Woods’ influence hasn’t diversified PGA Tour … yet

Leading up to today’s release of "42," a film about Jackie Robinson, there’s been a lot of talk about the decline in the number of African-Americans playing baseball.

Isn’t it more interesting, and just as timely, to note that 16 years after Tiger Woods burst into the mainstream consciousness by winning his first Masters, other blacks haven’t followed him to anything close to PGA stardom?

Only one other, Joseph Bramlett, has recently made the tour. Like Woods, his father is black and he is multi-racial. Like Woods, he was a national champion at Stanford.

Very much unlike Woods, Bramlett has yet to win. In 28 PGA Tour starts, he has just two top-25 finishes and is on the Web.com Tour this year, where his highest finish is second.

It’s surprising there’s no one else, considering how much was made of Woods’ potential to inspire minorities to take up the sport. Bramlett said it might just be a case of more time.

"Hopefully, I can leave an impact on the game that can help change things," he told Doug Ferguson of the Associated Press in 2011, before the Sony Open in Hawaii, Bramlett’s first pro tourney. "Tiger had a huge impact, and I’m just one of several kids coming up right now. I think that by the time I’m done and sitting in a rocking chair, that hopefully this game will look a little different."

KITV-4 sportscaster Jahmai Webster was 12 when Woods won his first major at Augusta in 1997. The perfect age to be starstruck, right?

"My dad (Lawrence) was huge on the role model aspect, and I remember the classic (TV) shot of Tiger and his dad," Webster said. "It was very exciting to have an African-American excel in pro golf. But it wasn’t like he was the poster child for all blacks to start playing golf. At that age I was more into Michael Jordan and his career."

Basketball was Webster’s best sport at John F. Kennedy High School in Granada Hills, Calif. He also played football and he ran track largely because his dad coached it.

"Baseball? I was pretty good until they took the tee away," he said with a laugh.

Webster was exposed to golf as a youngster because his godfather, Melvin Glover, is an instructor. But he never actually played a round until after college.

"Basketball was just more fun," he said. It remained the sport of his dreams in part because there were many blacks succeeding at the highest level. Golf had just one.

But while Woods didn’t inspire him to hit the links, Webster said he is surprised there aren’t more blacks on tour.

"Absolutely. You see someone pop up every now and then, but no one seems to have the staying power," he said.

Webster plays two rounds of golf a year, and doesn’t own a set of clubs — yet.

"As you get older, it’s harder to go out and shoot hoops and bond over that," he said. "I get invited to tournaments, so I think I’ll be playing more. Golf is the go-to sport in this professional circle, for business in general. It’s an ice-breaker, and no one is Tiger Woods … pretty much everyone sucks."