TV ratings

[ArgoRavi]

The below was posted on the CFL form, and from what i understand from BBM, it's true, the Fox's viewers in Canada would have counted
One thing I find interesting is that Zelkovich fails to understand that the cable companies are now replacing American network signals with Canadian cable channels when simulcasting is involved thus viewers are seeing Canadian commercials, thus the ratings are in fact included as part of the total of the Canadian cable channel.

Is the World Series being simulcast though? I know that in past years, Sportsnet would use Fox's world feed while FOX would use their regular feed and these were two different things. Also, when TSN shows an NFL game as they do on Sunday and Monday nights, I don't believe that it is a simulcast. However, when CTV, CITY and, I believe, Sportsnet show their NFL games, that is a simulcast.

[Ballstothewall]

Is the World Series being simulcast though? I know that in past years, Sportsnet would use Fox's world feed while FOX would use their regular feed and these were two different things. Also, when TSN shows an NFL game as they do on Sunday and Monday nights, I don't believe that it is a simulcast. However, when CTV, CITY and, I believe, Sportsnet show their NFL games, that is a simulcast.

To me and from what I understand is this, if you are viewing Canadian TV commercials on a US feed or stations, then those viewers will be counted in Canada

[ArgoRavi]

To me and from what I understand is this, if you are viewing Canadian TV commercials on a US feed or stations, then those viewers will be counted in Canada

You are correct. BTW, I just realized that Monday night games are not simulcast as we don't get ESPN in this country so the audience is comprised of whomever is watching on TSN. The only NFL games that I don't think are simulcast are the Sunday night games as I am pretty sure that we see NBC's commercials if we are watching on there and TSN's commercials if we are watching on there. Most, if not all, other NFL games are simulcast which means that the ratings which Zelkovich publishes is an accurate count of NFL viewers in Canada. Of course, there is the NFL Sunday Ticket but I wonder how many Canadians subscribe to that. I have never seen any numbers published for that service.

[Neely2005]

You are correct. BTW, I just realized that Monday night games are not simulcast as we don't get ESPN in this country so the audience is comprised of whomever is watching on TSN. The only NFL games that I don't think are simulcast are the Sunday night games as I am pretty sure that we see NBC's commercials if we are watching on there and TSN's commercials if we are watching on there. Most, if not all, other NFL games are simulcast which means that the ratings which Zelkovich publishes is an accurate count of NFL viewers in Canada. Of course, there is the NFL Sunday Ticket but I wonder how many Canadians subscribe to that. I have never seen any numbers published for that service.

If a game is being broadcast on Any Canadian channel it will be blacked out on NFL Sunday Ticket. I experience this all the time with my NHL Center Ice package.

[Neely2005]

LOUSY TV NUMBERS FOR RAPTORS

The Toronto Raptors opened their season Wednesday night with a win, some glitz and terribly troubling television ratings.

Playing opposite the Maple Leafs and the last night of the World Series, the Raptors had an audience of only 54,000 on TSN2. That has to be alarming to new MLSE boss Tim Leiweke, who has talked about making the Raptors Canada's team.

By any comparison, even considering the difficult circumstances, and the fact they weren't on a mainstream network, the Raptors TV numbers border on embarrassing.

The Maple Leafs season opener drew an average audience of 2.3 million on CBC.

The Blue Jays season opener in April did a 1.4 million number on Rogers Sportsnet and at times throughout the night had more than two milion people watching.

The sometimes forgotten Argonauts played their season opener against the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. The TSN numbers for that game: 673,000.

The Raptors opening night did less than one-twelfth of the Argo audience. It will be interesting to monitor the television numbers as the season progresses -- not opposite Leaf games or other sports of consequence. Finding out exactly where the Raptors stand across Canada may be shocking to those who operate the NBA club.

RATINGS GAME

Here's a look at the ratings of Toronto sports teams on opening night this season, with networks and number of viewers.

Leafs CBC 2.3 million
Jays Sportsnet 1.4 mil
Argos TSN 673,000
Raptors TSN2 54,000
*television numbers come from network PR departments

http://www.torontosun.com/2013/11/02...ries-this-week

[ArgoZ]

I was one of the 54 000! The Raptors get low tv numbers, but seem to always be discussed on the radio. Argos get decent tv numbers, but hardly any radio time. Raptors have good attendance and command some steep prices for Miami games. Argos have low attendance and always affordable tickets.

[Argo57]

I was one of the 54 000! The Raptors get low tv numbers, but seem to always be discussed on the radio. Argos get decent tv numbers, but hardly any radio time. Raptors have good attendance and command some steep prices for Miami games. Argos have low attendance and always affordable tickets.

