Instant Karma to Shine On For ESPN

The recent purchase of the largest ESPN Radio local stations by Good Karma Brands is reason to be curious as to where this fits with ESPN's strategy for the near future. Good Karma is now in the process of purchasing KSPN 710 Los Angeles, WEPN-AM 1050 New York, and WMVP 1000 in Chicago. The NYC purchase also includes continuing the existing LMA (local Marketing Agreement) for WEPN-FM 98.7.

 

What we don't know yet is if this is intended to bring millions of dollars in to ESPN at this point in time, or if it means that ESPN is no longer as bullish on its radio operation. Perhaps time will tell when the various pro league and collegiate broadcast rights come up for renewal. 

Although the preliminary word is that existing local contracts, such as KSPN having the Angels (among other local teams) and WMVP having the White Sox, will remain in place, it will be interesting to see how the funds received for these purchases will be used by ESPN.

Meanwhile, it is curious that Turner Sports appears to be taking the rest of 2021 off from national telecasts (after December 21st) as scheduled. (As of press time, NHL games were postponed through Christmas while the NBA games were still on.) This appears to be deliberate, considering that the typical five game NBA telecast schedule for Christmas Day this year is all to be shown by ESPN and ABC. In past years, TNT would usually have a doubleheader as their portion. Two of the games air on ESPN, two only on ABC, and the prime time Nets vs. Lakers tilt is scheduled to air simultaneously on both.

In its first year of its NHL contract, TNT had been scheduled to air Wednesday Night NHL in its bizarre time slot of 10 PM ET starts. (The scheduled Dec. 22 Edmonton vs. L.A. telecast was scratched, with the Dec. 29 Dallas vs. Colorado game still on as of press time.) Having a national telecast series in which the games run well past 10 PM in three time zones is strange enough. With so many fans home and/or available to watch during the holiday period, it's hard to believe that Turner Sports would be reducing its coverage of both sports.

Its NHL coverage, however, is scheduled to resume Wednesday night doubleheaders on Weds. Jan. 5th with the St. Louis vs. Pittsburgh telecast scheduled for 7:30 PM ET. TNT is also scheduled to air the New Year's Day "Winter Classic"between St. Louis and Minnesota. Amazingly, this year's event is scheduled for prime time, whereas NBC typically aired this game early afternoon on New Year's Day. You would think that TNT would want to be able to maximize the opportunity to promote the New Year's game, especially with the new time. Instead, they have fewer opportunities than ever.

 

 

 

 

Football Ratings Heading For A Big Score

Last weekend's SEC Championship Game telecast between Alabama and Georgia proved to be huge for CBS and its stations. With a peak of nearly 18 million viewers, this telecast became the highest rated conference championship telecast (any conference or network) since 2018. 

Overall college football season ratings were also good for CBS. The network finishes with the highest average viewers amount of any for college football. This becomes even more impressive when you factor in that ESPN and Fox share the highly rated Big 10 Conference package. For example, the impressive Alabama vs. Georgia numbers were slightly below last month's Michigan vs. Ohio State (regular season) showdown on Fox.

Adding to this is the consideration that the Michigan vs. Ohio State telecast was in the early window (Noon ET start), whereas the SEC Championship game was leading in to prime time in the Eastern Time zone. Because of this, the Big 10 Conference stands to do very well during 2022. Their deal with both Fox and ESPN expire at the end of the 2022 season. Could be quite the bidding war, especially if the Conference is willing to add a possible third TV partner.

On the NFL side, it appears that the surge by the New England Patriots is paying off in the TV ratings. The October Sunday Night Football game on NBC with the Patriots facing Tom Brady and the Bucs was among SNF's top three telecasts ever. Their recent Monday Night Football game vs. Buffalo wound up as the most watched MNF Week 13 telecast since 2013. This comes after Patriots ratings were reportedly down by more than 20% during the 2020 season. For this season, overall NFL telecast ratings are up more than 7% over last year.

 

Joe Davis and Kurt Warner will be calling the Saturday Dec. 18th  Las Vegas vs. Cleveland telecast and the Christmas Day Indianapolis vs. Arizona telecast, both of which will be only on NFL Network and in the local markets.

