For a ratings comparison with another league: https://www.si.com/tech-media/2017/04/16/lebron-james-espn-bill-simmons-grantland-what-if
Think you have to reference the full figures, though, which show that the NHL can lure 1.2+M on NBC. But still, that is intriguing and suggests MLS is within (almost) touching distance of the NHL's cable numbers, which would be saying something as the league looks to build their value. No where near the volume of content as the NHL, but the potential would be there to have comparable opportunities on the main over-the-air networks, however. If these figures hold or get better, I'd say it means MLS could land a deal about half of the NHL contract next go round.
I wonder how much the respective time slots affect the ratings. The potential audience for a weekend afternoon MLS game is going to smaller for a weekday prime time NHL game.
Based on what? The NHL has so much more commercial time during their games. An NHL broadcast is worth far more than an MLS broadcast at the same ratings.
To be sure time slots are a factor, but there's value in filling a content void, as well, and that still exists on many weekends. Yes, hockey games have more commercial time but also typically run longer as a broadcast. Plus MLS has wider appeal among Spanish-language broadcasters and has at least part of its season without competition from the other leagues save MLB. But the main thing, to me, is that the NHL deal isn't, comparably speaking, all that big to begin with. Last I saw it was about $600M annually (from about early last year), whereas MLS is raking in <$90M. Since the new media deals MLS TV ratings have improved and the league has expanded into more markets, which not only increases probable exposure but also broadcast options. Regardless of whether or not the NHL is being underpaid (it is), it's safe to say that average NHL cable telecasts at around 330k are not 8x the viewership for MLS. Fair enough, MLS broadcasts on Fox likely aren't nearing NHL numbers on NBC, either, but based on payments for the World Cup and other soccer leagues and events the sport is still on a strong upswing. Thus, it stands to reason that MLS will earn more from their next media deals and I don't think $300M is out of reach in that regard. Given the relatively paltry amount that would still yield on a per team basis I'm sure MLS will be asking for more than that. Granted, NHL teams have much, much stronger local TV deals and sponsorship deals, etc. The league as a whole sees total revenues near the $4B range, IIRC. MLS? Not so much.
Also as has been pointed out before, many NBCSN NHL games are blacked out in the local markets. I'd like to see what their average is for their national exclusive games.
Lets remember that SUM bundles MLS + some NT games, so the ratings that the NT gets for friendly games are part of the equation.
As TV and digital viewing habits evolve, MLS looks to stay ahead of the curve Read - FourFourTwo World Soccer Talk misread the numbers? You don't say.... Otherwise, firm numbers about the increases.
If these increases are true then MLS is averaging about 440K viewers per game on ESPN and 400K on Fox; which are some pretty astounding numbers.
I haven't seen an actual number, but it must be out there somewhere and I don't think it is "good". I've seen a couple of tweets about the game being beat by the EPL game on NBCSN and the La Liga game on BeIN.
I haven't seen the Bundesliga numbers for Fox, but Fox Deportes had 58k for the Bundesliga game and 31k for the MLS game. https://sportstvratings.com/grizzli...s-tv-ratings-for-saturday-april-15-2017/7981/
The Bundesliga match you mention is from 2016. It doesn't have the 2017 match. However, they do say they only include numbers with a rating of 300k or higher, so maybe the Bundesliga game didn't get over 300k?
It is year to date growth. Rather than looking at last seasons average and compare it to the average so far this year, they are looking at this far into the season from last year and compare it to this year.
Such a shame! It was a great match too. Was hoping for a much better number. Shows how much pure hatred there is still for MLS among soccer fans. So much more to relate to for a US-based fan in Orlando-LA as opposed to Shalke-Bayern that doesn't even carry any meaning for the teams involved at this point of the season given their respective positions.
You are right. I didn't realize that they were not out of the woods yet (pretty certain they will not get relegated). However, it doesn't change the theme? How many fans in US are going to care whether Shalke gets relegated or not???
I'm not sure hatred is the right answer? Since MLS isn't very popular, it requires a stronger lead-in to lift its rating above a certain number. If it is safe to assume that the Bundesliga game got less than 300k, that's a rather weak lead-in and the Bundesliga had already driven off Fox's viewers by the time the MLS game started.
If you interact with a lot of soccer fans or follow facebook comments on let's say Fox Soccer you will see lots of hatred. Like "this league is much worse than ANY league in Europe", "this is not soccer", "Schweinsteiger plays against high school players now", etc., etc.