Maybe it all comes back to the facility (Skydome) and lack of atmosphere at the live event, smaller more intimate venue lively atmosphere= better game experience....more repeat customers.

[argotom]

I was one of the 54 000! The Raptors get low tv numbers, but seem to always be discussed on the radio. Argos get decent tv numbers, but hardly any radio time. Raptors have good attendance and command some steep prices for Miami games. Argos have low attendance and always affordable tickets.

Raptors in Canada and on TV is a joke. The team has been force fed to the population from the very beginning to include buying tickets when MLSE has to blackmail its Leaf fan base to also buy for basketball. On radio again, the program directors for the various Toronto station have obviously been ordered to talk crap basketball when only friends and family care, this all at the expense to the Argos and CFL which remains the second most popular sport in the country and garnering absolutely no respect here.

[Ballstothewall]

I was one of the 54 000! The Raptors get low tv numbers, but seem to always be discussed on the radio. Argos get decent tv numbers, but hardly any radio time. Raptors have good attendance and command some steep prices for Miami games. Argos have low attendance and always affordable tickets.

How do you figure the Raptors have good attendance number. They officially quote 16,000 and change for ther posted attendance aver. This is for a 19,000 and change building. Take away Leaf season ticket holders and there in trouble. I have been to Raptor games, were whole sections are empty, only to claim 16,500. Real number would be closer to 10,000. Media does not comment on the fake attandance numbers for Raptors or TFC game, due to them being owned by MLSE. No sports editor wants his/her reporter to get there access to the Leafs cut off.

[Neely2005]

18% from what? Do they provide numbers for Southern Ontario?

CFL ratings up due to Southern Ontario:

http://ca.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/eh-...183017606.html

At an average of 703,000 viewers a game, the CFL stands second only to hockey as this country's most-watched sport. They're ahead of the Toronto Blue Jays' 540,000, a comparable number since the Jays generally play six games a week while the CFL offers up four.


Combined ratings on TSN and French-language RDS averaged 758,000 viewers per game, an increase of 3.6 per cent over 2012. The RDS numbers are down a tad, but considering how far the Montreal Alouettes have fallen there's no real surprise there.


But while overall ratings increases give the league something to crow about, that's not the real big news. The big news is that they're being driven by the most unlikely source of all: Southern Ontario. Ratings for games involving the Toronto Argonauts were up 26 per cent from last year while audiences for Hamilton (Guelph) Tiger-Cats games rose 14 per cent.
Ratings for all CFL games were up 18 per cent from last year in Southern Ontario and the Hamilton-Toronto clash on Thanksgiving Day drew the league's fourth-largest TV audience of the season with 956,000 viewers.

[Neely2005]

Ratings on #TSN for @BCLions vs @sskroughriders game - 1,621,000, up 5% from 2012.
Audience peaked late in 4th at 2,441,000 #GCPlayoffs #CFL

Ratings on #TSN & #RDS for @MTLAlouettes vs @Ticats was 1,417,000, up 12.4% from '12.
Audience peaked at 2,256,000 in OT #CFL #GCPlayoffs

https://mobile.twitter.com/CFL_PR/st...93038952890368

https://mobile.twitter.com/CFL_PR/st...92995860631552

[Neely2005]

Eastern Final
The Eastern Final featuring Hamilton @ Toronto attracted an average audience of 1.7 million viewers on TSN – making it the most-watched Eastern Final ever on English television. Audiences for the all-Ontario matchup were up 21% compared to last year's average audience of 1.4 million viewers on TSN.

Audience levels peaked at 3.1 million viewers on TSN late in the game as the Tiger-Cats held on to defeat the Toronto Argonauts 24-17.

Western Final
The Western Final featuring Saskatchewan @ Calgary was watched by an average audience of 1.9 million viewers on TSN, up 2% compared to last year's Western Final.

Audience levels peaked at 2.7 million on TSN in the fourth quarter of the game as the Saskatchewan Roughriders completed a 35-13 upset of the Calgary Stampeders.


http://www.tsn.ca/cfl/story/?id=436925

[Neely2005]

Grey Cup ratings reveal game was most-watched sports program of 2013


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sport...ticle15596026/

[ArgoRavi]

Grey Cup ratings reveal game was most-watched sports program of 2013


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sport...ticle15596026/

Solid ratings but they would have been better with a closer game. Still though, this was probably in the top 10 or 12 Grey Cups of all time.