TNT should be getting concerned about disappointing ratings for its NHL telecasts over the first 1/3 of the regular season. The numbers are down significantly from what NBCSN had been doing for previous "comparable" telecasts. It's looking much better for ESPN's telecasts. 

PHOENIX: Baseball fans know the name Garigiola. Chris Garigiola, the grandson of NBC baseball voice Joe Garigiola and son of former Diamondbacks GM Joe Jr., has been named to host the pre-game and post-game shows on the Diamondbacks Radio Network. Chris had most recently been calling minor league games, such as Pensacola, the AA affiliate of the Marlins.

The Cost of Cancelation

As much as the sports fans' collective appetite for watching live sports continues to be strong, the growth on what it takes out of our wallets is also on the increase. Now comes word that Comcast, which is the nation's largest cable provider, is preparing still another round of price hikes for subscribers to start in January 2022. The big reason, according to sources in the know, is due to the increase in the costs for Comcast to carry channels, especially the sports channels.

Of course, these rising costs for cable and satellite are leading to cord-cutting, which is on the increase. A recent report by Leichtman Research Group which covers all of the larger cable/satellite groups around the country, there was a loss of approximately 650,000 subscribers during the 3rd quarter of 2021 alone. For comparison, the 3rd quarter subscriber losses for Q3 of 2020 (same length of time) was around 90,000.

You would think that the loss of this many subscribers would be cause for concern among the networks increasing their fees as well as for the providers. Instead, they all seem content with increasing the costs for the millions of us that keep paying up. It means that they have those of us that continue to spend the bigger bucks to watch these games are paying back the difference those who want to send a message by canceling are trying to send.

The ratings don't lie, however. This past Saturday's (11/27) Big Ten showdown between Ohio State and Michigan drew nearly 16 million viewers, making it the largest audience Fox Sports has ever had for a college football telecast. Keep in mind this game was at Noon ET and not in prime time. Adding to that was the more than 3,000,000 viewers reported for their morning pregame show. 

Even this past Monday Night Football game (11/29) drew nearly 11 million viewers for ESPN. What makes this viewing number significant is that the Seattle vs. Washington matchup was between two teams entering the game under .500. 

 

 If you are still wondering why so many of the TV sports networks are running so many more betting shows than ever before, the answer is in the opening paragraph above. It's more than the revenue generated for airing these shows. The more people are betting on these games, the higher the interest and the more than fans will want to watch them. At the rate things are going, some bettors may have the goal of trying to cover their cost for the next month of cable or satellite.

College football fans get a tough break for the coming Championship Saturday. Casual fans are not as familiar with the University of Cincinnati, which continues to contend for the final four and the championship games. This Saturday (12/4) has the Big 12 Championship at Noon ET (Baylor and OK State) on ABC, which leads in to the much anticipated Alabama vs. Georgia clash in the SEC Championship game on CBS at 4 PM ET. The Big 10 Championship battle between Michigan and Iowa follows at 8 PM ET on Fox.

Meanwhile, U. of Cincinnati's game vs. Houston for the American Conference Championship (also on ABC) also happens to get underway just after 4 PM ET. This puts it up against the Georgia vs. Alabama telecast. Put that together with the expected blowout by Cinci and it probably means that they could be the "least known" team to compete for a national championship.

Two Games Two Sports No Problem

It's fun for play-by-play announcers to handle more than one sport over the course of a year, but now we have a number of announcers doing so within the course of a couple of days. This includes one or more on a national level.

Joe Buck at Fox continues his busy stretch of crossing over from NFL games to the MLB Post-season, even with the World Series in progress. Adam Amin, a rising star at Fox, catches a break this coming weekend by not having to travel for multiple events. Amin is scheduled to call the NBA game between Chicago and Utah for NBC Sports Chicago on Saturday night (10/30) which is being played in Chicago. On Sunday, he calls the NFL game for Fox between the Bears and visiting San Francisco 49ers. He will then travel to Boston to call the Bulls vs. Celtics game on Monday night. 

Steve Levy had quite the experience this past weekend. Levy got the gem of an assignment for any hockey announcer by getting the Seattle Kraken home opener (Oct. 23) against Vancouver. Although he had not called an NHL game on national TV since 2004, you would have sworn that he calls them all the time. He needed to be in Seattle anyway, because, as coincidence had it, he was there to also call his usual Monday Night Football game (10/25) with the Seahawks hosting New Orleans.

