Should Be Where Over When

It's understandable and appreciated how much the NFL does to keep football in the media throughout the year, especially in the off-season. Somehow gaining so much publicity and coverage around the country of mini-camps, draft preparation, and events such as the combine are like a public relations person's dreams come true.

However, the release of the upcoming season schedule this past Thursday (5/12) brought this way too far over the edge. Clearly the presence of USFL games has the NFL concerned, while chances are it won't need to be. The onset of the USFL must be reason why the NFL went overboard with the schedule info, especially with tactics such as releasing certain key dates in the days and hours leading to their "official" announcement.

Some of the blame for this unnecessary hype goes to the media. The networks which televise live games are desperate for opportunities to remind their audience that they are home to NFL games. The sports stations around the country love to have anything "new" as an excuse to talk about the NFL.

The problem with all of this wasted time is that we already knew the opponents for each team, as well as which games will be home and away. Consequently, just knowing which order and which days and times for specific games does not carry the appeal that the NFL and the media were acting like.

In recent years, the coming season's opponents and home games have been announced within a couple of days after the conclusion of the regular season. For those that are fans of a team heading to the playoffs, that announcement doesn't mean very much at the time.

How can this be solved? If the NFL wants true excitement about announcing its schedule, then don't announce the coming season's opponents both home and away months before their "schedule release party". If fans didn't know for sure who the non-divisional opponents will be and who their team will host ahead of time, there would be some suspense.

If the NFL insists on maintaining this format, this schedule release party stuff will be right "down there" with the stupid mock drafts that many media outlets thrust upon us as if there is some importance to it.

Meanwhile, congratulations to the NHL on increasing interest in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Those of us who were critical of the NHL for choosing multiple partners (ESPN and TNT) after all the years with NBC doing such a solid job doing it all stand corrected.

Though the first round of the playoffs, the two families of networks have combined for a roughly 9% increase in viewership. What makes this even more significant is that the Chicago Blackhawks, long one of the highest rated and most nationally televised teams, failed to make the post-season. (If they had the feeling is that this ratings increase would have been in double digits this early into the playoffs.)

At the same time, NBA telecast ratings (also shared with ESPN/ABC and TNT) also went up during the simultaneous (to the NHL playoffs) second round of playoff games. The surge for the Golden State Warriors this season is a big part of the ratings increase.

Even with the NBA and NHL playoffs in full swing and the NFL sneaking its way in to the TV schedule, MLB is seeing some progress on the ratings front. A month in to the season, ESPN Sunday Night Baseball ratings are up roughly 4%. (Perhaps the absence of Alex Rodriguez from the primary telecast is a factor.) The ratings for the opening Sunday Morning Baseball telecast on Peacock (from 5/8) were the highest that MLB has had for a Sunday afternoon window in more than three years.

Peacock having a consistent start time (11 AM ET for now, soon to be 11:30 AM ET) will probably be a factor in stronger ratings than TBS used to have for Sundays, when its start times varied almost every week by as much as three hours.