Last year was the year of the tease.
Halfway through last season, as select tournaments dropped from the '06 schedule faster than cellulose in a film editors dark room, the PGA machine was priming us fans for the new PGA for '07. What with the multi-million dollar FedEx tin Cup, a revamped programming schedule and new venues to broadcast from...the carrot, like a John Daly appearance fee, dangled in front of our noses, for us to sit down this year and watch the new PGA.
Well, the new PGA started last weekend in Torrey Pines...oh, let me back up...see, the Tour doesn't really start until Tiger Woods says it starts...which started last weekend in Torrey Pines.
And, other than old man Faldo as co-captain in the TV booth, and spectators paying more for a hot dog, nothing much has changed.
Tiger is still winning, 3rd round leaders are still folding, Mickelnuts is still not meeting expectations, players are still making this once-majestic-only-to-be-lengthened golf course look like a putt-putt course with still more Honking-Good-God-Mother-of-Pearl-sized drivers , TV announcers are still using the same dull verbiage to describe the magnificence of The Golfer Formally Known as Tiger (all apologies to Prince) and the bar is still being set by one golfer.
Do you hear that blood-curdling scream? It's the paid-in-full sponsors of the '07 PGA tournaments that Tiger won't play in this year.
I'd bet you that more people will sign up at metascape Second Life this year and design their own virtual Avatar's, than golf fans sit down and watch a non-Tiger PGA event this year. In his first tournament and first win of the season, Tiger has virtually guaranteed that no one will watch a PGA Tournament this year unless he participates.
And that is an outcome that will still haunt the new PGA.
Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,
JFB
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