[Neely2005]

Some preseason TV Ratings:

17. CFL, Blue Bombers at Stampeders, Saturday, TSN2: 332,000
18. CFL, RedBlacks at Roughriders, Saturday, TSN2: 288,000
21. CFL, Lions at Eskimos, Friday, TSN: 197,000

https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/eh...150659421.html

[Neely2005]

12. CFL

Stampeders at Lions

Friday

TSN

444,000

15. CFL

Redblacks at Alouettes

Friday

TSN

268,000

https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/eh...183205487.html

[Neely2005]

"I was being interviewed about the wide world of sports media on a radio show last week when I was asked a question I've heard dozens of times: Why does the CFL insist on going head-to-head with the NFL?

My answer, which is basically the same answer I've been giving for years, is that Sunday is a good day to draw people to a stadium and despite the relatively big TV contract the CFL is still a gate-driven league. Secondly, the CFL has nothing to fear from the NFL when it comes to drawing TV viewers.

That certainly was borne out by the ratings from last Sunday. The 4 p.m. CFL game between Saskatchewan and WInnipeg averaged 1.1 million viewers on TSN. The 4 p.m. NFL game between San Francisco and Dallas averaged 683,000 viewers... "

https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/eh...193422068.html

Here are the most-watched sports events on English-language television for the past weekend, according to BBM Canada overnight ratings:

1. CFL, Roughriders at Blue Bombers, Sunday, TSN: 1,107,000

2. MLB, Blue Jays at Red Sox, Friday, Sportsnet: 821,000

3. CFL, Stampeders at Eskimos, Saturday, TSN: 753,000

4. NFL, 49ers at Cowboys, Sunday, CTV: 683,000

5. CFL, Lions at RedBlacks, Friday, TSN: 668,000

6. NFL, Early games, Sunday, CTV: 601,000

7. NFL, Colts at Broncos, Sunday, CTV: 595,000 (NBC viewers not measured)

8. MLB, Blue Jays at Red Sox, Saturday, Sportsnet: 528,000

9. NFL, Giants at Lions, Monday, TSN: 495,000

10. NFL, Chargers at Cardinals, Monday, TSN: 430,000

11. CFL, Ticats at Alouettes, Sunday, TSN: 413,000 (RDS viewers not measured)

12. MLB, Blue Jays at Red Sox, Sunday, Sportsnet: 346,000

13. PGA, BMW Championship final round, Sunday, Global: 305,000

14. PGA, BMW Championship third round, Saturday, Global: 273,000

15. Tennis, U.S. Open men's semifinal, Sunday, TSN2: 208,000 (CBS viewers not measured)

16. Auto racing, NASCAR Sprint Cup, Saturday, TSN2: 192,000 (Fox viewers not measured)

16. NFL, Patriots at Dolphins, Sunday, TSN2: 192,000 (CBS viewers not measured)

18. Auto racing, F1 Italian Grand Prix, Sunday, TSN: 170,000

19. MLS, D.C. United at Whitecaps, Saturday, TSN: 168,000

20. Tennis, U.S. Open women's final, Sunday, TSN2: 138,000* (CBS audience not measured)

21. Equestrian, Spruce Meadows Grand Slam, Saturday, CBC: 126,000

[Will]

The NFL early game beat out the Ticats-Alouettes game. We'll have to watch that trend over the next couple of weeks. It was two eastern teams on a very nice day, but if all-eastern games were to continue to be beaten out by the NFL I don't think it would help counter the argument that pro-NFLers have about the majority of CFL ratings coming from western teams.

[Neely2005]

The CFL usually outdraws the NFL when the two go head-to-head, but it was pretty hard to top a game that actually lived up to the hype. The CFL game had no hype attached to it -- a 1-9 expansion team against an 8-3 defending champion playing at home -- but still managed to grab just short of 1 million viewers. A surprisingly competitive game and a wild-and-crazy, only-in-the-CFL finish didn't hurt.

What's amazing is that the two most-watched games were played simultaneously at 4 p.m. on Sunday. That means an awful lot of people were watching football at that time, something Bell has to be very happy about.

Here are the most-watched sports events on English-language television for the past weekend, according to BBM Canada overnight ratings:

