ST. ANDREWS, Scotland – Golf, like boxing and tennis and track and all other individual sports, relies on the power of its stars. It’s an inevitable thing, really.
In team sports like baseball or football, fandom builds from countless things. Geography. History. Team colors. A Dodgers fan, a Bears fan, a Spurs fan might be rooting for the team of her father or favorite teacher or the first team she ever saw in person or any other reason.
But in golf, like those other individual sports, a player must give you a reason to care. There are thousands of professional golfers around the world and all of them have honed their skills to the level of magic.