NFL Excuses Run Out After Ratings Declines Continue

[Eleazar]

NFL's Litany of Excuses Runs Out After Ratings Fall for Second Year

By Lucas Shaw
Bloomberg.com
November 2, 2017, 11:30 AM CDT



TV networks are running out of excuses for the dwindling popularity of the National Football League.

They blamed the election for ratings declines last year, and hurricanes for a soft week one in September. Protests during the national anthem, and President Donald Trump’s criticism of the league, have faded from the headlines.

Advertisers are starting to believe a different explanation: the viewers aren’t coming back. Audiences are down an average 7 percent from a year ago through the first eight weeks of the season, excluding last Monday. That’s on top of a decrease of about 8 percent last season that spurred numerous changes in the broadcasts, from shorter commercials to better matchups earlier in the year.

“There’s just not as many people watching TV the way they used to watch TV,” said Jeremy Carey, managing director of Optimum Sports, a sports marketing agency. “It’s going to be an issue for advertisers when they can’t reach a large-scale audience the way they have.”

With CBS Corp., 21st Century Fox Inc. and Walt Disney Co. set to report earnings in the next few days, analysts are bound to raise questions. These companies have used the popularity of the games to extract additional fees from cable operators, promote other shows on their networks and sell lots of commercials. Pro football games drew about $3.5 billion in ad spending last year, including the postseason, according to SMI Media Inc.

Media companies have spent billions of dollars on the right to air football games, which had been immune to the erosion of viewership for other TV programming. Audiences for TV networks have diminished for years as the growing popularity of online alternatives Netflix and YouTube and the availability of most shows on-demand have reduced the appeal of dramas and comedies. Live TV, like sports, was supposed to be immune, but that theory looks highly questionable now.

Ratings for the NFL suggest the same societal trends are now affecting the league, even if the declines aren’t as dramatic. The drop in game viewership ranges from 5 percent for NBC’s “Sunday Night Football” to 11 percent for the CBS Sunday package. “Monday Night Football,” on Disney’s ESPN, has attracted more fans this year than a year ago, but the numbers are still down from 2015.

Viewership of the four main broadcast networks fell 8.7 percent last year, and 12 percent among adults 18 to 49, an important demographic for advertisers.

CBS’s 11 percent slump for NFL games is the steepest of the networks. Its parent company, which reports earnings after the close Thursday, is more vulnerable than rivals to the trend because the vast majority of its earnings come from the broadcast network. The declines at CBS reinforce a complaint that has gotten louder and louder in recent weeks: The league got greedy in adding the Thursday night game on broadcast.

Reserving top games for Thursday night robbed other time periods of good match-ups. After a nosedive in ratings at “Monday Night Football” last season, the league has scheduled better games for that time period, further damaging Sunday afternoon.

“Ratings declines on both general entertainment and NFL programming could be the single biggest point of focus for investors this quarter, and we’re not sure what media companies can say about the health and tone of the ad market to assuage fears,” Steven Cahall, an analyst with RBC Capital Markets, wrote in a note last month.

Viewership is dropping fast among people under 54 -- a key demographic for advertisers -- and even faster among those 18 to 34. Audiences for games on CBS, NBC and Fox have slid at least 10 percent among that younger cohort.

Advertisers aren’t abandoning the NFL, one of the only places they can still reach more than 10 million people at once. But they are growing concerned. John Schnatter, who appears in TV spots on behalf of his Papa John’s Pizza International Inc., laid into the league on a conference call this week, blaming the ratings for his company’s slow revenue growth and calling for the league to put an end to player protests.

Networks and other advertisers identify a wide range of reasons for the NFL’s struggles. The league has overexposed itself by making highlights available on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Snapchat. Identifiable stars like Peyton Manning and Aaron Rodgers have either retired or gotten hurt. The quality of play has deteriorated. Player protests and concussions have driven away some fans.

Some executives argue viewership of the league has still improved over the long term while dropping for every other show. Yet the amount of time people have spent watching football this season is at the lowest point since 2011, back when there were fewer televised games, according to Mike Mulvihill, Fox Sports’ head of research.

“The cumulative effect of everything happening in the world at large is having an impact on NFL viewership,” Mulvihill said. “ The league was defying the laws of gravity.”

['Hamas' Jenkins]

I once wondered if the NFL adopting something like relegation would help improve the shitass owners, but I have a feeling it would encourage teams to play and seek out QB talent in the most bitchmade way possible so that they don't drop out of the league

[cooper barrett]

Originally Posted by 'Hamas' Jenkins

I once wondered if the NFL adopting something like relegation would help improve the shitass owners, but I have a feeling it would encourage teams to play and seek out QB talent in the most bitchmade way possible so that they don't drop out of the league

I'd have to see that w/ 32 teams? No, I don't think so, yet I'm not a big fan of worst gets the best either.

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by 'Hamas' Jenkins

I once wondered if the NFL adopting something like relegation would help improve the shitass owners, but I have a feeling it would encourage teams to play and seek out QB talent in the most bitchmade way possible so that they don't drop out of the league

Unfortunately I don't think there's a damn thing we can do. The best option might be for Jerry Jones to win the argument to have less revenue sharing. It would hold owners more accountable for building their own fan base instead of relying on the cowboys to make money for them. Maybe some owners starting to approach the red will force a few ownership changes. As long as you keep the salary cap and floor, I don't think it will impact parity. I would have worried about owners using that as an excuse to try to move the team to a different city but now that LA is filled, I don't see that happening.

