Tiger & Olympics

[Chilli Dipper]

On April 5, 2016 at 11:22 AM, ScouseJohnny said:

That was a response, really, to the assertion that "golf doesn't need the Olympics," which another poster made. I wholeheartedly disagree.

There seems to be a general feeling that golf is in something of a malaise. The logical assumption would be that seeing a well-known American superstar golfer winning a gold medal would captivate people, but, well, there are already four opportunities a year to watch top golfers compete for golf's greatest prizes, not to mention all the other PGA Tour events. So clearly that isn't enough. I think Adam Scott is right - just another 72 hole stroke play event featuring well known faces is boring.

If, in some weird twist of fortune and alternate reality, Tiger Woods won a gold medal at the Olympics, that would make a lot of men over the age of 30 who post at the Sand Trap ecstatically happy. I don't know whether it would be enough to get a 13 year old kid bugging his parents for lessons and a set of clubs in a box from Costco.

I watch golf. I may watch bits and bobs of the Olympics, and go and make a cup of tea when they cut to the shot putting for a bit. I'm not going to sit back and watch the Olympics with the same enthusiasm that I watch the Players.

The Olympics might have provided a venue to do something a bit different - like allow for a top amateur competition, but what we have is basically another Tour event.

I may be wrong, but as I recall, Olympic boxing doesn't yet look like big fight night from Vegas for the Heavyweight Championship of the World...

The format is going to need to be changed before 2020, that's for sure. There's nothing special about a 72-hole stroke play tournament, especially one where half of the world's top 50 won't be there, but a player outside the top 300 will because he's the top-ranked player from Bangladesh. I don't see how inviting a outclassed player to finish 50 shots behind the eventual winner is going to expand the game, or capture the public's imagination.

I'd like it to be like the NCAA golf championship, with a medal play round followed by a team match-play final. Barring that, the IGF needs to retool its qualification criteria: exemptions for the winners of national opens, shortlists of the Orders of Merit on various tours, etc. Maybe a Stableford format would be more competitive for the type of field the tournament will invite.

On that last remark: amateur boxers no longer wear headgear as of this Olympics, and there is a remote possibility that professionals may be permitted to fight in Rio, so that may not be very far off.