Our obsession as humans with streaks of uninterrupted success or failure reveals a disappointingly slavish devotion to the Gregorian calendar. For example, we had to invent the “Tiger Slam” for Tiger Woods’ amazing achievement of winning four consecutive major tournaments because the ancient Romans thought January 1 would be a nifty place to start the new year.

However, Tiger’s working on a streak now that impresses on its own merits, not requiring the logical hoop-jumping. He is a mere two strokes back from the lead at Doral after one round this week. If he wins, it will be the sixth straight victory for Woods, stretching back to last season’s Buick Championship and not counting his Target World Challenge win last winter.

Tiger has been deferential to Byron Nelson’s streak of 11 straight in 1945, stating, “What Byron accomplished, that goes down as one of the great years in the history of our sport.” However, there are mitigating circumstances to Nelson’s streak that knock it down a few pegs in history’s eyes. Is there reason to believe a Tiger win this weekend will extend the more impressive feat?

Tiger Woods’ streak has been built at events like the PGA Championship and in match play. At each event, Tiger has been forced to take on opponents like Phil Mickelson, Rory Sabbatini, and Vijay Singh. His wins have consisted of the rare come-from-behind effort and the natural Tiger domination.

Byron Nelson did not join the war effort in 1945 due to a blood disorder and was able to stay home and feast on the carcasses of lesser golfers. One of his wins was in a four-ball team event. Isn’t his effort less impressive considering the field and that odd four-ball event in Miami?

Not a chance, according to an excoriating article by Brent Kelley at ABOUT.COM. Kelley clears the air about such misconceptions with a single wave of his keyboard. Nelson had to compete against Sam Snead and Ben Hogan, neither slouches, for nearly all of 1945. Throw out that four-ball event much like we ignored the Target World Challenge for Tiger and it’s 10 v 5 today.

Most importantly, each of those 10 ends up being worth as much as each of Tiger’s 5. Perhaps Nelson’s competition was not as deep as Tiger’s, but we don’t have the tools to measure that yet. Tiger cherry-picks his events worse than Nelson ever did. Snead and Hogan could compete with Nelson; no one’s proven they can do the same with Tiger, but he’s not halfway there.

We see Tiger’s grimace on a lazy Sunday afternoon in beautiful high definition and are deeply impressed. We see grainy black-and-white photographs of Byron Nelson and we see room for doubt. Nelson won’t receive too many votes over Tiger Woods as the better player, but Nelson had the better streak.

So far. Tiger’s not done yet.