CHICAGO: WSCR 670 The Score has a multi-year extension in place for Bulls broadcasts to continue. The Score has been airing the Bulls since 2018. Chuck Swirsky, now in his 14th season as radio voice of the team, will continue in his role. 

WASHINGTON D.C.: A familiar name for the locals, Steve Buckhantz, is returning to NBC Sports Washington. He will serve as analyst for this coming Saturday's (10/30) telecast of James Madison vs. Elon, working with Curt Dudley, who will call the game. Buckhantz is expected to be added to more games in the near future.

National With A Local Flare

Milwaukee sports fans now have two national voices calling local team play-by-play on their telecasts, with the naming of Lisa Byington as the new play-by-play voice for the Milwaukee Bucks. Byington was chosen to replace Jim Paschke, who had called the Bucks games for the previous 35 seasons. Paschke gets to go out "on top" with the Bucks having won their first NBA Championship in 50 years back in July. 

Byington has been calling college basketball for Fox Sports and the Big10 Network, in addition to having been the first woman to do play-by-play for Turner Sports and CBS during this year's NCAA Tournament. She also called a football game for Big10 Network back in 2017. 

In addition to becoming the first woman to be named primary play-by-play announcer for an NBA team, she adds this to her incredible year which also includes calling Olympics events for NBC.

The other "national" voice calling games in Milwaukee continues to be Brian Anderson, who also calls NBA games, as a primary play-by-play voice for TNT's coverage. Anderson continues as the lead voice of Brewers TV for every game his TBS/TNT baseball and basketball schedule allows him to. Although the networks generally don't want national telecasts to include the local team's announcer, it is worth noting that TBS will carry the National League Division Series and the NLCS. Look for Anderson to call the series not involving the Brewers in the NLDS. If the Brewers advance, it will be interesting to see if TBS goes with Ernie Johnson on the call instead of Anderson.

Speaking of TNT, the network is preparing to debut its NHL coverage next month with a number of national games. Adding none other than Wayne Gretzky to their studio staff brings them major credibility. Kenny Albert and Brendan Burke will share play-by-play duties. For primary analyst, the network will have a Chicago Blackhawks flavor. Ed Olczyk joins TNT as primary analyst to work with Albert, while continuing as local analyst for every Chicago Blackhawks telecast his TNT schedule allows. Working with Burke most night will be Darren Pang, who also played in Chicago for most of his career.

If Sports Is About Competition, What About Sports Radio?

We don't need still another example of what's wrong with radio today, but the sister sports talk stations in Indianapolis have provided one. First, it should be stated that David Wood is an excellent radio executive, as his role of overseeing a cluster of stations within this market prove beyond a doubt. It's just that the corporate decision to add to his duties is the example. Wood has also (the important word here) been tapped to oversee programming on both Sports Talk 93.5 AND 107.5 The Fan. 

 

Let's get this straight. We have two stations going after the same audience of sports fans all day and all night long. Now we have the same management person overseeing them both. How ironic that stations which are based around sports and competition each have the same leader. I suppose that if New York City were to have the same General Manager making acquisitions for both the Yankees and the Mets that there would be outrage from fans filling up the sports stations with content.

You would think that the parent company of these stations would look at this much differently. Imagine assigning separate management responsibilities to different people, while assigning the same budget and opportunities. Whichever delivers the highest ratings gets a bonus or incentive. I suppose that's asking too much these days.

The reach of the Las Vegas Raiders shows during the preseason with the availability of the local telecasts. Their exhibition game telecasts, as called by Beth Mowins and Rich Gannon, are being seen well beyond the Las Vegas and Salt Lake City market. In addition to being shown on KRON-TV San Francisco (understandable, at least for now), their exhibition games also air in both Anchorage and Fairbanks Alaska, Honolulu, and in Los Angeles. 

Speaking of preseason telecasts, the duplication was amazing last weekend (8/21) when the Dallas Cowboys played the Houston Texans. A total of 10 TV markets within Texas had both the Cowboys and Texans telecasts available to them at the same time. The Cowboys telecasts are also seen in Oklahoma City as well as two markets in Arkansas and two in Louisiana.

DENVER: Rachael Vigil has joined KKFN 104.3 The Fan as a digital host and producer, coming over from a similar role with the Western Athletic Conference.

