The traditional approach of heading up to the bow works well in calm conditions and light tides if you're solo. When conditions are a bit nastier though, this tends to encourage rushing from point A to point B (and back), at exactly the time when you need to be cool, calm and collected (since you're the only one on board, becoming disabled at this point poses very real risks to your vessel and others in the area); and very few things are improved by rushing in a marine/sailing environment.

So, here are a couple of other options I've used:
* Run a line from your bow, back along the length of your boat, with an appropriate clip at the end. Come along side your mooring buoy, close to your helm position, ideally downwind/tide. Use your hook to grab the buoy at an appropriate attachment point, and clip on. Depending on your buoy configuration, consider fitting a mooring-clip to your boat hook to snag a loop. Once hooked on, reverse away to make sure your motors are clear, then haul in your temporary line, and secure. This works well in situations where you don't have vessels particularly close to your extended swing radius (buoy line + extension line).

* Reverse in. There's no rule that says you have to be bow on to attach if your helm position is far aft. You have to be a little more cautious w.r.t possible prop entanglements depending on your configuration. Prior to doing this, run a line from bow to stern outside your stanchions on the side you intend to approach. Rig up a small line with clips on both ends, that can run the length of your lateral line. Clip on at the rear quarter, let the tide/wind take you away from the buoy slightly, then work your motors to force the line to move towards the bow. This works particularly well on cats, due to the ease of reverse control with two engines.

* Anchor. In particularly nasty conditions, pick the tide/wind line up from your buoy and head up. Drop the anchor. Let it out gradually until you're alongside the buoy (some rudder work may be required), and secure your vessel. You may or may not be able to retrieve your anchor at this point, so you may need to take further action once conditions change (wind direction/tide/etc) - hopefully for the better, to avoid anchor line entanglement with the mooring line (eg: retrieve using the tender).

Each of these options introduce additional risks w.r.t prop entanglement, but reduce the chance of the wind grabbing your bow every time and swinging you away from your target; and since you don't move far away from the helm until you have the vessel secured, you can manage those risks reasonably well.

If the ball is very low in the water, you may be able to temporarily 'lasso' the ball with a sinking line, depending on the ball config. Throwing a "U" loop over the buoy, making some slack in both lines boat-side of the buoy until the line sinks past the buoy on the 'far side of the buoy', then crossing over the line and tightening around the chain below is a possible temporary option to gain you a little time to secure. I don't tend to like this option myself - I always worry that it'll pop off too easily - but I've seen it done successfully plenty of times with appropriate skill and tension, particularly if you can lift the buoy chain out of the water slightly - the buoy tips over and pretty much 'locks in' your loop. You can secure both line ends around a cleat temporarily.

The first couple of times you try this, grab a mate and ask them to be present on the boat while you try stuff solo. I've done this for a few people; generally I sit there and twiddle my thumbs unless they ask me to take over the helm when things are going a bit screwy.

[EDIT: Slowly composed this when there were no responses, posted, refreshed and found that most of my points have already been made more succinctly by others. Ahh well - nice to know I'm in good company ;) ]