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As previewed earlier in the week during a CBS conference call, Jim Nantz opened the telecast with some prepared thoughts. Here it is if you missed the telecast.

Jim Nantz 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾wow...powerful! I encourage you to watch this. 🙏🏾 #BLMpic.twitter.com/tas6nGHTr6

The COVID-19 era’s first official full-field event drew a healthy 683k viewers during its Golf Channel window, and another 447k viewers when a PGA Tour Live free preview ran showing the 2020 Charles Schwab Challenge. (Comparisons to last year’s May playing are in the press release below and the primary sign of a ratings bump.)

Before any Tour execs start elbow bumping over the numbers, ShowBuzzDaily says the highly anticipated return’s .12 rating landed 68th on the list of top cable programs Thursday. The live golf scored 82nd for the morning PGA Tour Live airing.

The 69th ranked show Thursday was Loud House on Nickelodeon, while 70th was Untold Stories of Hip Hop on something called WETV. (No clue. I have a better chance of finding TruTV on the dial.)

For Immediate Release:

PGA TOUR’S RETURN BECOMES MOST-WATCHED ROUND 1 

Plenty of good stuff in this Lance Barrow profile by David Barron in the Houston Chronicle. The longtime CBS golf producer is working his final Colonial tournament since joining the network in 1977.

There was this on his predecessor Frank Chirkinian:

Along with CBS veterans like Steve Milton and Jim Rikhoff, Barrow is one of the few network employees who worked with Chirkinian, who relished his nickname as “The Ayatollah.”

“My personality is different, but Frank taught all of us,” he said. “We used to call CBS the ‘Chirkinian Broadcast School.’

“If somebody compared our telecast with Frank’s, which is hard to do because of technology and all the things we have now, I would view that as the ultimate compliment. I’ve always tried to ensure that nothing gets in the way of covering the golf tournament and the competition, and that’s what Frank wanted to do, too.”

AP’s Stephen Hawkins covered the television angle to the “Return To Golf” and Rickie Fowler’s “mic’d up” approach got the most attention. Deservedly so. As I Tweeted at one point, had Fowler not done so I’m pretty sure the telecast would have been considered a real drag. But just getting inside the ropes with him a few times and overhearing other comments from his group, took us to some places we rarely get in a PGA Tour event.

And there was a bit of a rocky start when a normal microphone picked up an obscenity-infused compliment. Here is the offending moment, should be inclined.

From Hawkins’ story:

“Well, we were hoping for better audio with no fans, surrounding the course,” commentator Jim Nantz then said on the broadcast. “Apologize if anybody was offended with what they may have heard there.”

That threesome of the world’s top three players — No. 1 Rory McIlroy, No. 2 Rahm and No. 3 Brooks Koepka — was being followed by TV support people, a coach, a trainer and a small group of media during the first PGA Tour event in three months.

The expletive was audible even though none of the players in that group were wearing a microphone, like Rickie Fowler did throughout the first round of Charles Schwab Challenge.

As for Fowler, Brian Wacker at GolfDigest.com covers the highlights of what we learned and notes what just hearing these exchanges did to help in a fan-free environment.

In the process of shooting a three-over 73 that included four bogeys in the last five holes, he offered a PG-version of commentary that was mostly a terrific listen to a world so few have access to. It wasn’t explosive, but did provide added value, especially as the day wore on.

After the first two holes of silence—sans for the sounds of Fowler’s shirt moving as he walked—viewers were welcomed into the conversation as Fowler and his caddie, Joe Skovron, shared their thoughts on a 154-yard approach with a 8-iron that sailed about 10 yards too far.