 

 

Field of Dreams, But Nightmare For Baseball Fans

If only Fox Sports hadn't treated Thursday's (8/12) Field of Dreams telecast like it was a movie. Would have been nice, and helpful to keep baseball fans up to date. Fox is supposed to be the big player for Major League Baseball. 

 

Perhaps it is being a White Sox fan that added to the frustration, but I would imagine that other avid baseball fans felt it too. Here was Fox Sports, which will be airing the World Series again this season and has NFL telecasts coming up, forgetting to use their usual scroll of scores and updates at the bottom of the screen for the entire night. Making it even worse, there was no mention of scores of other games in progress, or that had been played earlier in the day.

 

The "earlier in the day" was significant to this "Dreams" game. Cleveland, which is a distant second to the White Sox in the A.L. Central, had already lost during the afternoon, raising the White Sox division lead to 11 games at game time. At the time, this was the largest lead the White Sox held over Cleveland all season. That was news that White Sox fans wanted to hear. Instead, we got Joe Buck saying that the "lead was 10 and 1/2 games going in to today's action". Did the lead network for MLB not know there were other games taking place?

 

Early in the game, the White Sox scored on a homerun by Jose Abreu. It so happened, as many White Sox fans knew, that this homerun tied Abreu for #3 on the franchise's all-time homerun list. Given the history of the franchise, which played a role in the movie Field of Dreams, this was a big deal. Yet, zero mention of that accomplishment from Joe Buck or anyone else on the telecast.

 

But the horrible lack of information was not just aimed at White Sox fans. While I can understand not having a camera for the bullpens, we were rarely told which pitcher was warming up for either team. Even worse was a pinch-hitting appearance by Danny Mendick of the White Sox in the all important 9th inning. 

 

As a Sox fan, I had no idea that Mendick was on the active roster. There was zero mention on the telecast about how and why he was in the game. (It so happened that MLB, for some strange reason, allowed both teams to add a 27th player. Until finding this out on my own, I was falsely worried that there was an injury I hadn't heard about.) Joe Buck and company didn't even mention who Mendick was hitting for. Sheesh.

 

However, Fox was ready with all kinds of graphics and video about the movie Field of Dreams throughout the telecast. It's OK to do that under these circumstances, but there is no excuse for not even making an effort to inform the fans of what's going on.

 

The Pittsburgh Penguins will have Josh Getzoff calling all games on radio starting with the upcoming season. Getzoff called the team's road games over the previous three seasons, adding home games this past season when Mike Lange opted out due to the pandemic. Lange, who called Penguins games on radio for 46 seasons, is giving up his play-by-play role after 50 years total of calling hockey. He will continue to be a part of Penguins broadcasts throughout the coming season. Ray Borque continues as analyst.

 

The ESPN Monday Night Football crew with Steve Levy and Brian Griese will get to do some local pre-season telecasts this year as a warmup. The pair will call the locally available Denver Broncos telecasts. These will be in addition to the pair of exhibition game telecasts which will air on ESPN.

 

Mike Golic will serve as an analyst for Westwood One NFL regular season broadcasts this season. This will be in addition to Mike's weekly football show which will be distributed by Westwood One.

 

How exciting can this week's NBA Summer League telecasts sound? With Gus Johnson scheduled to do play-by-play on Friday (8/13) on NBA-TV, we are likely to find out.

A Performance of Olympic Proportion

Just as NBC did with the NHL contract over the past few years, NBC did a tremendous job with its just coverage of the just concluded Olympics. Using its family of networks while making specific sports and events relatively easy to find added to the quality production value. Mike Torico was superb as primary "studio" host, making it clear to all that he had done his homework and was on top of everything going on around him.

This makes it even harder to swallow that NBC lost the NHL contract and lacks content to continue with NBCSN starting very soon.

However, while NBC Sports deserves applause on that count, it is quite the opposite for college football fans, especially of Notre Dame and Toledo University. NBC wants to promote Peacock, especially it's premium version which costs $4.99 per month. They are trying to slip it under the radar that the Notre Dame home opener on September 11th against Toledo will ONLY be available to paying customers on Peacock. It will be treated as a regular NBC telecast, with Mike Torico calling the game. This game also marks the debut of Drew Brees as analyst.

