The 2022 MLS TV thread

This can be solved if they make it so the 77 Leagues Cups games on certain nights are only carried by one network as to ensure viewership isn't cannibalized and rather funneled to one channel be it ESPN or Univision on the given night during the month of the tournament.

 

Leagues Cup will be on Apple, but probably also there will be a linear TV deal, particularly for Spanish.

 

That’s impressive.

 

Another good week for MLS on ABC.

Notable soccer viewership from last week:

629k Chelsea v Everton (PL, USA)
555k ATL v SEA (MLS, ABC)
513k Dortmund v Bayer (Bun, ABC)
471k Arsenal v Palace (PL, USA)
219k LAG v Chivas (Leagues Cup, ESPN)

(Will have Span-lang in about 10 mins...)

— L W Johnson (@HelltownBeer) August 9, 2022

 

Leagues cup in English is a complete ratings flop... 149k for the second game on main ESPN is... Yikes. However, 1.01 million for the galaxy game in Spanish, which actually would have been the highest rated MLS regular season match ever, if it was an MLS game.

 

I watched the games on ESPN+ in English so add 2 more and probably we were not the only ones, if you don’t know those numbers, please don’t make those statements!

 

The second game kicked off at 11:15PM EST.............

The Leagues Cup is as much, if not more, about getting the Mexican-American viewership numbers. And in turn parlaying that into more interest in MLS. It's also about bringing more eyeballs to Liga MX, which in turn will bring in more sponsors and investment in both leagues.

 

LA vs. Chivas wasn’t the best game, very much resembled a friendly. LAFC vs. America looked much more competitive, almost CCL-like. Too bad that one didn’t have the better time slot.

 

You listened to twellman too much. The games were just about even in terms of intensity.

 

Nah, Galaxy game was lethargic.

 

Second half was I guess...

 

All Star Game: ESPN: 334k, Univision + TUDN 1.2 million

So pretty bad for primetime on ESPN, and super duper good for Univision. I can see why they are considering scrapping the format - ESPN might be complaining.

Where is Leagues Cup going next season? Is it moving to Apple?

 

Leagues Cup is on Apple, included with the MLS package. My guess is that when we get word of a linear TV deal for Spanish, it will include a lot of Leagues Cup.

 

Why are they scrapping the format if it's doing good?

 

Maybe ESPN is complaining, or maybe they just think they already tapped into the Mexican audience enough with leagues cup and are now free to use the asg to tap into a different audience.

 

2018 947,000 combined
2019 808,000 combined
2021 All-Star game averaged 1.4 million on Unimas and 180,000 on ESPN.

Why would they scrap the format?

 

I don't know, ask the Don. During halftime he hinted pretty strongly that this format is done.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if it was part of the negotiations for the Leagues Cup. One less game for the best of Liga MX.

 

Maybe Mexican TV ratings weren't great knowing Mexico is becoming a nation of chokers

I'm talking about the soccer teams.

 

The total audience 1772k for the all star game. ESPN is low but up significantly from FS1 last year

1199k Univision.
239k TUDN
334k ESPN

Source: https://showbuzzdaily.com/articles/...2-top-150-cable-originals-network-finals.html

 

I know the linear TV deal is being negotiated but I have noticed that the ratings for games do much better on free tv as the last two weeks games on ABC did over 500K. If they fell though or the deal is short I wonder if this could be an alternative? The CW was just brought by Nextstar and since MLS will take over the production of the broadcast maybe they could do a deal with them in the future. The positives would be the largest free TV network affiliation without live national sports on it. No more the game in progress will start after this event ends.
https://www.reuters.com/markets/deals/nexstar-acquire-75-cw-network-2022-08-15/

 

The CW overall aims at a much younger demographic in their programming so it might be a good fit. The problem I've noticed is most of the streaming "cable" services like Fubo and YouTube TV don't always carry local CW channels in their programming packages. I would be watching OTA myself, but I know quite a few people who use a streaming service and don't have an antenna.

There's an interesting tidbit in this Axios article on the deal:

So their plan is sports, news, and weather, and I'm really not aware of any sports that the CW carries unless there are some local deals.

On top of that, the new owners are already targeting older viewers:

 

I live in a relatively populated place with zero OTA television channels. So I am one of those people (I actually do have an antenna... which is how I found out there are no channels).

We do have 5G phone service and very high speed fiber, though, oddly.

 

BOURNEMOUTH/MANCHESTER CITY 427k on USA as the move from NBCSN to USA is a successful one for the EPL. This beat America vs Pumas on TUDN, but I don't have a Univision number. EPL vs Liga MX remain neck in neck for the "most popular league" in the USA award.