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Smylie Kaufman Talks PGA Tour's Innovative Broadcast Experiments
SportsGrid
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10/15/2024
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Sports
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00:00
One of the sort of the headlines in this past week that is very applicable to what you do
00:08
on a weekly basis, Smiley, is some of the new TV changes that the PGA Tour is experimenting
00:12
with.
00:13
We saw one of them this week that really isn't necessarily new.
00:17
In fact, what it really looks like to me is a borrowing of the concept that's worked for
00:22
many years on the DP World Tour.
00:24
It's the walk and talks that we've seen for a couple of years now on the PGA Tour, except
00:29
instead of having a set of air pods in and that player talking to broadcasters, commentators
00:34
are in her booth and you're not seeing them.
00:37
There is a on course correspondent holding a mic and going back and forth with that player.
00:41
And that is what you've seen on the DP World Tour for a number of years now.
00:44
So that's something we saw this week at the Black Desert Championship.
00:47
And then kind of two other pieces of the just I don't know if you want to call it a modernization
00:54
of the broadcast or just experimenting with new things.
00:56
But one was more of a focus on that cut line on, you know, really that Friday coverage
01:02
window of just less of a focus on the leaders and more of a who's sweating that cut line
01:07
and what's that number going to be?
01:08
And can we use more modern analytics and things like that to give you an accurate guess as
01:13
to where that cut line is going to end up?
01:15
And then also a a more of a narrow focus in the broadcast on a specific hole or a specific,
01:23
you know, at the Saracen Farms, like a dribble par four, just just instead of going wide
01:28
on the entire golf course, seeing a bunch of guys come through and play one section
01:31
of the golf course.
01:32
And Smiley, this applies to you because, you know, you've been doing the Fridays with Smiley
01:37
at one hole location this entire last season.
01:40
And you know, a lot of that's been cut line focus.
01:42
So just what are your reflections on the ways in which the broadcast hopefully changes and
01:47
what you're excited about to kind of see NBC Sports and Golf Channel do from your employer's
01:52
perspective?
01:53
So this is all coming from the networks, obviously listening to their audience, but also communicating
01:58
with the PGA Tour and their subcommittees that they have set up.
02:02
So there are players that meet with the networks and also just try to formulate a plan of of
02:08
how to make it more engaging, see more golfers and just make it a different experience from
02:13
day to day.
02:14
So the traditional way in which we've covered golf, which is Thursday, Friday, typical featured
02:19
groups, you go around the entire golf course with those, you know, two or three groups
02:24
outside of some big shots that you kind of find around the golf course that that kind
02:28
of gets sold.
02:29
And they're like, OK, let's go over to seven.
02:30
Most of the time, you kind of know I sit on the couch and something's about to happen.
02:35
The way that's going to be this fall and the way they're they're trying to test it out
02:39
is that, like you said, you know, going to one hole, whether it be, you know, for Shriners
02:45
this next week, it will probably be the drivable far for 15th hole and then the 17th hole,
02:50
which is a par three.
02:51
And I think what you're going to see in this is that we're going to see most likely just
02:57
about every single player that's in the field come through these holes.
03:02
So instead of only seeing, let's say, twenty five guys of the one hundred forty four, we're
03:08
going to see closer to the full field on the TV screen while you're sitting there watching.
03:13
So if you're a parent or you're a cousin or you're a friend or you're a fan of X, name
03:18
this player that doesn't get on TV, you know, once every five events, unless he holds out
03:23
a shot.
03:24
Hey, this is this is now this fall an opportunity to see him play, whether it be, you know,
03:30
that drivable hole or that going forward in two or that par three.
03:34
So you'll typically see that on Thursday and then Friday.
03:37
If your fan or friend or whatever it is, is on that cut line.
03:41
That's going to be the storyline.
03:43
And and that's that's the big thing that's been echoed from the players.
03:46
It's like we don't show enough of our golfers and that we don't focus enough on the cut
03:52
line.
03:53
And I could not have green up more on this.
03:55
I've always said that, man, it'd be cool to have some type of like a red zone experience
03:59
on Fridays.
04:00
But now we're just going to do it on the broadcast and Saturday and Sunday.
04:04
We've always focused on on the leaders and setting up these storylines of who's going
04:08
to win these golf tournaments.
04:10
But now we have Friday to really, you know, lean into what is one of the coolest things
04:15
that we have in professional golf, which is a cut.
04:17
You know, this is what guys decide whether they're going to get paid or not.
04:22
Not just the players, the caddies, too.
04:24
So it's a it means a lot for somebody like me, knowing going into every week, you know,
04:30
you're just trying to give yourself an opportunity on the weekend to go make a paycheck and move
04:35
up, whether it's the corporate tour pointless or the PGA Tour FedEx got pointless.
04:41
And that was our sole focus.
04:42
So I love that Friday is going to be that way.
04:45
I think just the graphics that I've seen this entire fall of just the rolling leaderboards
04:50
of so weird seeing, you know, a 20 person leaderboard of where the cut is.
04:55
You just never have seen that before.
04:57
So for me, I'm always checking that anyways to see who's making the cut and who isn't.
05:02
Now I get to watch it on Friday.
05:04
So I think it's a great way to to kind of test this as we kind of move into hopefully
05:09
getting people to turn on the TV on a Friday.
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