And in the charACTer (note Dr. John pronunciation) department, Tiger is still lacking. Cool guy and all, amazing golfer but he doesn't put on a show like Chi Chi. Yeah, all he's done is own all four Majors at one time, won 8, won one US Open by over a dozen strokes, and his first Masters over 8 strokes, and has won over 20 PGA Tour Events... before age 27. I think I'll forgive Tiger for not pretending he's a friggin' Three Musketeer...
Didn't you make the statement that Senior Tour TV ratings were better than PGA TV ratings in the 90s? I don't think that's EVER been true. Senior golf is BORING, and I really doubt it ever got better ratings than the regular Tour.
I'm amazed at people who look at Tiger, the #1 recognizable athlete in the WORLD, and find nothing but things to bitch about. Tiger is the greatest golfer EVER, PERIOD, END OF STORY. He'll pass Nicklaus' 18 majors by the time Tiger is 32-33. He's a complete and utter phenomenon. No one ever refrained from entering the same tourney as Arnie, because there was always the possibility that Arnie would blow up and finish way down in the field. Tiger doesn't do that.
Those guys are simply jealous. They KNOW that Tiger would whoop their ass if they were 40 years younger. None of them had to deal with the demoralizing aspect of having to play in the same field as Tiger. Gimme any of the old-timers against Tiger, and I'll pick Tiger every time. Their gripes about the other players might be a bit justified, but at the same time, when you have the MAJORITY of the Top 50 golfers in the world heaping such praise on Tiger, it's gotta be legitimate. They get no money for praising Tiger, and if you were ranked in the Top 20 in the world (and the ego to go with it), you'd have to swallow hard before admitting that Tiger is just simply a much better golfer. Which they admit. My only problem with Tiger is that he makes tournaments boring, winning by such large margins.
I guess since Tiger has done everything else in golf, he should now work on some sort of stage act, a la Chi Chi, so that instead of watching golf, we can watch funny antics instead.
Don't get me wrong, I have a lot of respect for Tiger. But I do like to feel that the athletes I watch are having a good time. I don't know why, it just does my heart good to think that some guy getting payed a lot of money to perform tasks the rest of us classify as recreational should be having fun. When I see Tiger drop an amazing putt the look in his eyes doesn't look fun to me. Looks more to me like he's thinking about how he blew the approach shot which is why he had to make a great putt. This probably has a lot to do with why he's so great, but there's something wrong with the picture.
I don't see these old fart criticizing Tiger. I see them criticising the other players. I don't think these old fart are afraid of Tiger, I think every one of them would play him for the Masters right now no hesitation. They'd probably get their clocks cleaned but that's not the point. As for for the "humiliation" the players just need to suck it up. As the old farts point out, anybody that makes the first cut is going to get a pretty nice payday out of a tournament, they should get out there and try to earn it. Playing for second place is what losers do, anybody admiting to being a loser even before they start has no business in professional sports. In a couple of months the football season is going to start, 32 teams with 40 odd players each will start the season, realistically only 4 or 5 even have a chance at the Superbowl, but you don't see teams deciding not to play because they don't have a chance at winning it all. They're getting paid fat money get going.
As for the ratings thing don't know what the overall was. Might just have been a one weekend thing. I just remember there was a big stink among the sports press that the Senior tour had/ was beating the PGA in ratings. I'm not a neilson watching kind of guy and I don't remember what the scope of the beating was. I just remember there was a big tizzy about it, and guys were starting to talk about the PGA becoming the senior tour's minor league, and there was some sideline talk about the LPGA gaining serious ground and possibly being in position to pass the PGA in popularity. Again, 1 season, 1 weekend, don't know; ut at some moment in time the senior tour did win the ratings battle with the PGA. Then Tiger showed up and everything went back to normal.