It should be noted that this is national ratings only. MLB's real strength is in their local ratings and subsequent local tv money. It seperates them greatly from the NBA or NHL.
Not only that, but most MLB national TV broadcasts are blacked out in the local markets so that the local broadcasts get those viewers. The flip side is that local markets are often not allowed to schedule games at the same time as a 'game of the week' national broadcast, so that the national broadcast is the only baseball game on TV at that time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Baseball_blackout_policy
No. I'm pretty sure the regional ratings follow the same hierarchy. The reason MLB teams get such huge TV money is because MLB teams play 162 games a season. The NBA teams only plays 66. MLS ratings could very well surpass MLB ratings over the next decade, especially in the 18-49 demographic, but MLB teams will still get 5 times the money in their regional TV contracts because they play 5 times more games.
This year, anyway. The second part of that is very true. I'm just not seeing how after decades of men's outdoor league soccer in this country getting poor-to-ehh ratings, we're going to pass baseball by 2022. But that's just me.
I do not believe this is true. I have been following this for a long long time and the local MLB ratings especially in the bigger cities dominate the NBA ratings. Yankees, Red Sox, Cubs, Philly, etc etc all do significantly better than the NBA does locally. It is the main reason that MLB is considered the most regional of the three big sports leagues. They don't draw well nationally (relatively) but do draw well (especially in the big cities) locally. And yes, of course the longer season helps the local contracts but if you look at the ENORMOUS size difference between the NBA and MLB local TV contracts you will see it is significantly more than just having twice the games to show. Side note: NBA teams play 82 games a year, not 66. You are confusing a strike shortened year with normal length of season.
There is no way in hell MLS will even catch a sneeze of MLB ratings ever. Locally here in Philly the Phils slaughter competition aside from the Eagles who only play 16 games. Here's a note of reality from Forbes: The Phillies led MLB in local television ratings in 2011, averaging a 9.7 on Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia. Ratings have increased for nine consecutive seasons. And another: Overnight rating for Portland-Seattle on ESPN was 0.6, best regular-season overnight on ESPN/ESPN2 since 2001.
I can't make any sense of it either especially since DC-NY has been the highest rated espn2 and NBCSN games this season.
This is definitely not the case. In Boston, the Celtics average around 5.0, and Red Sox average 5.0-6.0. From what I can tell, on average the ratings are about the same. NBA however dominates in the 18-49 demographics. The only reason MLB gets more money is the number of games. If the NBA had a 160+ game season, I guarantee they would make more than MLB (because of the 18-49 demo). Even if MLS doesn't surpass MLB in overall ratings, MLS will more likely than not surpass MLB in the 18-49 demographic this decade. We're really close as it is. MLB's 18-49 is atrocious.
Nope. The #1 problem with MLS isn't the ratings, it's not the demographics. It's commercials The fact that you can't show ads is a HUGE issue. ESPN/NBC need to build an audience for pre/post game shows, or else MLS is doomed to practically no TV money for the foreseeable future.
You are cherry picking and not looking over a span of years for an average. The Celtics all time high, for one season was a 4.7. It's previous all time high before that was only a 3.5 in the 2008 season. The Celtics dropped almost 30% in the ratings this season from that one time high of a 4.7. http://www.bostonsportsmedia.com/2011/02/celtics-enjoying-best-season-ever-on-csnne http://www.celticsblog.com/2012/5/2...n-ratings-increase-celtics-local-ratings-drop If you look over say a seven year period to weed out the one time spikes, you are going to see the Red Sox beat easily the Celtics in local ratings. The Red Sox lowest ratings between 2004 and 2010 was a 6.5. http://espn.go.com/blog/boston/red-sox/tag/_/name/tv-ratings The lowest Red Sox rating beats the highest Cetic rating. It is not even close if you look over the span of time and don't cherry pick.
Also, the Red Sox averaged a 7.9 in 2011. Not even their highest average in the past 8 or so years. http://articles.boston.com/2011-10-19/sports/30298459_1_nielsen-viewership-numbers-households Only two NBA teams averaged over a 5 locally in 2011(compared to 6 MLB teams that averaged over a 6 locally. And those two NBA teams do not have a MLB team in town. http://m.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Journal/Issues/2011/04/18/Media/NBA-RSN-ratings.aspx?
After all these years of watching MLS ratings really make no head way, you would think people would stop with these fantastic type predictions. Maybe the great WC ratings and the solid Euro ratings make people hope for MLS. Personally I would wait until MLS showed some consistent growth over a multi year period to make such strong predictions.
It would be nice if MLS tossed up a background ad on their website for SKC/Chicago like they did with NY/DC. Oh well...
It's been noted in the last few posts, but games that have had regional and national promotion have done better.
No they haven't. ESPN2 Average Viewership the last three completed seasons. 2009 284k 2010 249k 2011 238k http://www.majorleaguesoccertalk.com/mls-2010-season-viewership-down-12-on-espn2-10493
Just like it is a mistake to compare attendance from the middle of the season to the end of the season, it is also problematic to compare completed seasons of ratings with partial seasons. The partial season is too sensative to a single spike, like the Port Sea game which because of the small amount of samples in skewing the data. Hopefully the ESPN/ESPN2 numbers can stay up by the end of the year and reverse the trend of the previous seasons. Comparing NBCSN to FSC is difficult to make work because of the huge disparity in households. Best to wait until we can compare NBCSN to NBCSN next year.