Yet, fans of both schools (including Toledo University, which, because of this, gets robbed of the national spotlight) are expected to pay to watch this game, while the remaining telecasts will be as usual on NBC.

It's not up to me, but if they must make a money grab, put the "regular" telecast on NBC as usual. Offer up a $4.99 expanded telecast only on Peacock with no commercials, expanded pre and post-game coverage, and perhaps a player or coach on each time mic'd up. Do things that would make the avid fan willing to spend the money, but not rob the casual college football fans of a telecast.


With no teams calling, Robert Griffin III appears to be headed to an analyst role for the coming football season. Looks like ESPN noticed his quality work for Bleacher Report during their 2021 NFL Draft coverage. As of press time, he was reportedly completing a deal to join ESPN to work on both college games and its NFL coverage.

Over at CBS, the network has reportedly increased the role for analyst Jay Feely for the coming season. As the network prepares to unveil its NFL announcing teams, all signs point to Feely being teamed with Spero Dedes on regional telecasts. This comes after word that Adam Archuleta will now be paired with Greg Gumbel.

Local preseason telecasts will, once again, feature network play-by-play voices where possible. Ian Eagle will call the lone local Jets telecast (with Peter Schrager as analyst), Adam Amin will call Chicago Bears games (with Jim Miller as analyst), while Buffalo will have both Andrew Catalon and Steve Tasker on its exhibition games. Justin Kutcher will call Atlanta Falcons games. The champion Tampa Bucs fans will have Chris Myers and Ronde Barber on their telecasts.

NFL exhibition games will be upon us later this week.

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The Big Game Lacks The Typical Big Audience

If they executives of the major pro sports are not concerned about their ability to generate billions of dollars of income without opening the gates, they should be now. It has been one thing to have had regular season and early post-season ratings down across each of the sports since last March. But now that the Super Bowl ratings dropped, the ramifications could be coming over the next couple of years.

The Tampa Bay win over Kansas City finished as the lowest rated Super Bowl telecast since 2007, becoming only the 2nd telecast since then to generate under 100 million viewers. The audience was down roughly six million from last year's game.

Going in to this game, all signs pointed to record high audiences, even without the added drama of Brady vs. Mahomes for the championship. The pandemic caused far more people than usual to be at home or in limited gatherings to watch the game. The ratings of past years do not reflect the number of people viewing from large gatherings such as restaurants and bars. With millions fewer patronizing such establishments, there should have been an increase.

In addition, there was one more important factor. This year, betting on and around the "big game" was legal in many states along with online betting services able to advertise prominently within sports related programming. Point spreads and prop bets were more commonly discussed via the various media outlets.

Estimates in past years were that billions of dollars changed hands, whether legal or otherwise, because of the game. This includes the ability to bet on topics such as the length of the national anthem, last player to score, the coin toss, and so on.

These lower audience numbers happened despite including a record number of streaming minutes of the CBS telecast. Reports show that this was the first sports event ever to generate more than one billion streaming minutes, finishing with a "per minute" average of more than 5.5 million "streamers".

Despite these factors which were expected to add significantly to the audience, viewership was down. It means that during the pandemic, all four major sports have now experienced declines in championship series ratings. The leagues and teams cannot point to fans being in the stands or large gatherings to view.

All of this will make it tough for the TV networks to bid the billions of dollars they typically do or did. They are already faced with economic cutbacks and reduced advertising budgets from many large companies.

For that very reason, this could be a significant development in the sports world. The first major test figures to be the NHL, which needs to put a new deal in place before the 2021-22 season. NBC's deal runs out after the current season, while NBCSN will be going away sometime after the current NHL season and playoffs end. Indications are that NBC will not be aggressive with renewal efforts. It will be interesting to see if or how much Fox Sports and ESPN compete for future NHL rights given the current viewership climate.



LOS ANGELES: It's rare to have the son retire before the dad, but Jorge Jarrin is doing just that. Jorge decided to retire from the Dodgers Spanish radio broadcast team following the team's World Series win. Although he was on the broadcast crew for only 6 seasons, he leaves behind a 35 year on-air career in L.A., including his long tenure as a traffic reporter for KABC 790. Jamie Jarrin, Jorge's father, continues as the primary Spanish play-by-play voice.