1. NFL, Broncos at Seahawks, Sunday, CTV: 1,012,000

2. CFL, RedBlacks at Roughriders, Sunday, TSN: 917,000

3. CFL, Eskimos at Tiger-Cats, Saturday, TSN: 751,000

4. NFL, early gameS, Sunday, CTV: 727,000

5. CFL, Argos at Lions, Friday, TSN: 663,000

6. MLB, Blue Jays at Yankees, Saturday, Sportsnet: 581,000

7. CFL, Stampeders at Alouettes, Sunday, TSN: 467,000 (RDS Viewers not measured)

8. MLB, Blue Jays at Yankees, Friday, Sportsnet: 434,000

9. MLB, Blue Jays at Yankees, Sunday, Sportsnet: 408,000

10. NFL, Steelers at Panthers, Sunday, TSN: 356,000 (NBC viewers not measured)

11. Auto racing, NASCAR Sprint Cup, Sunday, TSN2: 244,000

12. Auto racing, F1 Singapore Grand Prix, Sunday, TSN: 165,000

13. Soccer, Liverpool at West Ham, Saturday, Sportsnet: 149,000

14. Soccer, Chelsea at Manchester City, Sunday, Sportsnet: 120,000

15. Soccer, English Premier League, Saturday, TSN: 103,000

16. MLS, Whitecaps at Timbers, Saturday, TSN: 97,000

17. Soccer, Manchester United at Leicester, Sunday, TSN: 95,000

18. Soccer, Newcastle at Hull City, Saturday, Sportsnet: 85,000

https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/eh...182648683.html

[Neely2005]

And so it begins.

The pumpkins are free of frost and the trees are still hanging on to their leaves, but hockey is back on television and showing that once again it's ready to dominate the ratings. The CFL and NFL, which have led the ratings for the past few months, can now prepare themselves to take a back seat to Canada's national obsession. The NHL is ready to resume its rightful place as the king of Canadian sports.


A good indication of that came over the weekend when a meaningless pre-season exhibition between a replica of the Buffalo Sabres and a reasonable facsimile of the Toronto Maple Leafs managed to crack the top 10 on the ratings list. That Sunday night game drew an average of 472,000 viewers to Sportsnet, more than any of the Toronto Blue Jays final outings of the year and more than one CFL game (though the 455,000 who watched the Montreal-Ottawa football game didn't include those multitudes tuning into French-language RDS.)
Think about that for a second. A half-million Canadians had nothing better to do on a Sunday night but watch a hockey game that featured a lot of minor leaguers and meant absolutely nothing -- except to determine which fourth-liners might make the team.


This, of course, is great news for Rogers, which has sunk its entire sports future into hockey. Whether the ratings translate into enough revenue to justify the $5.2 billion price tag is yet to be determined, but there's no doubt that the audiences will be there.


Although hockey will dominate until next June, things are still looking pretty good for football. The CFL took three of the top five spots while the NFL had the other two.

On the other hand, things continue to look dismal for Toronto FC, a soccer team that plays in television anonymity. Two weeks ago, the team drew 29,000 viewers to Sportsnet. Last Saturday, their game against the Portland Timbers attracted an average of 87,000 to TSN.

That's a vast improvement, but was still among the least-watched sports events of the weekend.
Many of the soccer team's low ratings could be explained by the fact they've been relegated to lesser channels like Sportsnet 360 and TSN2. But to draw numbers like that on the big sports channels at a key point in the MLS season should be sending shivers down the spines of the owners at MLSE.


Here are the most-watched sports events on English-language television for the past weekend, according to Numeris overnight ratings:

1. NFL, Eagles-Niners/Falcons-Vikings, Sunday, CTV: 785,000

2. CFL, Lions at Stampeders, Saturday, TSN: 784,000

3. CFL, Roughriders at Eskimos, Friday, TSN: 716,000

4. CFL, Tiger-Cats at Blue Bombers, Saturday, TSN: 676,000

5. NFL, Bills-Texans/Lions-Jets, Sunday, CTV: 570,000

6. NHL, Sabres at Maple Leafs, Sunday, Sportsnet: 472,000

7. CFL, Alouettes at RedBlacks, Friday, TSN: 455,000 (RDS viewers not measured)

8. NFL, Saints at Cowboys, Sunday, TSN: 444,000 (NBC viewers not measured)

9. MLB, Orioles at Blue Jays, Friday, Sportsnet: 402,000

10. MLB, Orioles at Blue Jays, Sunday, Sportsnet: 379,000

11. MLB, Orioles at Blue Jays, Saturday, Sportsnet: 375,000

12. Auto racing, NASCAR AAA 400, Sunday, TSN: 284,000

13. Golf, Ryder Cup final round, Sunday, TSN: 220,000 (NBC viewers not measured)

14. NHL, Flames at Canucks, Friday, Sportsnet One: 208,000

15. NHL, Maple Leafs at Sabres, Friday, Sportsnet One: 191,000

16. Martial arts, UFC preliminaries, Saturday, Sportsnet 360: 159,000

17. Soccer, West Ham at Manchester United, Saturday, Sportsnet: 150,000

18. Golf, Ryder Cup third round, Saturday, TSN: 130,000 (NBC viewers not measured)

19. Soccer, Arsenal at Tottenham, Saturday, TSN: 107,000

https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/eh...162215214.html