Viewership of Major League Soccer games on ESPN2 is down 9.5% through August 17, according to Sports Business Daily.
MLS games on ESPN2 are averaging 257,000 viewers, which is down 9.5% compared to the same time last year when the average viewing audience was 284,000. Compared to the same period in 2008, the average viewing audience for MLS games on ESPN2 is down 10.1%. The average in 2008 was 286,000.
The largest viewing audience for a Major League Soccer game on ESPN2 this season was 391,000 for the July 4th broadcast of Seattle Sounders against Los Angeles Galaxy. Despite the expected bounce from the 2010 World Cup when the United States men’s national team got knocked out of the second round, the Major League Soccer games have seen no bounce as of yet.
I still do not get why people expect a bounce after the world cup. If anything I think people got soccer fatigue and used up all their ‘Im going watch some soccer’ time with their spouse during the WC and are still recovering.
So why then did the Premier League viewing audience numbers in the United States last weekend increase significantly compared to last year?
Cheers,
The Gaffer
Did they jump Year over Year for the first week or are you comparing the first week of this year to the average of last year?
Also did they start the season last year with Aresenal v Liverpool?
They jumped from the opening weekend of this season compared to the opening weekend of last season. No, there wasn’t an Arsenal vs Liverpool on the opening weekend of last season, or anything close, but that game was on Fox, not ESPN. ESPN saw a significant increase, as well as FSC did for EPL.
Cheers,
The Gaffer
The ESPN increase was due to them advertising it a week in advanced rather than the deal getting done on the day before the opening day
I agree. Even as an avid fan, I got to the point where I didn’t want to watch any matches for a month after the final. Especially a lower quality of the game. Yes, there’s an increase in interest, but people need a break after watching so many games.
Yes the TV ratings could be better as the general interest in soccer in the US climbs and high if we are to judge it by ESPN’s other ratings for international football and the EPL. A couple factors to think about in my view are the lack of big names in MLS until the recent signings. No David Beckham due to an injury and Landon Donovan only became a star after the World Cup to draw a general TV audience. The vast volume of soccer in the US has to hurt MLS on TV. We have talked about it but you have to be a real fan of the team to take time out of your summer schedule to watch KC v. SJ instead of making time to watch Arsenal v. Liverpool. Finally, hey it’s summer time and who wants to be struck inside when you can go to a game. MLS attendance is good. So bad and good but overall MLS is growing.
You are the gayest poster here. You’re always saying “grow the game!”, “we’re getting better!” like a little panzy. No one cares about what you have to say. STFU already.
As per the ratings, they will only keep decreasing. The EPL is superior in every way. No one can be bothered to watch your shit league.
didnt the kansas city wizards beat Man U in a friendly.
Instead of watching the league, he reads two bit blogs and posts on them.
Instead of a worth post, he trolls.
What a smart dude.
Tell that to your children and your grand children and so on. The MLS is on the right track to be a very good league. Once the league starts paying top players big time money, those big time players won’t hesitate where they want to play football. You seem to forget about the QUALITY of LIFE in the United States. Great Schools for the children, from preschools to universities just one reason of many to come here. It’s only a matter of time before this goes down. The United States, a country that has The NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB, all of which are the best leagues in their respective sports, will soon have a 5th league at the highest levels. Either you don’t know, realize or don’t seem to want to admit that American Leagues pay athletes Big Time Cash. MLS won’t be any different, just wait and see when your children and your grand children are rooting for an MLS team because just like me and you, they want to see the very best. Major League Soccer is coming, It’s inevitable. Deep down inside you’ve always known that Americans will never settle for less.
Sincerely you,
Martha Focker
Hey Martha, you are an idiot. Your little mickeymouse league will never be better than what it is now. It is shite. The supporters are all losers who drive away normal people from following the league.
Do you think people want to sit next a bunch of retards saying “oh oh oh” for 90 minutes? You all are pathetic.
Quality footballers don’t want to play there. Look at how Beckham wanted out. Your league is a cesspool of mediocrity. It will fold before it improves.
Hey EPL. You mean the league that is expanding or the one in Europe where teams are going into administration or the ones racking up more debt than some countries are having to pay off.
Your post sounds like a guy telling someone next to him on an airplane free falling from the sky that everything is going to be alright when he is only trying to mask his own fear.
