How the mobile web won the golf war

On Monday a friend sent me a text message containing a link to ESPN's mobile web coverage of golf's 2008 U.S. Open playoff, which pitted eventual winner Tiger Woods against underdog Rocco Mediate: "This is awesome--I can sit in this NXTcomm session and get updates on the Tiger/Rocco playoff," he wrote. It seems he wasn't the only one relying on mobile to keep him in the U.S. Open loop: ESPN reported huge fan interest in the tournament across multiple platforms, with its WAP site averaging more than 2 million unique daily visitors throughout the five-day event, generating nearly 3 million mobile page views in all. By comparison, ESPN.com generated more than 5.1 million visits between Thursday and Monday, yielding 36.7 million page views; Monday's playoff alone generated nearly 2.4 million visits and 10.7 million page views. Still, for golf nuts out of the office, trapped in a trade show session or even playing 18 holes of their own, ESPN's mobile coverage offered a lifeline to one of the more dramatic events in recent sports memory.

Is this a turning point for the mobile web? That's tough to say. The Open playoff was in many respects a perfect storm--few major sporting events take place outside of primetime or weekends, and most go to overtime directly after the end of regulation. Even in pro golf, it's rare that the leaders play another 18 holes the next day instead of moving into a sudden-death playoff. (For that matter, this was the first time the Open ended in a tie since 2001.) So a tournament that in most cases would have been decided on Sunday evening, when most viewers are at home in front of their TVs, instead overlapped into Monday afternoon, when most people are at work. Also, this particular Open playoff was unusually riveting, with perennial fan-favorite Woods, clearly hobbled by a knee injury that it turns out will cost him the remainder of his season, squaring off against Mediate, a 45-year-old career journeyman seeking his first U.S. Open title--their competition was so fierce that even 18 additional holes were not enough to determine a winner, with Woods finally claiming victory on the first hole of sudden death. Simply put, if you care anything about sports you needed to know what was transpiring Monday--and mobile was there to hook you up.

It may be a while before another event captures the imagination of the mobile masses quite like the 2008 U.S. Open, but a new study issued this week by web browser developer Opera Software suggests this was by no means the first time your average golf fan surfed the mobile web: According to Opera, men worldwide now account for nine times as much mobile web traffic as women. And in a nice moment of synchronicity, Opera's monthly State of the Mobile Web report also spotlights the top 10 sports sites accessed via the Opera Mini browser--ESPN.com ranked only fifth internationally, behind sites including LiveScore.com, Championat.ru and IPLT20.com. With soccer's Euro 2008 tournament now in progress and the Summer Olympics on tap for August, this promises to be a busy summer for sports fans--and given the global excitement both events will generate, possibly a breakout season for the mobile web as well. -Jason