Rory McIlroy: Transforming the Tours. Rebranding Golf.



Rory McIlroy
 (From CanadianGolfer.com)

"It's nice that people say that he could be this or he could be that or he could win 20 major championships, but at the end of the day I've won one." - 2011 US Open winner Rory McIlroy

That quote, modest as it was, spoke volumes as to not only how much Rory McIlroy has already changed the dynamic in men's professional golf -- both on his home European Tour and here in North America on the PGA Tour -- but how much capacity he and his fellow "New Kids on the Block" hold to re-brand the sport itself.

When a 22-year-old wins the US Open the way McIlroy did last weekend, the sports world takes notice. When a 22-year-old does it with the grace, eloquence and class shown by the Irishman, the sports world has every reason to celebrate.

McIlroy is a big story because of his record-breaking US Open win, an eight-shot rout that saw him go 16-under par at the Congressional. He's a bigger story because he did so to shake off the choker label that has followed him since he detonated and folded at the Masters in April. In my books, he's an even bigger story, however, on the strength of his approach to the media, his fellow players and, ultimately, the fans of the game of golf.

Dealing with the media is part of the territory that comes with being a professional athlete, coach or executive. Dealing with it well is unfortunately still the terrain of far too few personalities in professional sport. Even at the age of 22, McIlroy already appears to understand the axiom of excellence when it comes to media and public relations: That the way you speak to the media is ultimately the way you come across to the fans.

The best in the business realize that the sports media is the conduit of players, coaches, executives, franchises and leagues to their fans. That's true even in this Internet era of expanded controlled communications.

Rory McIlroy gets that. He is an exciting prospect for golf not only because of his obvious talent and dedication to his craft, he is a golden asset to the game of golf because of his poise at the microphone.

If he and the other New Kids -- names such as Rickie Fowler, Adam Scott, Jason Day, Martn Kaymar, Graeme McDowell, Charl Schwartzel and Luke Donald -- are as good with their publics as they are on the course, golf will do just fine thank you in the years after the era dominated by Tiger Woods.

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Brendan Shanahan proves to be a solid PR asset for the National Hockey League

Strong communications skills and media capabilities have become increasingly important over the past 10 to 15 years for senior executives in general and Chief Executive Officers in particular. That's true in mainstream business but it's arguably even more the case in the business of sport, where the relationship between consumers (fans) and product or company (franchises or leagues) is unique.

In most cases in the regular private sector, only shareholders feel a vested interest in the company in which they own stock. There are some corporations whose products command a higher brand of loyalty and connection (Apple comes to mind) but few if any can compare to the "equity" that fans take in their favourite club or league.

The hard core fans feel a sense of ownership in their team. They care about their favourite league. The best franchises and leagues get that and relate to their fans and their larger audiences as if they are a public trust or a community asset.

After 17 years on the job, however, National Hockey League commissioner Gary Bettman has yet to crack the code on public and media relations. Specifically, he has not mastered any sense of relating to hockey fans through television.

How badly he wrestles with the media in general was so brutally on display in his CBC television appearance with Hockey Night in Canada host Ron MacLean last week. Maybe too much time in the sun that day was the problem, but it was one of the poorest television performances by a professional sport commissioner I've ever seen.

Bettman on Hockey Night in Canada June 2nd, 2010: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ww3md8DvoTY

Bettman was alternatively defensive and prickly, even in the studios of the television network that pays more for NHL rights than any other carrier in the world. He was clearly annoyed with MacLean and a line of questioning that focused on ownership troubles in a variety of NHL markets, most notably those in the U.S. sunbelt, instead of what he was hoping would highlight the terrific overall economic performance of the league.

OK. I would have encouraged MacLean to acknowledge the NHL is having record financial results in spite of the basket cases in the southern U.S. and simply raise the matter of what could be if those problem childs were replaced by teams in northern U.S. markets and in Canada, which has never been more bullish for the NHL and which is driving in a big way the league's overall success.

That being said, it's unfathomable to me that Bettman handled the CBC piece the way he did and that he is so bad at media and public speaking despite almost two decades in the commissioner's chair.

Thankfully for the NHL, it has some other emerging executive assets who could help strengthen the league's brand as they grow into their roles and gain more exposure in front of the camera. None is more obvious and more well-equipped to do so than NHL vice-president of business and hockey development, former star player Brendan Shanahan.

Shanahan's interview last night on Hockey Night in Canada was as good as Bettman's was bad earlier in the week. The Stanley Cup champion and surefire Hall of Famer was open, courteous, insightful and even humourous. The contrasts between the two interviews -- and how they reflected the NHL they were each representing -- could not have been bigger.

Shanahan on Hockey Night in Canada June 6th, 2010: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAFl89kgzMo

Shanahan was a prototype power forward in his years with the Hartford Whalers, St. Louis Blues, New Jersey Devils, Detroit Red Wings and New York Rangers.

Sunday night's interview reminded us how well he handles the public side of the business and how much value he could bring to the table for the NHL as its own power forward in media relations and television.

It also laid bare how weak Bettman is on the same fronts and how difficult it will be for the league's frontman to change his stripes when he clearly does not enjoy that part of his role as NHL commissioner. The right strategy for the NHL -- especially with a new round of collective bargaining upcoming -- would be to showcase the likes of Shanahan every opportunity it gets.

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If Tiger Woods can bottle some of that humility, his public relations drive will go further

He wasn't even in the game of effective crisis management in December and January...he was out of bounds on proper media relations with his unilateral video statement February 12th...in the rough with his two controlled, five-minute interviews with Tom Rinaldi of ESPN and Kelly Tilghman of the Golf Channel on March 21st.

Finally, in his third shot at it in the first three months of 2010, Tiger Woods finally made it onto the fairway of professional public relations today with his 35-minute media conference at Augusta -- his first truly interactive PR event since the bizarre car accident of November 27th, 2009 and the resulting flood of allegations and eventual admissions of infidelity throughout December.

Off the tee, Woods did the right thing by apologizing to his fellow PGA Tour players for causing them to have to deal with the fallout from his sex scandal -- while he was either silent or disrespectfully fueling even more questions by scheduling his media statements in the middle of Tour events. He was sorry for being such a distraction and for inconveniencing them as he has over the past five months.

While he is still having difficulty getting his head around some of the areas of questioning -- which will not go away anytime soon -- he still gave enough new information to make the media conference more than just a necessary evil for him; five stitches and a sore neck, a torn achilles and blood platelet therapy from Toronto's own Dr. Anthony Galea to help him heal faster.

Yet more than anything, what Tiger did right today was finally show some humility.

If Tiger Woods the athlete can find a way to bottle that humility and humanity, his public relations drive will go a lot further. It might never fully repatriate the impossibly clean image he had before the car crash and sex scandal, but it would do enough to largely restore Tiger Woods, Inc. as a billion-dollar empire and an athlete corporation valued at more than $600 million US.

To get there, he needs to strike a balance between the two very different Tigers on display today at Augusta, four days before he strikes his first ball back on Tour in the opening round of the Masters on Thursday.

The first was the Tiger who was tight, stern and sometimes short in the face of questions on the scandal. The second was a Tiger who smiled and comfortably handled the golf questions, even gushing at the prospect of playing again and winning on the PGA Tour.

The second Tiger is someone the golf media and the world haven't seen a lot of since his early years on the tour. It's a Tiger who would bring a lot of people -- fans, media and sponsors -- back into his tent over time. It might even earn him some new fans among those of us who have found it difficult to connect with the robotic Tiger, largely because he rarely worked to engage us at any level other than as a golf superstar.

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