Monthly Archives: July 2012

NBC primetime off to good start; big ratings for first night

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Remember, NBC Sports chairman Mark Lazarus said NBC’s primetime ratings might be lower than 2008 Beijing, which had some live coverage thanks to the time difference.

Well, that wasn’t the case on night 1.

From NBC:

  • Last night, the first night of competition, NBC drew an 18.0 overnight rating and 33 share (8:30-11:30 p.m. ET/PT), the best overnight rating for the first night of competition for a non-U.S. Summer Olympics ever.
  • 18.0 Overnight Rating and 33 Share is 8% Higher than Beijing, 22% Higher than Athens, the Last European Olympics.
  • Last night, which featured Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte facing off head-to-head in the 400 IM (shown on delay in primetime and live on NBCOlympics.com), is 8% higher than the first night of competition for the opening Saturday night of the 2008 Beijing Olympics (16.6/30), when Michael Phelps won the first of his eight gold medals. The first Saturday night in Beijing was live to the Eastern and Central time zones in the U.S.
  • Last night’s overnight is 22% higher than the first night of competition at the 2004 Athens Games (14.8/25), the last European Olympics.
  • The 18.0/33 overnight is the second-highest for the first day of competition of ANY non-U.S. Olympics (Winter or Summer), only eclipsed by the first night of the tabloid-fueled Lillehammer Games (21.0/34) which featured the Opening Ceremony.

OVERNIGHTS FOR FIRST NIGHT OF COMPETITON (NON-U.S. SUMMER GAMES):

1. London – 2012 18.0/33 NBC
2. Seoul – 1988 17.1/32 NBC
3. Beijing – 2008 16.6/30 NBC
4. Barcelona – 1992 16.5/32 NBC
5. Sydney – 2000 15.6/28 NBC
6. Athens – 2004 14.8/25 NBC

OVERNIGHTS FOR FIRST NIGHT OF COMPETITON (U.S. SUMMER GAMES):

1. Los Angeles – 1984 29.5/55 ABC
2. Atlanta – 1996 19.9/39 NBC

TOP 20 METERED MARKETS FOR FIRST NIGHT OF COMPETITION:

1. Salt Lake City 23.9/46

2. San Diego 22.8/43

3. Kansas City 22.4/42

4. Columbus 21.5/39

5. Ft. Myers 21.3/40

6. Milwaukee 20.6/38

7. Denver 20.5/44

8. Indianapolis 20.4/39

9. Sacramento 20.2/41

10. Nashville 19.6/34

11. Oklahoma City 19.2/32

12. St. Louis 18.9/35

13. Richmond 18.7/33

14. Portland 18.5/41

T15. San Francisco 18.4/40

T15. Boston 18.4/36

T17. Norfolk 18.3/30

T17. Albuquerque 18.3/34

T17. Jacksonville 18.3/31

20. Phoenix 18.1/32

 

Forget live: Tape delay works for Opening Ceremonies for NBC

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The ratings validated NBC’s decision to show last night’s Opening Ceremonies on tape delay in primetime.

From @nbcsportspr:

  23.0/40 Overnight for Opening Ceremony on NBC best for a non-US Olympics ever;  up 7% from Beijing (21.5), 28% from Athens (18.0).

That’s a huge number. And it wouldn’t have occurred if NBC aired the Opening Ceremonies live in the afternoon.

The fact is, more people can watch at night, especially for a telecast that stretched more than three hours.

I was working Friday afternoon, as were many, many other people. Tape delay was fine by me.

 

 

Saturday flashback: Remembering the great Jim McKay

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You can’t help but think about Jim McKay every time there’s an Olympics. He and Roone Arledge helped make the event into a TV spectacle.

In fact, the IOC should give a cut of those billion dollar-plus contract to each of their families. I’m sure CBS Sports president Sean McManus, McKay’s son, would be in favor of that.

Here’s a 1991 interview Bob Costas did with McKay.

