ShareThisHere's one way to view Tiger Woods' epic victory in last month's U.S. Open in San Diego -- it validated the concept of bringing marquee tournaments to the West Coast.As you probably know, NBC scheduled the final two rounds at Torrey Pines to stretch into prime time on the East Coast. Woods made the decision look shrewd with a scintillating back nine Saturday -- two long eagle putts, one chip-in birdie -- and his dramatic, 72nd-hole birdie putt Sunday, to force a playoff with Rocco Mediate.The ratings were predictably strong: a 4.6 national rating Saturday and 7.5 on Sunday, the highest TV numbers for the Open since Woods outlasted Phil Mickelson at New York's Bethpage Black in 2002.Now, less than a month later, PGA Tour officials are talking to NBC about pushing next year's Presidents Cup -- at Harding Park in San Francisco -- into prime time in the East. In a news conference last week, Commissioner Tim Finchem said flatly, "We will be into prime time" at Harding Park.It's not quite so simple, because NBC televises the NFL on Sunday nights in October and will want golf to end before its pre-game football show begins. Still, it would make perfect sense for the Presidents Cup to stretch past the traditional finishing time of 6 p.m. in the East, or 3 in San Francisco, on Friday and Saturday."We're always trying to get our product in front of as broad an audience as possible," PGA Tour executive vice president Ty Votaw said. "When you get past the 6 p.m. Eastern time window, you broaden that audience."Even if television ratings are not the sole barometer of interest, they're powerful enough to influence the choice of venues. The USGA already has scheduled three more U.S. Opens on the West Coast in the next seven years -- Pebble Beach in 2010, Olympic Club in '12 and Chambers Bay, outside Tacoma, Wash., in '15. (Do not be surprised if Torrey Pines also hosts another Open before too long.)Safe to say, NBC will schedule the weekend rounds of those tournaments to finish in prime time back East.The wider point is this: The success at Torrey Pines bodes well for the future of elite golf on the West Coast. USGA officials no doubt are thrilled about the plan to bring the U.S. Women's Open to Pebble Beach (probably in 2014). Maybe, one day, the PGA Championship will return to California. Or even the Ryder Cup.One final television note: Golf Channel announced Wednesday that, for the first time, it will carry early-round coverage of the Presidents Cup starting next year in San Francisco.ANTI-DOPING CHATTER: Ever so reluctantly, the PGA Tour officially waded into the drug-testing era last week. The tour did not release names of the players subject to random testing at Congressional CC outside Washington, D.C., though Charles Howell III acknowledged he was tested.So was Finchem, of all people. He asked several questions of the drug-testing officials and still went through the process in 9 1/2 minutes, allaying his concerns about the efficiency and integrity of the program."I don't view it as anything meaningful from a symbolism standpoint," Finchem said. "I just think it's important that we understand the details."By now, it's not surprising to hear players express skepticism about the need for testing. But the popular view most recently voiced by Mediate -- "There's nothing we can take to help you in golf" -- is utter nonsense.As sports fans learned all too vividly from the BALCO scandal, steroids can increase muscle mass and accelerate recovery from soreness and injury. That absolutely would help a golfer, especially in this power-hitting era. And, once again: Testing is the only way to ensure the sport is clean.TAP-INS: Mickelson, Adam Scott and Ernie Els are among those playing in this week's Scottish Open, in preparation for next week's British Open at Royal Birkdale. ... Kevin Streelman and Justin Hicks, unlikely opening-round leaders in the U.S. Open, have prospered since their fleeting fame: Streelman twice finished in the top-12 on the PGA Tour and Hicks won a Nationwide Tour event. ... Paula Creamer and Karrie Webb headline the field in this week's LPGA event in Sylvania, Ohio. ... The annual Lake Tahoe celebrity tournament starts Friday at Edgewood in Stateline, Nev., with Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley, Ray Romano and Donald Trump among those expected to participate.(E-mail Ron Kroichick at rkroichick@sfchronicle.com.)(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
Open TV ratings boost for West Coast: Other notes
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