Tiger is back to his Winning Ways winning his 8th at Torrey Pines, but who is the biggest winner?
Tee-Links.com follows Tiger Woods's big win and a even bigger win for the Golf industry in need for a stimulus package.
Tiger Woods starts 2013 in a old familiar fashion by winning The Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines, to become the first golfer to win eight events at the same golf course. Not just any kind of win, Tiger came into the final round play up by seven strokes, something we were used to pre "TigerGate". With this commanding performance Tiger Woods has officially put in his reinstatement as the King of golf. This win by Tiger Woods is a bigger win for the Golf industry that has been struggling capture to attention of main stream America since Tiger's hiatus from the game. Whatever your opinion of the man is, there is no doubt that a return to his former self or even a shell of his former Tiger self is worth tens of Billions of dollars a year to a sport that misses Tiger dearly.
According to Nielson The average household rating/share for the 2007-08 tournaments played by Tiger was 3.3/8. The same tournaments played without the injured Tiger in 2008-09 averaged 1.7/4. An estimated average of 4.6 million viewers tuned in to those tournaments played by Tiger, compared to 2.4 million the following year, a drop of almost 47%. That is a huge amount of impressions and interest lost by a sport and it affects all involved including tour players, sponsors, advertising in endemics and non-endemics to golf industry.
Let's look at some Dollar and Sense
Tiger Woods turned pro in 1996, at that time Greg Norman became the first player on tour to top the $10M career earnings mark and just 4 years later in 2000 Tiger Woods YEARLY earnings was $9.2M. Tiger is Tiger nobody has ever brought so much attention period…This means increases purses, increased sponsorships, increased viewing time of the player that finished 23rd place.for that weeks tournament. Love him or hate him if you were in Golf, Tiger made you more money. Let's take a look at player that started in 1996 along with Tiger Woods, not to discount anyone, if you made the pro tour you are an exceptional player, but not everybody is Tiger Woods and that's not a knock, like being the 12th man on a NBA team, you might not be Lebron James, but you are a top player in the world. Brian Gay, who we would all love to play like, but is not known in the world of Golf has surpassed the $10M career earnings plateau, something that without a doubt is in direct relation with Tiger putting Golf on a different map.
Back to Torrey Pines 2013, CBS saw a 3.7 overnight Nielsen rating Sunday, a rise from 1.1 in last year’s PGA tournament in Torrey Pines minus one Tiger Woods who accepted a seven figure appearance fee to play in the Abu Dhabi dessert. That increase in viewership is a rise of 236% because of one man, that means a lot of money in TV land and again all the ancillary exposure that brings to everythingelse in the Golf industry. As a result the final round which was delayed till Monday because of fog aired on CBS national television for maximum exposure.
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