Once Annika Sorenstam actually started playing golf last week, everything was fine. More than fine, as far as CBS and the USA network are concerned — the LPGA champion's presence at the PGA event translated into a boost in the ratings.

Cable's USA, as a matter of fact, drew record ratings on Thursday and Friday as its cameras followed Sorenstam around the course. And CBS got a 4 percent boost over last year even though she missed the cut and didn't play on Saturday or Sunday. (The network did, however, air a recap of her efforts on Saturday.)

According to CBS, its numbers for the Colonial were the best since Tiger Woods made his one-and-only appearance in the tournament in 1997.

The really nice thing about USA's coverage on Thursday and Friday is that the analysts talked about what Sorenstam was doing at the time. And, on Saturday and Sunday, CBS's analysts talked about what Sorenstam had done. It was the pre-Thursday coverage on a multitude of television outlets that became unwatchable for two reasons: First, because there was so much of it that it became overwhelming and mind-numbing.

And, second, because all of the so-called experts were talking on and on without much of anything to say. The fact is that, before Sorenstam teed off on Thursday, nobody knew how she was going to do. The so-called experts were guessing.

Perhaps it would have been worthwhile if we were watching the ESP channel instead of ESPN. But it was just so much hot air.

"But I was right," the so-called experts who predicted Sorenstam wouldn't make the cut would say. So what? You were still guessing.

Not that television was alone. Sports talk radio was more annoying and less interesting than ever as the hosts offered groundless opinions. In the middle of last week, a quick flip from station to station found the local guys on KFNZ AM-1320 and KZN AM-1280 as well as Jim Rome on KALL AM-700 all rambling on about Annika — and found yours truly giving up on sports talk radio (as I did for most of the week).

Yeah, newspapers — including this one — were not Sorenstam-speculation free zones, but at least with a newspaper you can skip stories you're sick of and move on to something else.

Not that I blame Sorenstam for any of this. As a matter of fact, maybe if she did it more often it would be less of a novelty and TV and radio "experts" would move on to guessing about something else.

View Comments

WORLD CUP WOES: The switch of the upcoming Women's World Cup out of China (because of the SARS epidemic) to the United States looks like it's sort of bad news for American TV viewers.

Had the tournament taken place in China, ABC and ESPN — which hold the contract to televise the games in this country — would have aired most of them in the early morning hours. But by moving to this continent, ABC and ESPN may not be able to air most of the games live.

The problem is that the World Cup will be played between Sept. 23 and Oct. 11, which will conflict to some extent with the networks' coverage of college and pro football as well as other regularly scheduled programming. (The last Women's World Cup, played in the U.S. four years ago, took place in June and July.) So look for more of the soccer matches to be tape-delayed this time around.


E-mail: pierce@desnews.com

Join the Conversation
Looking for comments?
Find comments in their new home! Click the buttons at the top or within the article to view them — or use the button below for quick access.