NBC provided wall-to-wall coverage of the U.S. Open from The Country Club in Brookline over the weekend. Unfortunately, the network didn’t show a lot of the actual golf.
NBC's U.S. Open coverage was horrible
Between an avalanche of commercials and unnecessary vignettes, it was difficult to follow the action for most of the tournament. Local boy Keegan Bradley, who competed for the trophy and received a rousing ovation Sunday on his walk to the 18th green, disappeared for large portions of Saturday’s broadcast. Early in Sunday’s round, NBC’s leader board showed that Scottie Scheffler sank a birdie to take the lead. But viewers had not seen it yet.
Weirdly, NBC kept showing highlights of the rounds while they were still going on, instead of just showing more of the live action. When they finally Scheffler’s birdie put, it was anticlimactic, because we already knew it was going to happen.
Overall, it was a complete mess. The woeful coverage, which was also littered with commercials, turned everybody into a sports media critic.
In an apparent effort to appease casual fans, NBC decided to treat the U.S. Open like the Olympics, opposed to other mainstream sporting events. Olympic coverage is filled with fluff and packaged for primetime audiences who aren't familiar with events like curling and bobsledding.
Golf is a little more mainstream, to say the least. Most of the people watching want to see the action. Crazy concept, right?
NBC also toggled coverage between all of its platforms, just like the Olympics. Sunday’s round started at 9:00 a.m. ET on Peacock before switching to USA Network at 10:00 a.m. and then finally NBC at 12:00 p.m. ET. While network execs undoubtedly love that kind of synergy, it creates extra and laborious work for the viewer.
But seemingly, the viewer was never considered when NBC was planning its coverage — at least a viewer who actually wanted to watch golf.