A-Listers Beware: Fox Showing Weekday Coverage In Prime Time

Mike Reynolds reports on Fox's ambitious plans for U.S.G.A. event coverage and in particular, the U.S. Open. The news coincided with Fox's launch at the USGA annual meeting at the hotel of the people, the Waldorf Astoria. (Brad Klein with notes on the weekend.)

While the coverage time is up about only three hours for the U.S. Open over NBC/ESPN (who were on seemingly all day) with Fox Sports 1 showing golf from noon to 8 pm ET, the real eye-opener is Fox's plan to air three hours Thursday and Friday in east coast prime time (8 pm to 11 pm). NBC used to come on weekday afternoons to show a few hours of marquee players.

This means a "11.5 of the 22.5 hours scheduled for Fox will air in primetime," according to Reynolds.

Generally, the late wave of play at west coast US Opens has consisted of qualifiers and the trash crews. Galleries are thin and volunteers often outnumber fans. By 8 pm PT the A-listers are off having dinner and most of the media has moved on, while sensible spectators left hours before. And with a 17-mile spectator shuttle ride for all, the masses will be long gone even if Bobby Jones came back from the dead to qualify and is out on the course.

Yet with Fox (the big network) going live from the U.S. Open Thursday/Friday for prime time and the network paying handsomely for the privilege, this would seem to force the USGA to go with elite pairings very late in the day. It's hard to imagine Fox showing qualifiers on the big network on a Thursday night. But stranger things have happened.

The full U.S. Open broadcast schedule: