I know the numbers don't lie. When Tiger Woods isn't in a tournament, the ratings crash. When he is, and is in contention, which is almost all the time, the ratings soar.
When Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods were both climbing the leaderboard on the front 9 at Augusta on Sunday and playing together, it was compelling golf. But there were others playing at the time that were in contention as well. After Steve Stricker missed a pair of birdie putts on 1 & 2, that's the last I saw of him all day. Now I may have stepped away and missed him once, but for the most part, I was with The Masters all day. Now he went through a long stretch where he wasn't doing anything. In face, Stricker even went backwards with a bogey before he birdied two of the last three holes. So he finished with a couple of birds and we couldn't even get a replay. Yet Stricker finished tied for 6th with Tiger Woods.
I didn't hear too much from Tiger either. He made his mandatory couple of comments after this round to CBS, but he once again failed to go into the main media tent to talk to reporters about his round. Before you Tiger Woods apologists jump all over that one, I wasn't there, so it's not like I didn't get an interview. But as a golf fan, I was deprived of hearing what the world's best golfer had to say.
To CBS, it's been proven that more of Tiger is better, but don't forget about the rest of the leaderboard.