The Gaffer,
I would say as FSC grows in penetration in terms of the number of subscribers and homes it passes, also with adding HD, and with a better expectation of Premier League games on ESPN and set viewing times, people know where to go to find these things now.
MLS is still a jumble of games on Thursday, games on Sunday, games at 7:00 PM, 8:00 PM, 10:30 PM, etc etc.
I also agree there is some fatigue. The dust barely settles on the World Cup and we have summer friendlies, All-Star game, the return of Mexico and England, soon to be followed by Germany, Spain and Italy. I’m fatigued. I sort of sat out the first weekend of Premier League games as a viewer.
I would argue that you weigh the summer acquisitions and the World Cup bounce next year. The league will have three marquee Mexicans, Henry, Beckham, some other bright spots, new young talent, two new television markets, and maybe an odd addition or two of players in the winter transfer period.
I have to admit the quality of play is improving through results in the CCL. I haven’t seen Salt Lake play all that much due to tv coverage but saw them last night in CCL. They really know how to move the ball around in the midfield with some great attacking. Lots of fouls and both teams showed obvious hatred for one another. loved it. I wish MLS good luck but I don’t see ESPN renewing their contract.
The problem is, if ESPN wants the World Cup and US soccer (and soon maybe EPL and La Liga), they have to renew with MLS. SUM holds the cookie jar and if ESPN wants some cookies it has to eat its spinach.
a) ESPN barely markets MLS games at all
b) The ESPN mid week matches really haven’t been that good thus far. Since the teams and not MLS do the scheduling, MLS has no control on picking the best matches for midweek.
c) Soccer overload. Gaffer, Premier League did great on its opening weekend. Let’s see if that continues throughout.
a) This is too true, but at least MLS scores have started to appear on the ticker at the bottom of the screen. It’s a shame because the coverage itself is pretty good.
b) First, the Thursday night game should always have no later than a 9:00 PM EST kickoff (sorry LA, Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, and whoever else in the west that would have a 6:00 kickoff. Second MLS should have a flex schedule that allows the network to pick which games to show (do we really need to see DC United v. Chivas for the next game of the week?). Third, the MLS Final Kick that appears sometimes on ESPN.com should get onto Sportscenter at least once a week. It’s hard to follow a league, if you are a casual fan, when you don’t know the storylines.
c) I disagree with this, with attendance seemingly up, and real excitement about the next three expansion teams (Portland, Vancouver, Montreal), I can’t figure out the reason why. I don’t expect World Cup numbers, but I would assume the game of the week could get at least a 1 share.
It is hard to compare numbers sometimes.
For instance, the phenom posts for Take Me Out to the Ballgame show the MLS attendance numbers up for the year. But then you look at Seattle having more home games than everyone and had limited compacity last year compared to this year.
The hidden story being….Away from that the rest of the league was barely up.
So on the TV, my perception is that many of these games are very late at night and wouldn’t get any east coast viewership. Showing a Thursday night Sounder’s game on TV may look great with a very loud and huge crowd, but show it late at night and you are missing 40k potential fans and ALL of the East Coast that has to work the next day.
I would have to see the full story to see if a drop of 27k is significant.
If they want good ratings they should air the matches during weekend afternoons, not at 7:30 at night when only you and I would probably be watching.
It’s tough during football season but come on from March-August they shouldn’t bother with random soccer times.
Trying to quantify TV viewership is pretty dumb in my book. There area way too many variables. MLS tv ratings may not be as bad as some haters would like you to think, but they still aren’t good. Frankly, I don’t think they will be good for a while. Nobody is going to watch two random teams play on some random night each week.
Pefectly said.
The other thing, IMHO, that is hard to quantify is how much a TV station like ESPN value having the MLS relationship.
I agree with your random team part. I wonder how much local coverage hurts national coverage. In Boston, I could watch everyone of the Revs game, but now that I am in Alabama, I have to make due with whatever teams are playing during the Thursday night slot.
I do wish ESPN/MLS would come up with some sort of flex schedule so ESPN could pick the game of the week based on interest. Although then I would bet it would be an overload of NYRB, RSL, Chicago, and LA.
Sigh, you should consider renaming the site “MLS Ratings Talk.” MLS teams are undefeated so far in the groups stage of the CCL, with another team to play tonight. No coverage of that–at all–no preview of the Sounders v. Marathon. Nope, we get another post about ratings. I am frustrated because I actually like your writing.
