First off, it might be time to rethink that Masters pick. Hasn't been a good week for Tigers.

Detroit's much-ballyhooed boys of summer might be eliminated before the end of spring. Those cats, picked by many to win the World Series, are in a world of hurt after dropping their first seven games of the season. Then there are my beloved ballers from Memphis. Up nine with less than two minutes to play in Monday night's NCAA finals, they came from ahead to free-throw away the school's first national championship in an overtime loss to Kansas.

Earlier this year I wrote about getting splotchy when my favorite teams play (click here). The splotch-to-skin ratio rises in proportion to the importance of the game. When you consider that on a scale of 1 to 10 the University of Tennessee Orange and White spring football game is a solid 9.4, you couldn't have measured my nervousness Monday night even if you used those dials on Spinal Tap's amps that go to 11. The splotchiness was anything but a pigment of my imagination.

And that was before the game started. Memphis turned a five-point halftime deficit into that aforementioned nine-point lead with less than two to play. It seemed Kansas needed a perfect storm to have a chance. It didn't happen, and they still won.

Yes, they buried a couple of threes, including Mario Chalmers' game-tying triple with two seconds left, and got plenty of help from Memphis in the form of missed free throws and an untimely turnover on an in-bounds pass.

But in that final flurry, Kansas had a lay-up blocked, allowed a 3-on-1 fast break to the best transition offense in the nation, and gave up an offensive rebound off a missed free throw with 16 seconds left. And they still won. I'm getting splotchy just thinking about it.

As I lay in bed that night, staring at the ceiling 'til 1 a.m., body temperature approximately 400 degrees Kelvin in utter apoplexy, I replayed those maddening, myriad moments that conspired to take away the Tigers' title and my good night's sleep.

What if Jayhawks' forward Darrell Arthur doesn't hit those two tough jumpers, one from just inside the three-point arc or the second, which rimmed the basket and hit the backboard before falling in? What if Memphis doesn't throw away the in-bounds pass and give Kansas an open three? What if Joey Dorsey doesn't breathe too hard on Chalmers, fouling out and giving KU points with the clock stopped? What if, after Antonio Anderson blocks Sherron Collins' lay-up with 30 seconds left and starts a 3-on-1 fast break, Arthur doesn't get back in time to foul Chris Douglas-Roberts under the basket and prevent a four-point lead with 16 ticks to go? What if Douglas-Roberts chooses not to go up for the points and instead either pulls it back out to burn a few more seconds or, even better, hands it off to the trailing Robert Dozier for a game-clinching slam? What if Memphis makes, say, two of its final five free throws instead of just one? What if the refs call Derrick Rose for bumping Collins to the floor before the Jayhawks' guard has a chance to get the ball to Chalmers for the game-winner? Or if Chalmers simply misses an off-balance three-pointer with Rose's hand in his face? What if Arthur pronounces his name normally, DARE-ull, instead of duh-RELL?

The answer to all of those questions (or at least most of them) is that Memphis would be celebrating its first-ever national championship and I wouldn't have this permanent splotch mark across my face and neck.

All of which leads us to sports' most famous Tiger and this week's Masters. Most experts think anyone other than Woods winning is about as likely as the Olympic torch making it through the streets of San Francisco in full flame. He may be faster, higher, stronger than the rest of the field, but that doesn't guarantee Woods will win. Not even this year.

As great as Woods is and has been, especially at Augusta National, the field is still the percentage pick. Tiger won four of his first nine Masters as a professional, getting to that number ahead of Jack Nicklaus, who won four of his first 11 as a pro. Woods is now four-for-11 after coming up short the last two years. It's a ridiculous winning percentage, but the odds still favor someone else -- no one in particular, mind you, just someone.

It's not like Woods wasn't the prohibitive favorite in previous years. In fact, the last time he wasn't favored to win a major was probably the first time he won the Masters in 1997. And his last win, in 2005, actually followed a season in which he didn't win a single stroke-play event.

In each of the last two years, like this one, Woods had already won multiple tournaments upon his arrival in Augusta. I give him a pass for 2006 when he admitted he was trying too hard to win one last major before his father died (which Earl Woods did a month later). But last year, Tiger was overwhelmingly the world's best player, as he is now, and failed to win.

More notably, he lost despite taking the outright lead Sunday afternoon when third-round leader Stuart Appleby doubled the opening hole and Woods birdied the second. Tiger wouldn't make another birdie all day, though he eagled 13 to offset a pair of bogeys at 6 and 10. Still, with the tunamint on the line, Woods let it wriggle free. Let's see a show of hands for those of you who had Zach Johnson in your Masters office pool? Augusta National doesn't have a pool, but it does have a pond at 15, which is where Woods hit it in the final round with the outcome hanging in the balance. He saved par there but missed a makeable birdie putt at 16 and dunked his approach at 17 into the front bunker, effectively ending his bid for a fifth green jacket and making a hero of Johnson.

Woods enters the opening round of this year's Masters not just as a lock to win Sunday but a favorite to take all four major championships in 2008, a preposterous thought prior to his joining the Tour and still an outlandish notion for anyone except Woods, himself. But not even the world's best player can hit a Grand Slam with no one on base. Let's see if Tiger can get off to a better start than his namesakes from Detroit and finish better than his fellow felines from Memphis. If he does, it could well be a week and year that none of us will ever forget.

I'm getting splotchy just thinking about it.