Wednesday, July 25, 2001
Tiger’s magic to touch LPGA
By Randall Mell
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
(KRT)
You can’t, as a blanket statement, assert that Tiger
Woods is good for all of golf.
What about the LPGA?
Although Woods is the reason for another meteoric rise in
purses under the new PGA Tour
television deal announced last week, and although he is luring
new faces to the game, he doesn’t seem
to be helping the women’s tour much.
You could argue he’s hurting the LPGA, but that all changes
next week.
The women’s game should enjoy its best exposure ever
when Woods and Annika Sorenstam
team up to play David Duval and Karrie Webb in an alternate-shot
exhibition match at the Lincoln
Financial Group Battle of Bighorn, a prime-time ABC telecast Monday
(8 p.m. EDT). The winners
split $1.2 million of the $1.7 million purse in Palm Desert, Calif.
When Woods defeated Duval in the first Showdown at Sherwood
in prime time two years ago,
the telecast drew a 6.9 rating, the second highest rated golf
event that year behind the final round of
The Masters. When Sergio Garcia upset Woods in a prime-time match
last year, the ratings jumped to
7.6. Each rating point equals about one million TV households.
To put the 7.6 rating in perspective, consider that the LPGA’s
first major of this year, the
Nabisco Championship, drew a 1.1 rating.
With Woods drawing boys and girls to the game, the LPGA’s
ranks should reap benefits from his
presence in the future. Nowadays, however, Woods keeps trumping
the women. It seems every time
Sorenstam or Webb wins, Woods overshadows them with a victory
of his own.
The PGA Tour’s new four-year TV deal beginning in 2003
is believed to be worth between $825
million and $850 million, a nearly 50 percent increase over the
current package. The purses on the
PGA Tour average around $3.5 million per tournament this year
and are expected to grow to $6
million under the new deal. The LPGA’s purses average about
$1 million this year.
While the PGA Tour basks in riches, the LPGA is wrestling
with the fact that it likely won’t hold a
tour event in Florida next January because of sponsorship and
golf course woes. That has to be
embarrassing. The LPGA’s headquarters are in Daytona Beach.
More than 70 of the tour’s players
live in this state. Still, all three of the tour’s season-opening
events face problems. The Orlando- and
Miami-based tournaments are struggling to find new sponsors. The
Naples event is on hold for a year
waiting for a new golf course.
With Sorenstam and Webb dueling for Player of the Year honors,
the women’s game is stocked
with good story lines. The LPGA will try to get that word out
during its prime-time exposure next
week. The tour introduced its new advertising campaign with 60-second
commercials during last
weekend’s NBC telecast of the Sybase Big Apple Classic. Titled
“Positively Amazing,” the campaign
features childhood snap shots of the tour’s top players intermingled
with shots from today. Music from
a contemporary remake of Alan Lerner and Frederick Loewe’s
classic, ``Thank Heaven for Little
Girls’’ provides the lyrical backdrop.
The spot also will air during the Battle of Bighorn.
The initial campaign features 14 LPGA players, including Sorenstam,
Webb, Dottie Pepper, Meg
Mallon, Se Ri Pak, Lorie Kane and Grace Park.
“Our new advertising campaign is the first of many brand-building
initiatives the LPGA will
develop and roll out during the next 18 months to further strengthen
the LPGA’s brand image and
create a stronger connection between our fans and players,”
said Karen Durkin, LPGA senior vice
president and chief marketing officer. “This campaign showcases
the personal journey of our tour
players, from their childhood to living their dreams as world-class
athletes.”
Everyone else
The newest Tiger Web site features nothing about Tiger.
It’s AnybodyButTiger.com.
“You turn on the TV, and all you see is Tiger Woods,
Tiger Woods, Tiger Woods,” Web site
founder Bill Foss told the Florida Times-Union. “You start
to wonder, ‘Is there anyone else out
there?’”
Foss says he isn’t anti-Tiger, he just wants more exposure
for other players. The opening page of
his site features the top 10 players in the Official World Rankings,
starting with No. 2 Phil Mickelson.
Tiger’s left off.
© 2001 South Florida Sun-Sentinel.
Visit the Sun-Sentinel on the World Wide Web at http://www.sun-sentinel.com/
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.
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