrington, Luke Donald, Miguel-Angel Jimenez, Ross Fisher, Peter Hansen and brothers Edoardo and Francesco Molinari at his disposal.

American captain Corey Pavin will counter with Phil Mickelson, Steve Stricker, Dustin Johnson, Zach Johnson, Jim, Furyk, Stewart Cink, Rickie Fowler, Hunter Mahan, Bubba Watson, Jeff Overton, Matt Kuchar and Tiger Woods.

U.S. 2010 Ryder Cup team. Photo courtesy Welsh Assembly Government.

Play begins in the three-day event Friday and here are a few Ryder Cup factoids that might otherwise get lost in the shuffle:

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In the end, the FedEx Cup was awarded to a worthy champion.

It didn’t go to a player, who limped home with mediocre finishes in the last two playoff events as Vijay Singh did in 2008.

Nor was the season-ending crown handed to someone, who got into the field without even winning a tournament as no fewer than a dozen players had a chance to do at this weekend’s Tour Championship.

Winning does account for something, it appears, and Jim Furyk secured the Tour Championship crown with a one-stroke victory over Luke Donald on  Sunday and grabbed the $10 million cash bonus in the process.

It was his third victory of the 2010 season, which currently leads the PGA Tour and set a new career high for Furyk.

Jim Furyk won his first Tour Championship and claimed the 2010 FedEx Cup. Photo by Keith Allison.

“It’s only four years old, but 40 years from now there should be a lot of history in this trophy. And to have Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh, Tiger Woods, Jim Furyk sounds — I’m very proud of that because those two can flat play,” Furyk told PGATour.com.

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Bubba Watson can win this year’s FedEx Cup, but Tiger Woods cannot.

Six majors champions are in the ultra-exclusive top-30 field at this week’s Tour Championship, but only one of those players currently holds his title.

And a total of 12 golfers will tee it up at East Lake on Thursday with a shot at the $1.35 million first-place check and the $10 mil cup bonus despite the fact they did not win on the PGA Tour this year while winners Bill Haas, Cameron Beckman, Jason Bohn and Anthony Kim will not.

At least Phil Mickelson will get to defend his title.

Such is the climate of the PGA Tour’s version of a playoff, a four-tournament swing that caps its run with the Tour Championship in Atlanta this week.  The process began with 125 players and has been whittled to 30.

Matt Kuchar is the top seed at the Tour Championship. Photo by Keith Allison

The road to the playoffs is entirely based on points, awarded to players relative to how they finish in each tournament with big events like the Masters worth a little more and secondary events like the Reno-Tahoe Open worth about half.

So, it’s equitable — the same values are available to all — but once the playoffs start points spike considerably and there are cuts at each of the three run-up events to Atlanta.

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He would prefer the lettering to be different on the trophy, but Dustin Johnson will take it — victories on the PGA Tour don’t come easily.

It was just a short month ago, when Johnson took a swing he’ll likely never repeat. His ill-fated swipe in the sand at Whistling Straits turned a possible PGA Championship title into the penalty stroke heard ’round the world.

Coupled with his collapse at the U.S. Open in June and Johnson had more major tournament heartbreak than one career should endure: certainly one season.

So his victory Sunday carries the title sponsor of BMW and not PGA, but it was his second win this season, fourth of his career and notice served that he is among the game’s young stars.

“You know, after a few unfortunate situations I’ve had, you know, it definitely feels good and gives me a lot of confidence going into next week and the rest of the year,” Johnson told PGATour.com. “You know, it makes things a lot easier.”

His $1.35 million check will help to smooth out some rough spots as well, but seemingly easy is Johnson’s ability to put himself in contention. He successfully defended his title at Pebble Beach in February and was the 54-hole leader on the same golf course at the U.S. Open in June.

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