The “Tiger effect” lifted the Wyndham Championship to its best final round rating in eighteen years.
Final round coverage of the PGA Tour Wyndham Championship drew a 3.4 final rating and 5.0 million viewers on CBS last Sunday, up 159% in ratings and 165% in viewership from last year (1.3, 1.9M), and tied with 1998 as the highest rated final round of the event since 1997 (3.5).
Sunday marked the 12th time this season that final round PGA Tour coverage has hit a multi-year high, and the 7th time that ratings have been the highest in at least nine years.
Woods entered the final round in a tie for second place, but quickly fell out of contention. Had he won the tournament, which he was playing for the first time, he would have qualified for the FedEx Cup playoffs.
In addition to the multi-year highs, Sunday’s final round ranks as the highest rated non-major golf telecast since Woods’ victory at the 2013 Players Championship on NBC (5.0).
Third round action last Saturday drew a 2.9 final rating and 4.2 million viewers, up 187% in ratings and 208% in viewership from last year (1.0, 1.4M). The telecast drew a higher rating and slightly more viewers than the comparable rounds of the PGA Championship and U.S. Open, and ranks as the highest rated third round of a non-major since the 2012 Ryder Cup (3.0).
(Wknd. numbers from Nielsen)
