We've all taken our shots at Michelle Wie over the last two years as she went from a teen phenom with limitless potential, to a cautionary tale of young, misguided talent.

But if the LPGA is going to stop the bleeding of sponsorships and events and emerge as a stronger, more relevant tour, we all need to put on our Wie Warrior hats.

I was just thumbing through a piece in the New York Times about the state of the LPGA, and it's easy to see the writing on the wall: The tour is losing money, sponsorships and tournaments at a more alarming rate compared to the more stable PGA Tour.

I did catch a bit of the Sybase Classic's limited TV coverage over the weekend between NHL playoff games. One of the great things about the LPGA Tour compared to the PGA Tour is that because there are fewer events and the money isn't as lucrative, in practically every LPGA event the marquee names are competing. There are only 29 tournaments on the LPGA schedule this year (down from 34 in 2008), and its safe to say most of the tour's top players will play in at least 20, but more like 25 of the events. That means every weekend, you've got the stars like Paula Creamer, Lorena Ochoa, Natalie Gulbis and Wie on TV.

On the PGA Tour, you've got fields like this past week at the Valero Texas Open in San Antonio, where the biggest names are Zach Johnson and Justin Leonard - good golfers in their own right but hardly elite. I didn't watch a shot.

What I did see of Wie at Sybase sent mixed signals. Her swing looks great, her putter looks dreadful. She missed three short putts Saturday that would have put her right on top of the leaders heading into the final round. Instead, she took home a respectable, but still not satisfying T-3.

If the LPGA is going to get stronger, gain more sponsorships and tournaments, it's probably going to have to be on the back of Wie, not Ochoa or Creamer. For whatever reasons, the public has associated Wie with women's golf, and it's the mainstream TV viewer that is going to move the needle. Some of the tour's cute babes with their sassiness and pin-up calendars might help, but it won't be as effective as a figure that can become a pop culture icon and superstar. Right now, it seems like only Wie could do both of these.

I'm not crazy about some of the decisions "Team Wie" has made in the past few years and she's well down the ladder as far as my favorite gals on tour, but I want to see the LPGA get more TV time, more cash and more tournaments. And in order to do so, Wie needs to figure out the flat stick and start reeling in some wins.

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