good question… and may be getting past my expertise…

but php script, ie WP, cannot complete until the page is served…  so, for example, the page head tags are output well before the php scripts complete… and they begin displaying and doing other things…  this is why sometimes js scripts and other processing is moved to the footer…

html is still served from the server so not sure how much that affects the ability of the php script to exit…

and since the number of queries are the same, the php is essentially the same…  might be interesting to see if external http requests (which is what we see with google) from within the php is holding up the widget… 

maybe try turning off avatars from the widget and see if any different…  only mention that because it is an image that must be fetched…  shouldnt be an issue, but kind of grasping at straws….

While I am still not personally seeing bad load times with your site I am still this morning seeing the 404 errors caused by these x2 image http requests and strongly recommend you turn this off.

I also meant to ask if you are allowing the use of Gravatars and if you are to make sure you install the SP Gravatar Cache plugin as that can make a huge difference to a gravatar heavy page.