Costas keeps vow: Honors slain Israeli athletes

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Bob Costas did live up to his pledge to honor the Munich 11 during Friday’s night’s Opening Ceremonies. And given NBC’s relationship with the IOC, he walked a fine line by not hammering the committee for their refusal to have moment of silence for the slain Israeli athletes.

Here is what Costas said as the Israeli delegation walked in:

The Israeli athletes now enter behind their flag-bearer Shahar Zubari. These games mark the 40th anniversary of the 1972 tragedy in Munich, when 11 Israeli coaches and athletes were murdered by Palestinian terrorists. There have been calls from a number of quarters for the IOC to acknowledge that, with a moment of silence at some point in tonight’s ceremony.

The IOC denied that request, noting it had honored the victims on other occasions. And, in fact, this week (IOC President) Jacques Rogge led a moment of silence before about 100 people in the Athlete’s Village. Still, for many, tonight, with the world watching, is the true time and place to remember those who were lost, and how and why they died.

Then there was about 6 seconds of silence before Costas went to commercial.

It was exactly what I expected. Some people might have wanted a longer moment of silence, but Costas made his point.

 

 

Sports on Earth unveils with soft launch for Olympics; Posnanski makes debut

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USA Today Sports Media Group and MLB Advanced Media provided a taste of their new Sports on Earth site today.

The page features its signature hire Joe Posnanski writing from London. And there are other stories, including a post from Will Leitch

The entire site makes its debut in late August. Previously, I wrote that USA Today wants to compete with the big sports hitters on the Net. The new site wants to break news and set the agenda for discussion. Yes, the goals are set very high.

More to come.

Here’s the release issued today:

The USA TODAY Sports Media Group and MLB Advanced Media, L.P. (MLBAM), the interactive media and Internet company of Major League Baseball, today announced that Sports on Earth, a destination dedicated to great sports writing from some of the most respected voices in the industry, will be the first content product to launch from their newly-formed joint venture.

Prior to its scheduled launch in late August, Sports on Earth also will offer an introductory section of the site dedicated to the 2012 Olympic Games, which will run from July 27 to August 12.

The roster of voices for Sports on Earth is led by Joe Posnanski, named the 2012 Sportswriter of the Year by the National Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association as well as a two-time selection as the best sports columnist in America by the Associated Press Sports Editors (APSE).

Steve Madden, a two-time National Magazine Award winner who most recently served as VP of Digital Product Development for Rodale Inc., will serve as General Manager for the joint venture and for Sports on Earth, and Larry Burke will serve as Editor-in-Chief. Burke was an award-winning senior editor at SI.com and Sports Illustrated as well as the former editor of Inside Sports and the author of five books.

“We want to give sports fans a place to come for consistently great writing and compelling viewpoints on the most important news of the day,” said Madden. “The idea is to let great columnists do what they do best—provide insights and opinions that engage fans and give them perspectives they might not have previously considered.”

In addition to Posnanski (@JPosnanski), Sports on Earth (@sportsonearth) also will feature writing from:

  • Tommy Tomlinson (@tommytomlinson), former longtime columnist at the Charlotte Observer, where he was a 2005 Pulitzer Prize finalist for commentary and also was named best local columnist in America by The Week in 2004.
  • Gwen Knapp (@gwenknapp), an award-winning longtime columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle and, previously, the San Francisco Examiner.
  • Shaun Powell (@Powell2daPeople), a longtime columnist for leading media outlets that include Newsday, The Sporting News and ESPN New York and most recently a columnist for NBA.com.
  • Mike Tanier (@MikeTanier), formerly the senior writer for the influential NFL site Football Outsiders as well as a contributor to the New York Times’ Fifth Down blog who also has written for FoxSports.com.

The site also will have regular perspective from contributing writers such as Will Leitch (@williamfleitch), contributing editor to New York magazine and the author of four books. Other writers and contributors are expected to be added to the Sports on Earth lineup on an ongoing basis.