[GoChargers]

Originally Posted by 'Hamas' Jenkins

I once wondered if the NFL adopting something like relegation would help improve the shitass owners, but I have a feeling it would encourage teams to play and seek out QB talent in the most bitchmade way possible so that they don't drop out of the league

Promotion and relegation are never going to work in American sports this late in the game. For starters, where would the worst teams in the NFL even get relegated to? They don't have their own professional minor league(s) like the other sports do. It only "works" in Europe because their leagues were built to support it from day one - and even then, all it ever accomplishes is shuffling around the cupcakes for the mega-rich teams to beat.

We have the draft instead, and it's a better system because it gives every fanbase some semblance of hope for the future. For the majority of fanbases in Europe, merely avoiding relegation in their country's top league is their championship. That's pretty sad.

[Demonpenz]

Leicester City moved up to premier and won a title.

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by GoChargers

Promotion and relegation are never going to work in American sports this late in the game. For starters, where would the worst teams in the NFL even get relegated to? They don't have their own professional minor league(s) like the other sports do. It only "works" in Europe because their leagues were built to support it from day one - and even then, all it ever accomplishes is shuffling around the cupcakes for the mega-rich teams to beat.

We have the draft instead, and it's a better system because it gives every fanbase some semblance of hope for the future. For the majority of fanbases in Europe, merely avoiding relegation in their country's top league is their championship. That's pretty sad.

Not necessarily a better system. It allows too many bad owners to skate away with mediocrity. Parity is overrated in some respects. The worst owners... Need to take them behind the barn and shoot em.

[NJChiefsFan]

Overturns like this in the NE game aren't going to help. How that gets turned around is beyond me. I would be out of my mind if I was a Bills fan.

[ThaVirus]

https://mobile.twitter.com/BenVolin/...66172454699009

[cosmo20002]

Originally Posted by ThaVirus

https://mobile.twitter.com/BenVolin/...66172454699009

It'll be going out of business any day now.
/CP wierdos

[Jimmya]

NFL is king and people will always hate. Fox sports southwest televised every Texas state Championship football game at Jerry World. Football rules!

[ForeverChiefs58]

Raiders sideline reporter and former tackle Lincoln Kennedy on anthem protests:

If there was one thing that I think had some underlining effects but I don’t know how — it’s just a feeling, it’s just a gut-wrench feeling — the whole anthem controversy, I think, affected (the team) mentally,” Kennedy said in an interview with Bay Area radio station 95.7 The Game.

“I think it affected people. And in a sense that, not so much that you heard the rumors about, ‘Well, we’re not doing this because he’s not with us. It was an unnecessary distraction that warranted so much coverage and so much questions you couldn’t necessarily focus on football.

“Everybody wanted to know why is Marshawn Lynch sitting down. Everybody wanted to know is he protesting or what is he protesting. Everybody wanted to know how unanimously the team is going to protest — are they gonna stand together.

“Look, if I was in that locker room, I would be the first one to tell them ‘I’m not here to talk about that, I’m here to talk about football — the Kansas City Chiefs, the Denver Broncos, give me a football related question. Don’t ask me about the anthem or social consciousness. And I think that was something that wore, not just on the Raiders, but on a number of teams.”

https://apple.news/ApN8-Uej0SWe_ldkJht6Fqg

[ForeverChiefs58]

The NFL Canceled the Last Sunday Night Football Game of the Season because of ratings.


https://www.yahoo.com/newsroom/vibes....tsrc=newsroom

[Hydrae]

Originally Posted by ForeverChiefs58

The NFL Canceled the Last Sunday Night Football Game of the Season because of ratings.


https://www.yahoo.com/newsroom/vibes....tsrc=newsroom

Nothing was cancelled, they just did not flex any games into that time slot on New Years Eve. But they did put all playoff related games into the same time slot at 4;25 PM EST.

How many people would have been interested in attending a game on New Years Eve with the temps we are going to have across the country this weekend? Probably a very smart move on the part of the NFL that has nothing to do with ratings.

[BlackOp]

Originally Posted by ForeverChiefs58

The NFL Canceled the Last Sunday Night Football Game of the Season because of ratings.


https://www.yahoo.com/newsroom/vibes....tsrc=newsroom

I love that they are trying, as hard as possible, to prevent showing the empty seats. The marketers know that hype sells...and people will pay to be around something other's envy. Scarcity is important.

Once it is no longer is an attractive/status social destination...people will quit paying to go. It happens to clubs/restaurants too...

The market is correcting itself...and you can only sell a polished dog turd for so long.

NFL is getting what it deserves...nobody is going to pay $12 a beer and $75 parking for an event that doesn't make them feel important/special.

[DaneMcCloud]

Originally Posted by BlackOp

I love that they are trying, as hard as possible, to prevent showing the empty seats. The marketers know that hype sells...and people will pay to be around something other's envy. Scarcity is important.

Once it is no longer is an attractive/status social destination...people will quit paying to go. It happens to clubs/restaurants too...

The market is correcting itself...and you can only sell a polished dog turd for so long.

This is ****ing stupid.

The NFL decided NOT to FLEX a game Sunday evening because it's NEW YEAR'S EVE.

Seven out of Eight divisions are locked up. It would have been dumb to FLEX a game to 8:30pm EST/5:30pm PST on a night when most people are either throwing a party or going to a party and not watching football.

The ratings stay higher by airing the games in their original slots than on New Year's Eve.

Originally Posted by BlackOp

NFL is getting what it deserves...nobody is going to pay $12 a beer and $75 parking for an event that doesn't make them feel important/special.

Sure, that's why millions of people all over the country pay those prices. And by "deserves", are you talking about the $2.5 billion dollar Verizon deal that was recently signed?



Your flair for the dramatic is quite impressive.