Tiger Effect creating excitement
Tiger Woods wasn’t the only one celebrating after he won the Tour Championship. Golf announcers and network executives are excited about the momentum Woods’ comeback season can generate for ratings.
All three of the sport’s major U.S. broadcasters have reasons to look forward to the next nine months.
CBS’ Jim Nantz saw Woods saw signs of Woods working his way back into contention at the Honda Classic last February in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, as well as The Memorial in Columbus and at the PGA Championship, where he finished two strokes behind Brooks Koepka.
“I saw him working his way through it and never doubted that he would win again,” Nantz said. “It could have happened earlier but he would have trouble over the last nine holes and lose some shots. But you don’t say it was ever over with him because he will outwork everyone.”
The immediate beneficiary is the NBC Sports Group, which has this weekend’s Ryder Cup on Golf Channel and NBC. It also had last weekend’s Tour Championship and saw a ratings increase of 178 percent. Sunday’s final round had a 4.45 Nielsen rating. The round also had 18.4 million minutes streamed across NBC’S digital platforms according to the network.
NBC Sports Mike Mccarley, who is the president of the network’s golf coverage, said last weekend’s Fedex Cup finale and this weekend’s Ryder Cup present two interesting story lines.
“Last weekend he was squaring off against a generation of players who watched him. Now he is teaming up with them this week,” Mccarley said from Paris. “It sets up a good storyline