Can the big cat still move the needle as a house cat?

Ronan MacNamara
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Tiger Woods (Photo by Andrew Redington/Getty Images)

Ronan MacNamara

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The big cat, sorry, house cat is back this week.

Yes, the indoor version of Tiger Woods will grace our television screens and the expectation is that he will continue to move the needle.

The first week of his and Rory McIlroy’s Tomorrow’s Golf League left me feeling perfectly whelmed. Not underwhelmed or overwhelmed but generally content with what I saw in the two-hour showing last Tuesday.

919,000 people tuned in to the first edition of TGL but with Tiger back in action for night two it is widely expected that the audience will exceed over one million and maybe even get close to or beyond two million.

McIlroy described the TGL as bringing golf into the 21st century as he tries to modernise the game and refresh the sport. It could have the same effect on Tiger who has played just eleven times in three years and 59 times in the last decade.

Tiger’s presence for Jupiter Links will continue to preserve the novelty factor of the TGL so much so that if we are given another one sided contest it will of course be overshadowed by how Tiger looks, feels and plays despite his health issues.

With the walking element of golf eliminated from the TGL, Tiger should be competitive in this environment.

We will learn how his swing looks as he enters 2025 but the whole TGL series will tell us nothing about how he looks and feels physically. Nobody should be waxing lyrical that he is back or can stand the test of a 72-hole major championship just by hitting golf shots into a screen.

We all know that Tiger can still hit the shots.

Then there is the reality that Tiger is 49 years of age and the new, fresh, young audience that TGL is trying to attract to golf won’t have seen the fifteen-time major champion in his pomp or seen him play competitively.

I mean, some of our younger Irish amateurs have no recollection of Pádraig Harrington winning his three major championships between 2007 and 2008.

Tiger’s presence certainly gives the TGL some space to breath as far as being a viable product goes, and when his Jupiter Links side take on Rory McIlroy’s Boston Common there is no doubt that the viewing figures will be eye-catching.

But just Tiger’s involvement won’t be enough to sustain the TGL.

Last week, had it not been the inaugural staging, would have been written off as a disaster given the dominance that Bay Golf Club had.

Even how Rickie Fowler conceded a hole to Shane Lowry proved that there is a novel, exhibition element to the TGL and the danger is that people will grow dreary and bored of the concept if it lacks a competitive edge.

Yes, the format is cool, yes the different grasses involved and the visuals and the music, the conturing green is fun but people need to feel like there is something real at stake.

Tiger probably needs to be a competitive entity in this to make the TGL a sustainable product going forward.

For now, Tiger’s debut on Tuesday night brings another sense of intrigue and excitement to the TGL which has made a good start but has a long way to go before the public decide whether it is a concrete product or a gimmick.

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