Tiger Woods Masters: PGA Tour Needs Biggest Star to Shine Again at Augusta

You know who must've been thrilled about Tiger Woods' win at the Arnold Palmer Invitational this past weekend? Tim Finchem, the commissioner of the PGA Tour.

For Finchem and all the folks crunching numbers at the tour headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, Tiger's return to relevance on the golf course means increased interest from the general public, which means more viewers tuning in, which means more advertising dollars.

As such, Finchem and friends must be hoping and praying that Woods keeps this up next week, when he returns to Augusta National for The Masters.

No offense to Rory McIlroy, Darren Clarke, Keegan Bradley or defending champion Charl Schwartzel, each of whom won a Major last season.

But, in all reality, none of those names carries any particular sex appeal beyond the realm of diehard fans of the game. For better or (often) worse, Tiger is golf's lone link to the mainstream, the one player who transcends the ever-insular sport and can regularly infiltrate the national (if not the global) pop culture Zeitgeist.

The ratings bear that out. Woods' contention drove up the viewership of the 2012 Honda Classic to its highest levels in a decade and attracted more eyes to the final round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational than at any time since 2009.

Of course, this sort of phenomenon is nothing new. Ratings have regularly risen and fallen on the whims of Tigers' participation ever since his emergence as a bona fide phenomenon in the late 1990s. 

McIlroy has been pushed as the "Next Big Thing" to follow in Tiger's footsteps since his spectacular showing at the 2011 US Open and may well turn out to be that eventually. Rory's the closest thing to a household name in golf outside of Woods, a 22-year-old wunderkind who can often be seen in public either gallivanting with or being supportive of girlfriend and tennis star Caroline Wozniacki.

But, try as he might, McIlroy's appeal is still limited as much by his seeming lack of a major national origin (he's from Northern Ireland) as by a track record on the course that's far from proven at this point.

A win at Augusta National could change that, to some extent.

For now, though, the PGA would likely prefer that Tiger come away with his fifth Green Jacket. What better way to draw in casual observers and new fans that with Woods taking another step toward Jack Nicklaus in the annals of golf's greatest? What better way to sell the sport than to market the opportunity to watch history in the making?

At the very least, the powers-that-be are banking on Tiger being in the hunt on the weekend, which he has been for seven years running.

That should be enough to earn a golf clap from Tim Finchem, if not an occasional roar from the galleries at Augusta and, more importantly, a fist pump from the folks watching at home.

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