Golf

How to watch Tiger Woods’ Hero World Challenge live online, TV schedule and more

Tiger Woods returns from injury and almost four months of rehab with a new swing at his silly season event, where 10 of the top 15 players in the world will try to take down the tournament host.

by Brendan Porath

Dec 4, 2014, 1:00 AM UTC

Scott Halleran/Getty Images

Tiger Woods is back! Well, he’s back in the sense that he’ll be playing competitive golf this week, but harness your enthusiasm because it is just a limited-field silly season event.

Tiger’s World Challenge tournament is a staple of the silly season schedule, typically slotting in during the first week of December. It’s not an official PGA Tour event with FedEx Cup points, but it is sanctioned, recognized, and blessed by the Tour. Many Tour officials are in Orlando for the week, and help organize and run the event, which is one of three benefitting the Tiger Woods foundation. The other two that Tiger “hosts” are official PGA Tour events, the Quicken Loans National in DC and the Deutsche Bank Championship in Boston.

This tournament, however, is nothing like those two earlier in the year. It’s basically a nice little party hosted by Tiger, benefitting his foundation, and providing a little entertainment during an extremely dead portion of the golf schedule. There are always less than 20 players in the field, and this year’s World Challenge features 18 pros.

The World Challenge has also moved from California, where it was played just outside LA at Sherwood Country Club for the past 14 years. This year’s edition is at Isleworth in the Orlando area, the golf McMansion community where Woods used to live and site of that infamous one-car crash into a fire hydrant in 2009. The event won’t be staying in Orlando long, however, as Woods has already stated it’s headed to the Bahamas and the Albany resort community -- another one of these high-roller golf real estate developments where a lot of pros have property. Isleworth is a nice stopgap solution for Woods -- a bunch of world-class players live in the community and the nearby Lake Nona community, and the course has accommodated a comparable event in the past -- the now defunct and once grotesque Tavistock Cup.

While it may be a silly season tournament with an extremely small field, this is still a marquee event with a loaded list of players for this time of year. All 18 guys are the bigger names in golf, and 10 of the top 15 players in the world RSVP’d “yes” to Tiger. And then of course there’s the host, whose attendance changes the dynamic of any tournament. Given all the questions surrounding Tiger’s new swing, his health, and his return after almost four months away, this little event is probably must-watch for golf fans. So Golf Channel and their Comcast sister network, NBC, will be there to carry coverage all four days. There’s nothing else going on so there will be pretty comprehensive coverage and expect to see every single Tiger shot during the coverage windows.

Golf Channel will have sole coverage the first two days and then split with their network partner on the weekend. But unfortunately Johnny Miller won’t be making the trip to Florida, so Roger Maltbie will get tower duty with NBC’s lead golf commentator, Dan Hicks. Woods will also be up in the NBC booth chuckling with the on-air talent and serving in his duty as host. In addition to the four days of TV coverage, you will also be able to watch the tournament online via Golf Channel and NBC’s Live Extra service. Here are all your media options for this week at Isleworth (all times ET):