CHICAGO: WSCR 670 The Score has added long time host and producer Matt Spiegel back to its weekday lineup. Spiegel has been with the station for most of the past 28 years. He joins afternoon host Danny Parkins as co-host on the 2 to 6 PM shift after doing fill-in and weekends since 2018 when he was pulled from co-hosting middays.

 

MADISON: Bill Michaels, who left WSSP 1250 The Fan in Milwaukee last month, has jointed WOZN 96.7 and 1670 The Zone (Madison) for the 10 AM to 2 PM shift starting this week. His show is also airing on WAYY-AM Eau Claire and WKTY LaCrosse, with plans to add other regional markets.

NBC Says NB See Ya To National Network

Some expected it and others were surprised, but the upcoming end of NBCSN will have an immediate impact on the sports media landscape. Despite some ratings success over the past couple of years, it appears that the pandemic caused the NBC brass to consolidate even more than they already have.

Staff cuts on its regional sports networks hit last summer, with another round since the first of the year. With NBCSN able to move any remaining sports programming to USA Network, they can reduce production staff and operation costs while not having to fill air time with wasted programming.

Back in the 80's, USA Network was a major sports presence on cable, more so than ESPN at the time. USA Network had Thursday Night Baseball with MLB doubleheaders, as well as NHL regular season and playoff telecasts. (This was where NHL fans first heard Doc Emrick calling games at the national level.)

This season is the final one of the NBC contract with the NHL. While NBC has done a superb job with its coverage, including showing every playoff game on one of its networks, the NHL remains the only one of the four major sports which has only one network controlling its telecasts. While it is possible that NBC retains its national game presence, it is also possible that Fox Sports would be a player, needing more content for FS1 and FS2.

Word is that NBCSN will go away during 2021. It is understandable that they do not have a date yet. Due to the pandemic, we are not sure if and when there will be Olympic Games in 2021. Nor are we certain that the NHL Playoffs would end in July as currently planned.

Events such as NASCAR and Premier League soccer would be assigned to USA Network. Speculation has its Peacock service also carrying some of the events via that platform. Peacock already carries roughly 175 matches currently.

It is not known, as of press time, how much (or how little) the impact of the pandemic was behind this decision. As we commented on last week, even with millions of people spending more time at home, viewership of the major sports is down from a year ago and beyond. This makes us wonder if we will see more cutbacks on all sports networks as a means of sending a message to the pro leagues that rights fees may start to decline during upcoming negotiations.


Over at ESPN, it's looking like the Monday Night Football broadcast crew might be staying in place for more than the one season. Word is that Steve Levy, Brian Griese, and Louis Riddick have passed the audition and will be brought back for at least the 2021 season. Word is that ESPN is looking to add the just retired Philip Rivers to its roster of analysts. Hard to imagine Rivers being added and not made a part of the network's weekly telecast.


While CBS prepares for the Super Bowl telecast, there is more emphasis this time around on making its streaming of the game more readily available. Finally, it will be available without additional cost. Viewers will be able to stream the game on CBSSports.com, Yahoo Sports, along with Verizon Media for its customers. ESPN Deportes will air the Spanish version.


Meanwhile, VIZIO has now joined Samsung in having a variety of sports apps available to their Smart TV owners. VIZIO now has free channels available including NFL Channel (different from NFL Network), CBS Sports App, and the Pac 12 Insider. Samsung allows Smart TV owners to access paid apps such as MLB for its owners.

To Be Frank, It's A Big Loss For Detroit Sports Radio

It's looking more like watching football on TV during the pandemic is not the golden goose for ratings and advertising revenue the major networks were expecting. This past weekend, the impact (actually the lack thereof) was felt on both the NFL and college football scene.

The NFL Wild Card Weekend (Jan. 9 & 10) featured six telecasts for the first time ever. Although the Chicago vs. New Orleans game on 1/10 was the most watched NFL game since last year's Super Bowl, the ratings were actually down roughly 15% over the same playoff  window last year. It did become CBS' most watched Wild Card game since San Diego vs. Cincinnati in 2014.

The ESPN/ABC telecast of the Baltimore vs. Tennessee game was down from last year in both ratings and viewership, although the ABC simulcast was up from last year's. Over at NBC, the Sunday night Cleveland vs. Pittsburgh telecast did well, but its Saturday prime time game with Tampa Bay vs. Washington was down more than 30% in both ratings and viewership from the same window last year.

