‘The Match’ between Tiger and Phil was a good concept, but missed the mark once put into practice. To succeed with this format in the future, some amendments need to be made to make it more entertaining for the fans. Here are the top reasons it didn’t quite work:

1. Tiger doesn’t know how to banter. We were looking forward to Phil’s personality shining through as the two talked back and forth from hole to hole. Historically, Tiger’s play has captivated crowds in key moments - and he had one flash when he drained a chip on the 17th green to bring the match to even. However, for the most part the shot making and putting were not in peak form for Phil or Tiger. As a result, we watched as Tiger walked down the fairways on his own and as Phil talked to his brother (and also his caddy) about Oregon’s college football game. Tiger wasn’t made for the ‘corporate golf’ friendly and personable moments - he was made for delivering in the moment. Letting his playing do the talking. But that fell short for him almost all day.

At the end of the day, Rickie said it best…

2. We needed more engagement - more indicators on how much this meant to the players. At times, like when Phil and Tiger both gave each other 3 and a half foot putts for fear of winning on a miss, it felt like they were playing a practice round instead of a match for $9 million. As spectators, we didn’t feel the heat of the moment like we wanted to. Like we feel when Tiger is making a charge on a Sunday up the leaderboard. Hard to capture that feeling, yes. But the format deserved more interaction, more engagement and more intensity. Instead of just complaining about it, here are a few ideas to implement next time around:

• Phil and Tiger both wear a Fitbit so we can monitor their heart rates during certain moments. I would have loved to see if their pulses quickened up in the moments that seemingly mattered most. And how about a sponsor opportunity right there?

• More formalized challenges - and more often too. More on that below.

• Format - a few points here.

  • Honestly, moving forward we should get pairs involved. Let’s say, Jordan and Justin against Patrick Reed and Bubba. We’d have more personalities involved which the match was in dire need of - we’d also have the villains vs. the hero’s which any storyline is in need of. Phil and Tiger seem like friends now….BORING!

  • Give the players the ability to choose the format of the hole if they win it - I.e. alternate shot, best ball, etc.

  • Fan voting on bets. Use live twitter feed surveys to deliver the challenges the fans wanted to see.

  • Celebrity side bets. One of the best pets of the match was the live interaction between Twitter and the telecast. Justin Verlander challenged Charles Barkley that he wouldn’t get better than a double bogey on the first hole. EVERYONE wanted to see that...

3. The commentating was not good (except for you, Chuck). Not good at all. Why were we listening to a middle of the road PGA TOUR golfer in Pat Perez tell us about how he thought Tiger should and normally does drain certain shots. The commentators also spoke over Tiger and Phil when they were making side bets. We could barely make out when a side bet was happening, or what it was for and the announcers did not help us try to figure it out.

4. The side bets were not enough of a focus! There were a couple of bets that were quite large (is a million enough?!) but they had such a low chance of happening that it didn’t even matter there was a bet. I’m sorry, but draining an eagle from over 100 yards just isn’t going to happen even when we’re talking about Phil and Tiger. Secondly, why wouldn’t Phil and Tiger throw in some bets on VERY important putts? Instead of giving Phil the putt to go to extras on 18, throw 300k on it. Make it count!!! I want to see Phil’s hands shaking on the putter grip and his heart rate approaching 150 bpm through our Fitbit monitor.

Final point on this…did you feel like the money didn’t really matter to Tiger and Phil? Their net worth combines for about $1.1 billion. I think they are out of touch with what these bets actually mean given how filthy rich they are. Would be nice to see them bet strokes or clubs in their bag, that would put some added pressure on the shots and actually factor into the final match play score.

5. Bleacher report Live completely malfunctioned. Many people ran into issues being able to purchase the pay-per-view match, so they ended up giving it away for free. Not sure what this ended up doing to their monetization model, but I can’t imagine it was good. Bleacher Report’s coverage also seemed somewhat amateur - Adam Lefkoe and Shane Bacon didn’t quite the job done for me.

When it’s all said and done, ‘The Match’ was a good experiment for golf. However, everyone could tell it was the first attempt. That always leaves room for hindsight and things that could’ve been done better. Will we see something like this in the future? I bet we will. And I bet it will include more smack talk, and fan interaction in the future.