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He did relatively little for recreational golf play but did increase prize purses simply by increasing golf viewership.

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This is true. What he did was get a decent chunk of people to flip the channel over to golf when he's in contention. But for the most part, those people aren't playing golf, funneling any other money to golf, or doing anything else they weren't already doing before and won't keep doing after.

But I wouldn't say losing those channel flippers causes the game of golf to suffer. Networks and players get a little less rich maybe, that's about it.

I haven't read the article so maybe it addresses this, but I would still contend that Tiger did bring more golfers to the game, but the fact does still remain that golf is expensive and we did suffer a pretty big recession. Amazingly enough, the purses and money for the pros remained strong throughout that, but average people no doubt played less golf as they had less disposable income. Point being, I'd contend that regardless of what the total numbers show, more people were interested in, playing, and watching golf due to Tiger than there were before. Not to mention just the sheer amount of unquantifiable but likely huge amounts of positive run off for the golf industry due to his fame. Think Texas A&M and how much it has benefited from Johnny Football. Can't quantify it probably but you know it's there.

It was interesting to overheard a couple young guys at the course the other day... Going on about Tiger being washed up and how much they like Bubba. And how they liked Bubba since his 1st Masters victory (okay, you one-up each other all the time tweens). Was surreal to hear young golfers talk like that. I'm in the age group where most of our "fuel" for being a spectator and fan of the Pro game was Tiger. Changing in the guard for sure going on.

On Live From the Masters on Golf Channel they said the overwhelming "favorite golfer" for the kids in the Drive Chip & Putt was Rickie Fowler.

[This message has been edited by bagger05 (edited 4/17/2014 12:38p).]

You should read the article, watty. The number of recreational players grew at less than 1% per year over the first 11 years Tiger showed up, which is the rate of US population growth. Equipment spending was exactly the same after 11 years as before he showed up. Contend what you want, but one of those two should show an impact if he had anything more than a negligible one. So what will suffer? We'll lose all that non-growth when Tiger is gone?

[This message has been edited by DannyDuberstein (edited 4/17/2014 2:33p).]

I've read elsewhere that the participation rate remained steady througout Tiger's tenure. The participation rate in 1995 was something like 10.2 or 10.3%. 10 years later - exact same.

[This message has been edited by DannyDuberstein (edited 4/17/2014 2:52p).]

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they said the overwhelming "favorite golfer" for the kids in the Drive Chip & Putt was Rickie Fowler.

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Interesting. For a lot of those kids they have never seen the dominant Tiger that we all got to see during the 2000's. Yes, he had the 5 wins last year, but I can see why younger kids aren't as in love with Tiger as they are with a guy like Rickie.

Danny

I would like to see the stats on an annual basis. The article takes 1997 and 2008/2009. That just happens to be when the recession start to hit hard. If you have these stats on an annual basis I think it would be interesting to see if there was an impact before the recession.

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So what will suffer? We'll lose all that non-growth when Tiger is gone?

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TV ratings will suffer, we know that much for sure. As for the rest, we'll have to see. I don't think the numbers in the article are accounting for everything. I'm not sure, as I don't have proof and I usually hate arguments like the one I'm making, but I just know for a fact that I have personally talked to numerous people who got into golf solely because of Tiger and numerous more who aren't golf fans but are Tiger fans. There is an effect there. I don't know why it isn't reflected in those numbers, but there is an effect. My wife will watch with me when Tiger is playing. She doesn't really do that any other time. Does that show up in anything besides t.v. ratings? Not that one person, but millions of people like that, it has to filter into a tangible effect somehow. Right?

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Danny

I would like to see the stats on an annual basis. The article takes 1997 and 2008/2009. That just happens to be when the recession start to hit hard. If you have these stats on an annual basis I think it would be interesting to see if there was an impact before the recession.

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I don't have the link handy, but as mentioned, I've seen participation rates by year. Always around 10.__% regardless of year. Pre-recession, post-recession, etc

I think it's just going to be you old geezers that miss him from the game. From people that I know around my age (23), most of us dont really care if Tiger is playing well or not and most of us have a favorite professional that isnt him.

I'm an old geezer

Danny

That is just a little to convenient for me to believe. That it was just the same all along that the economy did not change the numbers at all.

So you are saying just as many people played golf and spent the same amount on golf in say 2003 as in 2008/2009 and all the years in between.

This is starting to sound like people want to say Tiger had not effect and are now looking for data that will support their argument. So they pick to arbitrary dates that help them make a point.

For the overall health of the game, I think an equally relevant number is total rounds played. I don't remember for sure, but I think I read in Golf Digest or Golf Magazine that the number of rounds and club membership are the metrics that really sucked it up during the recession.

10.x% of people still played golf, but instead of getting out once a week maybe it dropped to once a month.

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Danny

That is just a little to convenient for me to believe. That it was just the same all along that the economy did not change the numbers at all.

So you are saying just as many people played golf and spent the same amount on golf in say 2003 as in 2008/2009 and all the years in between.

This is starting to sound like people want to say Tiger had not effect and are now looking for data that will support their argument.

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I'm not hiding all of the numbers in my basement. Feel free to go look around and find contradictory #'s. Like I said, the participation rate data I saw was throughout, not 1997 vs 2008. Simply search whether Tiger grew the game of golf, and what you'll find consistently is that the industry says rec golf didn't really change much.

Pre-recession NYT article (Feb 2008) about golf declining while Tiger was winning the vast majority of his majors.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/21/nyregion/21golf.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

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The total number of people who play golf has declined or remained flat each year since 2000.

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More troubling to golf boosters, the number of people who play 25 times a year or more fell to 4.6 million in 2005 from 6.9 million in 2000, a loss of about a third.

The industry now counts its core players as those who golf eight or more times a year. That number, too, has fallen, but more slowly: to 15 million in 2006 from 17.7 million in 2000, according to the National Golf Foundation.

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[This message has been edited by DannyDuberstein (edited 4/17/2014 8:07p).]

The problem is there's no way to know what the numbers would be without Tiger.

My money says negligible. As one article pointed out, when it comes to people's decisions around recreational golf, the only player that matters is them. The time commitment, the financial commitment, and the skill development requirements are so massive that just being a fan of a particular pro golfer isn't something that is going to make or break someone from playing golf and sustaining that play.

And believe it or not, golf existed and was popular before Tiger. Some of us real geezers realize that.

[This message has been edited by DannyDuberstein (edited 4/17/2014 8:36p).]

Not denying that. Just saying that all the numbers are in a vacuum and they don't account for the very real fact that Tiger is one of the world's most famous athletes and has caused even non fans to be interested on some level. Logic says that somehow, he had an effect.

As a finance guy, I like numbers to confirm my logic. I wouldn't call the evidence we have as being numbers in a vacuum, but asking a negative to be proven is always a solid way to come to a stalemate.

[This message has been edited by DannyDuberstein (edited 4/17/2014 9:05p).]

Also can't disagree with that...

Some numbers (possible projections):

http://fansided.com/2014/04/21/tiger-woods-absent-cost-golf-industry-15-billion/#!FeNLx

[This message has been edited by watty (edited 4/21/2014 2:38p).]

watty,


i don't want this to sound like i'm attacking you. but that entire "piece" was written to get ad clicks. there is no evidence of anything. just throw crap up against the wall and get people to click for ad dollars.

No offense taken. Just came across the article and figured it would fit on this thread.