When FOX Sports goes live with their coverage of the U.S. Open at high noon on Thursday, one of golf’s most long-awaited debuts will finally be here.
Ever since FOX Sports swooped in and offered around a billion dollars over 12 years and pledged to offer 140 hours of coverage for the USGA’s marquee events — the U.S. Open, U.S. Women’s Open and U.S. Senior Open — there have been concerns from golf purists about what it all means for the TV broadcast of golf’s second major. This week, we finally get answers.
It’s certainly understandable that golf fans would have their reservations about FOX coming on board to televise the U.S. Open.
After all, they’ve never done it before, had no real “golf” broadcasters on their roster when they won their bid and — let’s face it — didn’t at all fit the bill of network that covered major championship golf.
The biggest skepticism comes, however, because they’re the network that brought some of the worst gimmicks innovations that network television sports have ever seen — and no one wants to see them on the golf course.
Seriously, who can forget the disaster that was the “FOX Trax” glowing hockey puck?
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The most important thing for FOX to know is that golf fans — die hard golf fans — are not football, baseball, hockey or NASCAR fans. They hold their game and those who cover it to a very high standard.
They don’t want robots or vapor trails that streak behind tee shots — they just want simple-but-in-depth coverage of their tournaments.
Innovative camera angles and tools of the sort will surely be accepted, but useless tickers and graphics that become distracting will not. Based on their track record covering other major sports, the key to their success will be striking a balance between innovation and aggravation.
As far as the team covering the action, they look pretty stout. Purists worrying about the knowledge of the commentators and interviews can rest easy with the team FOX has assembled.
Coverage will be anchored by two-time major champion Greg Norman and the face of FOX Sports, Joe Buck.
Buck, who is regular on FOX telecasts of baseball and football has no golf experience, so it will be interesting to see not only how he and Norman handle banter, but also how the two get compared to other golf broadcasting duos Dan Hicks and Johnny Miller and Jim Nantz and Nick Faldo.
Most importantly, the debut of FOX Sports at the U.S. Open also means the return of one of the most popular women in golf — Holly Sonders.
Sonders ditched Golf Channel for FOX Sports last July. She is expected — obviously — to play a major roll in the network’s coverage of the U.S. Open. She’s also handled sideline reporter duties for FOX’s NFL coverage last year.
Ultimately, it seems like the best idea for FOX this week is to innovate by feel this week, so to speak. Try some new things, but don’t get too cute, or they’ll face the criticism from the masses.
Of course, this won’t be the first time FOX Sports has covered golf. Joe Buck, Greg Norman and the team dipped their toes in the golf water when they covered the final day of Norman’s Shark Shootout late last year.
That performance was met with mixed reviews and certainly had its hiccups, but to fear that it is a harbinger of things to come is foolish. FOX has — we all hope — surely ironed out most of the kinks in time for this week.
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