- WWL
Thanks to Barcelona’s UEFA Super Cup victory over Shakhtar Donetsk last Friday, the Catalan club’s La Liga opener was not played until Monday. The opener against Sporting Gijon was broadcast on ESPN–the original channel not the Deuce–because ESPN just bought a share of La Liga broadcast rights in the U.S. this year and garnered a somewhat impressive 0.3 rating, according to Nielsen Media Research, with 294,000 households and an estimated 327,000 sets of eyes tuning in to watch the reigning Champions League and La Liga champions open its league season.
The Barcelona ratings are on par with those ESPN has garnered for the English Premier League matches this year, but the numbers are a bit of double-edged sword. The game was broadcast at 4 pm Eastern on ESPN’s main channel pre-empting shouting heads shows Around the Horn and Pardon the Interruption. ESPN’s willingness to pre-empt its established programs to show a soccer match indicates a desire by the World Wide Leader to really get behind soccer here in the states. Plus, the 0.3 rating for a Monday afternoon match during a weekday is a positive.
On the other hand, the pre-empted shows have ratings much higher than the Barcelona match. For the days preceding and following the match, Around the Horn pulled a 0.61 rating and Pardon the Interruption a 0.95 rating. Twice and thrice the ratings of the Barcelona match respectively. That the game could not hold a greater portion of the built in audience in those time slots is disappointing.
Scripted sports “talk” shows pulling higher ratings than a live soccer match only reinforces that the US is not a soccer nation. At least not yet. ESPN will certainly work to change that if there is profit to be made.
It baffles me that people would rather sit and watch idiots argue with each other instead of watching an actual sporting event. And people wonder why I have no faith in the American sporting public.
Maybe people were just confused because it’s pronounced “Hee-Hohn”, and they thought it was an old “Hee-Haw” rerun?
it’ll get there
I don’t really understand why the American Public don’t even seen to give football a chance. When you get absurdly boring talk shows beating major footballing veents, there is something seriously wrong.
Almost every country in the world has football as one of it’s main sports, usually the number one, but in the US this just isn’t the case.
PTI is kind of an institution. Not surprised more people would watch that over a La Liga game, even Barcelona, in the States. I personally, not unlike most Americans, prefer to follow a league like EPL where I can see Americans play and follow the teams in my own language more easily.
Also, the most countries follow football argument is a little stale, in the West, Ireland, Australia, and Canada all have their own version of Football they follow the most, the U.S. isn’t the only one that is just beginning to follow soccer.