NBC’s new Friday afternoon golf TV creation, "Happy Hour," has “turned one of the bleakest chunks of the weekly golf schedule (Friday afternoons) into legitimately entertaining television,” according to James Colgan of GOLF.com. Every Friday, Smylie Kaufman leads the network’s evening PGA Tour coverage “from the ground on this traveling set, narrating the action from that week’s best-known setting for an hour or more.” Kaufman “carries an easy mix of avuncularity and Southern Cool,” and his “frequent skewerings alongside the show’s guests ... leave the show feeling unbuttoned and distinct.” The launch of the "Happy Hour" format came from NBC’s "instinct to spruce up its Friday afternoon coverage at the start of the shape-shifting 2024.” The loss of lead analyst Paul Azinger and the addition of analyst hopeful Kevin Kisner “gave the network two analysts with deep relationships in the pro game” -- and Kisner and Kaufman’s “easy banter” encouraged NBC execs to try a test-run at the WM Phoenix Open. It is a “great format for Kaufman, who is a really intriguing mix of well-connected and easy to like” -- but it also is a “great format for NBC at a time when the conversation is about making golf on TV less stale" (GOLF.com, 3/19).
PHONE A FRIEND: This past week's "Happy Hour" segment -- which featured a drop-in from PGA Tour player Keith Mitchell -- scored well for Golf Channel and Peacock. The segment, in which the announcers were situated around TPC Sawgrass's famed 17th hole, averaged a Total Audience Delivery of 1.05 million viewers. The window (4:00-6:15pm ET) ranked as Golf Channel/Peacock's most-watched segment of the day (Josh Carpenter, SBJ).
