NBC Will Spend Time on Tiger This Weekend, But He's Not Playing

by Ryan Ballengee on Feb 27, 2009 3:35 PM EST

When Tiger Woods announced that he would return this week at the Accenture Match Play, the networks broadcasting the event - Golf Channel and NBC - went on a marketing barrage with the message that Tiger was back.

That was true for the Golf Channel, but due to Tim Clark's fantastic performance against Woods yesterday, that isn't true for NBC.

After showing commericals on their family of networks that Woods is back, they are figuring that they will have to deliver some kind of Tiger.

Hat tips to reader Diane vis a vis Geoff Shackelford for this from the LA Times:

Tiger Woods is out in the second round of the Accenture Match Play Championship, beaten Thursday by South Africa's Tim Clark. That means Woods won't be playing Saturday and Sunday during live network television coverage of the event, but he'll still be prominent on NBC.

"We'll have to deal with showing what happened to Tiger because this has gone from being a golf tournament to a news event," NBC golf producer Tommy Roy said. "Our weekend telecast will have to deal with showing what happened to Tiger. It will be our duty."

Duty? No, the duty is to do what you are paying the PGA Tour for the right to do - broadcast the PGA Tour live on TV. Frankly, I already know what happened to Tiger Woods. So does everybody else on planet earth. It has been jammed down our throats enough to know what happened.

With numbers like those that the Golf Channel saw, though, NBC must be thinking they are better off with Tiger highlites (or lowlites) than with the players still in the field.

Wednesday's first-round coverage of the match-play event resulted in the highest first-round ratings ever for the Golf Channel. Golf Channel President Page Thompson said the 1.8 rating was up 50% from the same round a year ago.

That was live, though, and the excitement of his first round back. I think NBC took a gamble on Tiger being there for the weekend and it didn't pay off.

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Comments

they have plenty of time

There isn’t enough continuous action to fill all the time – they have plenty of time to talk about a variety of different things. Usually it’s less noticable because they talk about several topics. Unfortunately, this year they are going to drone on and on about one topic. Yawn.

"this ball will fit in that fairway"

by courtgolf on Feb 27, 2009 4:30 PM EST reply actions

Yeah, it’d be one thing if they just kinda fit it in a couple of times. I don’t think they’re going to do that, though.

by Ryan Ballengee on Feb 27, 2009 4:36 PM EST up reply actions

you’re exactly right – I wouldn’t be surprised if they tape delayed shots to continue the Tiger talk — this could be worse than the Michelle Wie coverage at the Sony.

"this ball will fit in that fairway"

by courtgolf on Feb 27, 2009 5:07 PM EST up reply actions

Is it possible

that some people are not as fortunate as us and may not have seen those 30+ holes Tiger played Weds-Thurs? Is it possible they were working while we were super-duper bloggerating?

Let’s, for once, allow the working peasants to gaze upon that which we take for granted…

by One-Eyed Golfer Guy on Feb 27, 2009 9:25 PM EST reply actions