With Woods in Hunt, CBS Is Also a Winner

Ratings drive television.

Tiger Woods drives ratings.

So take a guess as to which player CBS was hoping would carry his summer hot streak into Saturday’s third round of the 88th PGA Championship at Medinah County Club in Medinah, Ill.

It’s really no secret.

Woods’ name among the weekend leaders is worth a ratings spike of 35% to 50%, whether it’s at a major championship or a regular PGA Tour event, CBS Sports President Sean McManus said this week in a conference call with reporters.

Not that McManus was out and out pulling for Woods, but the executive said of the world’s top-ranked player, “Everything that Tiger does seems to be exaggerated a little bit, it seems to be a little bit bigger.”

Woods, he added, “has had an enormous impact on every aspect of the game, from the attention that the American public pays to it to the economics of it to the television ratings to the general perception of the sport, I think. He’s been nothing but a positive influence in all those areas.”

Piped in announcer Jim Nantz, who will head CBS’ 10 hours of weekend coverage, “The sport is blessed to have the No. 1 sportsman in the world.”

What Woods has wrought, Nance said, is “the golden age of golf. There’s never been a better time. I know Jack [Nicklaus] and Arnie [Palmer] probably would cringe if they heard me say this, or Byron [Nelson] and Ben [Hogan] and Sam Snead would say, ‘Wait a minute, what about our time?’ But I believe right now, today, is the best time the game has ever been in....

“Golf has a place in pop culture today like it never has in the past.”

Still, a general perception has been that the PGA Championship is not only the last but the least of golf’s four majors, lacking the stature of the Masters, U.S. Open or British Open, all of which precede it every calendar year.

“From my perspective, as a former player, I don’t think that’s true,” said CBS analyst Lanny Wadkins, a former PGA Championship winner. “I’ve always felt that that was a media presentation and as players we felt like all the majors had equal importance.

“I think the fact that it’s had the strongest field in major championships for the last 10 years, the players know how important it is.”

Maybe viewers do too.

The average weekend rating for the U.S. and British opens this year was 3.9. Last year’s PGA Championship, won by Phil Mickelson in a rain-necessitated Monday finish, drew an average weekend rating of 4.8.

Short Waves

In addition to its cable coverage of today’s second round of the PGA Championship and early action Saturday and Sunday, TNT has partnered with pga.com to provide simulcast coverage on the Internet.... Wilt Chamberlain will be the focus of a one-hour documentary and three more hours of NBA TV programming Monday, which would have been the late Laker center’s 70th birthday.