The Fox telecast of L.A. vs. Seattle on Saturday wound up as its lowest rated Wild Card telecast since 1998.

However, the lower viewership is not a result of expanded playoffs and having consecutive days with triple headers. The NFL's combined regular season ratings were down roughly 7% from the previous season and about 2% from the 2018 regular season. While Fox led the overall ratings, they showed an overall decrease of more than 5% from 2019. The CBS telecasts were down roughly 4% from 2019, with its lowest average since 2017. NBC's Sunday Night Football had its "least watched" season since 2008, dropping around 18% overall. One positive for NBC is that SNF did finished as the night's highest rated prime time program, which could be due to the increased amount of reruns and one-time specials due to the pandemic.

It wasn't just the NFL suffering from lower viewership. The Alabama vs. Ohio State college championship game on Monday (1/11) is now the lowest rated and least watched of the national title games. The decline was roughly 28% in ratings compared with last year. In this case, there are other likely contributing factors. The game itself was a blowout, and came on the heels of the six NFL playoff telecasts over the previous two days. This point is bolstered by the fact that both the Alabama and Ohio State New Year's Day bowl game wins to reach the championship each had higher ratings than their championship match.

These viewership and ratings declines are not only happening with football. During the pandemic, the recent World Series ratings were  down roughly 30% from 2019, the NBA Finals down about 49%, and the Stanley Cup Finals were down by more than 60%. Both the NBA and NHL Finals were held more than three months later than traditionally scheduled.


Meanwhile, as the NHL season gets underway, NBC made it official that analyst Mike Milbury is gone after 14 seasons in his role with the network. This could be due to politically incorrect comments made during a telecast from the bubble. Jeremy Roenick is also gone from his NBC analyst role as a result of comments made on a podcast.

Although John Forslund called play-by-play of NBCSN's featured opening night game between Chicago and Tampa Bay with Eddie Olczyk, the network has yet to proclaim a #1 announcer to fully replace the partially retired Doc Emrick. Brendan Burke and Kenny Albert will share in the spotlight for the time being.


DETROIT: It's hard to imagine Detroit sports without Frank Beckmann, but after 48 years with WJR 760 fans are going to have to start getting used to it. Beckmann remains the only person to have broadcast games for the Tigers, Red Wings, Lions, and Pistons. In addition, he also called U. of Michigan football for 33 seasons upon succeeding Bob Ufer for the 1981 season.

Beckmann's last show is currently scheduled for March 26th. He has hosted the 9 AM to Noon spot on WJR for the past 18 years. Best wishes to Frank!


CHICAGO: White Sox TV play-by-play voice Jason Benetti has been named Illinois Sportscaster of the Year. Over on the radio side, with the broadcasts moving back to WMVP ESPN 1000 for the coming season, Connor McKnight has been named as the studio host. He will also fill in on play-by-play, which will be a first for him, for approximately 25 games. Those will be the games that new radio voice Len Kasper will shift to the TV booth and fill in for Benetti, who continues assignments for ESPN.

Trying Out The Extra NFL Playoff Games

The #7 seeds in the NFL Playoffs will really be playing for more than their own post-season survival this coming weekend (1/9 and 1/10). Considered to be a temporary addition of one more playoff team from each Conference because of the pandemic (even though teams all played the usual 16 games), this will be the first time we get six playoff games in one weekend. It has been four games over recent years.

If the ratings are strong enough, chances are expanded playoffs will become a regular occurrence. Yet, it's not as certain as we would all think. The Week 17 ratings, with playoff seedings still to be decided and so many people staying home, were not what the networks would have hoped.

The fact that most markets had both early and late games from both Fox and CBS may have saturated things. Yet, only one of the four time slots (two on each network) showed a ratings increase on Dec. 27th. This was the Fox telecast of the Bears vs. the Packers, with both teams needing a win. This telecast went to roughly 75% of the markets. NFL ratings have not been as strong as anticipated throughout the regular season.

Theories on why include the overlap of pro sports well into the NFL season and some fans not wanting to watch during the pandemic. What happens with ratings for the post-season, and, of course, the Super Bowl will be quite interesting.