In the vein of the Sounders #trophiesnotfriedlies movement, I am going to start a new hashtag: #pleasewriteaboutsoccernottvratings.
The ratings will rise when the viewing public think the quality of the soccer is worth watching. America is smitten with soccer fever and bored by our league. To show it’s worth watching we need to win versus international competition: The result of the second leg TFC v. Cruz Azul and the other MLS teams traveling south this and next week is more important than how many people watched Dallas v. Kansas City on a Thursday night four months ago.
Please. Write. About. Soccer.
I agree. I am struggling to find much being written about the CCL. It is my first year really follwoing it closely and I imagine more like me will follow each year but without much to read it is difficult to get into it.
This website took lessons at EsPN apparently.
They are way better than ESPN. Look at ESPNs MLS page (http://soccernet.espn.go.com/section?id=mls&cc=5901) Its front story is from may! Like there is no news worthy things in the MLS since May????!!!?!??!
I would say one of the reasons for a drop in their ratings is that ESPN does absolutely no marketing for the games, and only begrudgingly provides a highlight here or there. Until the people at ESPN are absolutely convinced that soccer is a money-maker in the states, they will not provide the coverage the game should get. As far as the league is concerned, the upcoming negotiations with Versus will be key in providing the league with a more widespread ability to reach viewers (as the channel is available to around 78 million households as opposed to the 34-or-so million on FSC).
I’m so excited for the CCL this year around. MLS is the only sport in USA that has international competition that means anything. World Series is a joke, NBA finals is wayyyyy too long and NFL has a bunch of fat guys in tights.
MLS will gain popularity when we go down to Mexico and crush Cruz Azul etc. and make it into the club world cup and beat the Euro teams. Friendlies are gay and the CCL is the only route to face Europe.
The games are on Thursday night. Not exactly prime viewing time for most folks. In addition, FSC has a really crappy announcing crew (i.e. “Donovan with time and space….) that just isn’t comparable to the EPL announcers. The more I watch and have to listen to them the more I don’t like them. Broadcast Saturday games and get engaging play-by-play announcers.
If I competed against How I met your mother and two in a half men, I’d have bad ratings too.
That being said, until each cable/satellite box has a chip in it telling Nielson what we watch, ratings will be highly inaccurate. I find it hard to believe that 5000 people represent the American viewership. Its crazy to tell me 1/3 of Americans watched the Super Bowl when towns shut down even when their team isn’t in it.
Take a statistics class. 5000 people is easily a large enough sample size.
5k may be big enough but you can easily fudge the outcome by the selection of where the 5k come from.
Lets say of the 5k they get 3k from the south and the other 2 k spread out over the country.
Gee. I wonder how MLS would rate in the college/NFL football hotbed that is the south. I use to live in Atlanta and as much as i want for Atlanta to get a team and be successful I know it is still an up hill battle. I knew several people in the area that have a hatred for soccer and the fact that they think the world is trying to shove soccer down their throat in the US and would 1) never have their TV on an MLS game and 2) if they filled out a survey and had to say if I did watch then it would be this league would never choose MLS over a European league even if they don’t watch either because they simply want MLS to fail.
ESPN does not promote the MLS. ESPN Deportes and ESPN Deportes Radio spend all week promoting the Mexican League and talking about Chicharito. Most of the people working at those two outlets are not able to tell how many teams the MLS has. It is obvious the Premier League will have great ratings this season because of Chicharito.
Didn’t I read somewhere that MLS was in talks with Versus? Since MLS would be only the 2nd major sport on that network, they would promote the hell out of the games.
I’m a D.C. united fan and even I will have a tough time deciding to stay up for a 10pm EST start vs the last place team in the west vs the last place team in the east for a game that means not much of anything for either team. I’ll obviously watch but agree with everyone talking about giving ESPN a flex schedule of some sort especially this late in the season.
Think about it from a baseball or NFL perspective. If the Rams are 3-10 and played the Chicago Bears at 4-9 on a national ESPN or even NBC game then their numbers would be down. I know I wouldn’t watch unless it was my favorite team playing just like I will watch D.C. united my favorite team this Sunday night on ESPN2. However I would watch if it was a 2 teams fighting for the post season or 2 playoff teams. And they definitely need to market better as I just happened to flip to ESPN several weeks ago on a Sunday night to catch the 2nd half of the 5 DP NY vs Chicago game because I had no idea that was happening.