"Anyone who thinks Tiger can rescue the game is dreaming."
/Dave Seanor looks at the state of the game and says a Tiger turnaround will not help the sport thrive again because the numbers do not suggest he ever grew the game in the first place. Thanks to reader John for this:
Bottom line, fewer people in the United States play the game now than when Woods was at his zenith, and that number continues to erode. According to the National Golf Foundation, there were 25.7 million golfers in America in 2011, down from a historic high of 30 million in 2005. Rounds played last year dropped to 463 million from 518 million in 2000. For the sixth year in a row, more golf courses in this country have closed than have opened (158 closures vs. 19 openings in 2011, according to the NGF). The frenzy of golf course construction from the mid-1980s through 2005 was primarily a real estate boom, not a golf boom.
Golf isn't for everybody. It's not easy to learn, and it's impossible to master. It's expensive. It's time consuming. It's intimidating. It's humbling. Its rules often defy common sense and some of its traditions are downright primitive. For the last 20 years, golf's powers-that-be have tried to "grow the game" with all sorts of "initiatives" and pie-in-the-sky, if not delusional, promotions--with zero success.