According to Sports Bussiness Daily's reader survey, Tiger Woods hasn't won back fans yet. (Photo Courtesy: Fred Vuich/SI)
65% of responders to the 6th annual Sports Business Daily Reader Survey say if they were a brand they would not sign Tiger Woods as an endorser. Prior to last year’s revelations about issues in Woods’s private life, it would have been ridiculous to even ask this question. Woods dramatic fall from grace has been well-documented, only time will tell if he will ever regain worldwide market dominance.
Then again, the short term memory of fans is apparent when you consider Baltimore Ravens LB Ray Lewis went from being arrested in 2000 for murder and aggravated assault, to the cover of Madden Football in 2005. Mike Vick may be the next ‘only time will tell’ story. If he continues to dazzle NFL fans and show remorse for his prior misdeeds, can endorsement deals be far behind? To channel Raiders Owner Al Davis, is the ultimate answer ”Just Win, Baby”?
EA Sports chief executive John Riccitiello seems to think so, telling Reuters that the company has no plans to drop the former world #1 golfer from their wildly popular Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11 video game, but they sure would like to see some victories…soon.
“This is no threat against Tiger. We’re with him because he has the promise of being the world’s best golfer,” Riccitiello said. “We have no plans to move away from him, but it’s a business relationship on the basis of we make the best golf game and he’s the best golfer. Both of those things need to be true in the long run for the partnership to make sense.”
Other Sports Media Survey Results
Some other interesting results from the survey included Al Michaels edging out Bob Costas by .09% as Favorite TV Play-by-Play personality and Cris Collinsworth winning Favorite TV Game Analyst over Kirk Herbstreit and Troy Aikman.
ESPN dominates in the Sports studio show category, earning the top 3 spots with SportsCenter (35%), Pardon the Interruption (24%) and Mike and Mike in the Morning (9%). The only non-ESPN show to make the list was Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel on HBO ( 8%).
More results from the Sports Business Daily Reader Survey will be released over the next 4 days, be sure to return to sportstvjobs.com where we will continue to summarize the results for you.