Westwood One will be broadcasting all six NFL playoff games this weekend nationally to participating stations. Kevin Harlan will call the prime time games on both Saturday and Sunday for Westwood One, making him the only broadcaster to call more than one of those games. That includes analysts. Ron Jaworski joins Harlan on Saturday for the Tampa Bay vs. Washington game, while Tony Boselli will work with him on the Cleveland at Pittsburgh game on Sunday. Both prime time games will be on NBC, with Mike Torico calling the Saturday game and Al Michaels the Sunday one.

Sports talk radio lost one of its pioneers earlier this week with the passing of Tom Bigby at the age of 76. Bigby is most known for having developed WIP-FM Philadelphia into the sports talk giant it still is during his 15 years there. He also worked with leading sports stations such as WXYT 97.1 The Ticket in Detroit and KRLD 105.3 The Fan in Dallas. Whether in one of those markets to listen one of "his" stations or not, listeners of sports talk radio across the country will always have Bigby to thank for it.

The sports media also lost another major contributor last week . Those who go back to the days of Baseball Digest, Hockey Digest, and books about sports will likely remember George Vass. George passed away in the Chicago area at the age of 93. Vass was more well known in Chicago, having reported for the Chicago Daily News and Sun-Times from 1958 to 1994. He was a baseball beat writer (White Sox and Cubs) in the 60's and 70's.

CHICAGO: On a much happier note in Chicago, Leila Rahimi becomes the first woman to co-host a weekday show on WSCR The Score 670. She was named to co-host the 9 AM to Noon spot along with Dan Bernstein full-time after being well received in her weekly stint during that time started this past September. She had been with NBC Sports Chicago, being a victim of their cost-cutting layoffs last summer.

WISCONSIN: Milwaukee's WRNW 97.3 The Game is now being simulcast from 6 AM to 6 PM on Rhinelander 101.3 The Game. The station is airing Fox Sports Radio during the evenings and overnights.

PROVIDENCE: WPRO-AM and WEAN-FM have cut back on their sports programming, reducing from three hours on weeknights to only one hour. As a result, Andy Gresh does his final show for the stations on Jan. 8th. Kevin McNamara, sports reporter for the Providence Journal, will host the one hour of sports talk from 6 to 7 PM starting on Monday.

The Flex Works For The Fans

The increase in switching NFL telecasts between CBS and Fox this season rewards fans that only have access to their locally televised games on this final weekend of the regular season. The best example is CBS having the Arizona vs. L.A. Rams telecast instead of Fox, and understandably making it the primary doubleheader game (Jan. 3). This allowed the NFL to shift the Green Bay vs. Chicago game to the 4:25 ET spot and enable Fox to make it the primary doubleheader game. Week 17 is highlighted by both networks getting a doubleheader game.

Because of the flexing, fans can follow both telecasts, which determine the final NFC playoff participants. Fox also has the New Orleans vs. Carolina game, along with the Seattle vs. San Francisco telecast going regional, and at the same time. These games will determine the top three seeds in the NFC in a season in which only the #1 seed gets a post-season bye week.

There is one irony to the Fox late game window. As of press time, the Phoenix market is scheduled to receive the Green Bay vs. Chicago telecast instead of the San Francisco vs. Seattle telecast. Because of the 49ers having to relocate their games due to Covid restrictions, that game is being played in Glendale AZ (the stadium which is home to the Cardinals).

MINNEAPOLIS: KYCR 1440 starts the new year by expanding the air time of Eric Nelson and Wally Langfellow. Instead of only a Friday night and weekend sports talk show, "Ten Thousands Takes" begins Monday (1/4), airing from 5 to 6 PM weekdays. There will also be a live show most Saturdays at Noon. The pair have co-hosted since 2002. Langfellow, known more for his studio hosting during North Stars broadcasts in the 80's on WCCO, continues to do high school play-by-play on KYCR.

TAMPA: WDAE has announced its new co-hosting team for afternoons, moving Jay Recher to team with former Buccaneer Ian Beckles. Recher has been with WDAE since 2014. He will continue with his role on USF football studio coverage.

Finally, thanks for all of the nice holiday greetings. The plan is to return to regular posts during 2021 as we all recover from the pandemic. 

Let's make this a great year!