Rory Effect? 2013 WGC Match Play Ratings Down

The Nielsen overnights show a 17% decline Saturday and 24% slide Sunday.

               2013       2012
Sat          1.4/3      1.7/4
Sun         1.9/4      2.5/5

2012 included Rory McIlroy beating Lee Westwood in one Sunday semi, and Hunter Mahan besting Mark Wilson in the other semi.

Comments

[Doctor]

Nowhere to go but up. With the bar sufficiently lowered, there could well be a 15% increase in viewership in 2014.

[greg c]

there just aren't that many golfers on the tour that are interesting to watch...the PGATour is pretty much a snooze fest...they could go to a four month season, and nobody would notice...

[Garland]

I explicitly didn't watch, because the Tour wants to take their ball and go home if the USGA doesn't do as they wish.
Boycott the Tour!

[Digger Dave *is* digsouth]

Thr guys who are for the ban should put a long putter in their bag, and all of them play a short p4 with the long putter, tee to green, just anything to show what a farce the long club is. Just do it.

[Never Forget]

Tiger Woods was not there, that's why. 20 yrs too early to even say RorE effect. You media guys will not stop pushing your guy.

[Abu Dhabi Golfer]

CNN was repeatedly running an expose on Oscar Pistorius all weekend long - maybe that's were some of the viewers went.

Nike's #1 needle mover?

Oscar Pistorious

Light years ahead of the rest.

[fourputter]

Pace of play was again beyond awful, even making allowance for the cold conditions. Day really has to do something about his disrespect of the game and his fellow competitors: he was abysmally slow. But he, if the worst, was not the lone sinner.

[HBL]

In the long cold months of Central New York winters, after NFL, and before the snow melts, my wife often like to watch Sunday afternoon PGA Tour golf. We tried to watch Sunday's match play (a format that I enjoy playing) and just couldn't do it. The golf, when it was being shown was fine, but so many commercials and such much commentator time. Ryder Cup is great because there are any number of matches and there is a general sense of importance. But a slow plod around the course, even by two very nice players, is still a slow plod. We put in a British murder myster, had a nice meal, and I read about Tim Finchen's public airing of the Tour's opposition to an anchoring ban. Somewhere I also learned that someone one the event.

[munihack]

The tour could solve this with fewer players and a round robin format similar to group play in soccer. The players would be guaranteed more matches and the eliminated players could still play on to establish their place in the tournament instead of ties. To make it more interesting only half the field gets paid...

I'd like to see one of the majors or the Players adopt the U.S. Am format- 2 days of stroke play and then match play to produce the winner. The PGA used to be match play, they should return to it.

[fishman]

3:45 for 15 holes, playing twosomes, wide open golf course. Pathetic. Watch two shots, cut to commercials, watch two more shots, cut to same commercials...rinse and repeat. And this was the semi-finals where two matches mattered. The finals were even worse. I had the TV on tape delay and skipped all the commercials. Still nearly unwatchable.

All four guys were glacial. From Jr golf to HS to college to minitours these guys have been trained to play this slow. They haven’t dobe anythingin the past because of money—too much at stake—or because golfers emulate playing for big money, thinking that’s what they have to do to be serious golfers. Every one of these guys in the semi finals was glacial. Had any of the matches gone to 18, It would have taken 4:45 to 5 hours. Every kid that watches this crap must think that the only way to putt like these guys is to wait until it is your turn, look at the putt from both sides, then to the side, take a final look from behind the ball, make a few practice strokes, then, and only then, stroke the freaking ball. The scary part is that the younger the player, the slower they play. Simpson & Bradley are the poster children for glacial, but it really applies to all of the young American players, except maybe Fowler.

[dbh]

HBL, not sure if 'such much' was a typo or a reference to Casablanca. Either way, I like it!