Sports on Earth will be the first product of the New York City-based joint venture between the USA TODAY Sports Media Group and MLBAM, which was formed in February 2012 and was created to develop and produce new content and products for sports fans across all digital and mobile platforms.

National TV schedule for NBA: What a surprise? Lots of LeBron, Heat

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With the Olympics starting today, it’s time to start thinking basketball. No, not Olympics basketball. NBA basketball.

Schedules for the 2012-13 season were released. In a stunning development, LeBron James and the Miami Heat are going to be featured in many national telecasts. In fact, it seems, almost every one.

In the no surprise department, Boston at Miami will be the prime attraction on opening night on TNT on Oct. 30.

ABC and ESPN will feature five games on Christmas Day, including–you guessed right–Miami hosting Oklahoma City.

NBA.com has the complete schedule of all the national games. Let the countdown begin.

 

 

Fire up the remote: Your Olympics TV guide

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For those of you who watch sports the old-fashioned way on a television, here’s how the schedule breaks down for NBC and its networks.

NBC

NBC will broadcast 272.5 hours of coverage.

NBC will again be divided into three day parts: daytime, primetime and late night. NBC’s primetime program, featuring the marquee events such as swimming, gymnastics, track and field and beach volleyball, will air 8-11:30 p.m. (ET) on most nights.

Daytime coverage has increased significantly for London. Coverage will begin on most weekdays at 10 a.m., immediately following Today, which is originating from London. On weekends, NBC’s daytime coverage will begin as early as 5 a.m. A one-hour late-night show will begin 30 minutes after the conclusion of the primetime program.

NBC Sports Network

NBC Sports Network will serve as the home to U.S. team sports, with 292.5 hours of total coverage from 2012 London Olympics this summer, including 257.5 hours of original programming – an average of more than 14 hours per day – the most-ever for an Olympic cable network.

On most days, coverage will air from 4 a.m.–8 p.m., which covers the live Olympic day in London.

NBC Sports Network coverage, originating from Olympic Park in London, will air up to 20 medal rounds and 22 Olympic sports, including Team USA basketball, women’s soccer and field hockey.

MSNBC

MSNBC will carry 155.5 hours of a wide variety of long-form Olympic programming over 19 days. The channel will air up to 18 medal rounds and 20 Olympic sports, from badminton to basketball to soccer to wrestling.

On most weekdays, coverage will air from 9 a.m.-6 p.m.. There will be longer programming windows on Saturdays and Sundays.

CNBC

CNBC will serve as the home of Olympic boxing this summer, including the debut of women’s boxing. The channel will televise 73 hours of boxing coverage over 16 days — every day from July 28-August 12 — from elimination bouts to the men’s and women’s finals. Same-day coverage will air from 5-8 p.m. during the week, with six hours of live coverage airing each day on the weekends. This marks the fourth consecutive Summer Games that CNBC has featured Olympic boxing.

Bravo

Bravo will act as the home of Olympic tennis this summer. The channel will televise 56 hours of long-form tennis coverage over seven days, from July 28-August 3. Live coverage will air from early morning until mid-afternoon on most days.

 

 

 

$1 billion doesn’t go as far as it used to; Why NBC still bullish on Olympics despite losing money

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NBC announced this week that it has sold $1 billion of national television and digital advertising for its coverage of the London Olympic Games. That’s the most ever for an Olympic Games and approximately $150 million more than the total for NBC’s coverage of the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

But here’s the bad news: NBC spent nearly $1.2 million for the rights to the games and will incur another $100 million in production costs.

Now it’s hard to believe that you could generate $1 billion worth of advertising and still lose money, but I’m guessing network executives felt that way in the 50s when the figure was $1 million.

It’s all relative.

NBC, though, believes it actually has reason to be bullish on its latest Olympic investment. After London, the network will shell out $4.38 billion for the 2014 Winter, 2016 Summer, 2018 Winter and 2020 Summer Games.

Technically, the fees per Olympics stays relatively flat. However, the two Winter Olympics are in Sochi, Russia and South Korea. It remains to be seen if those games will produce $1 billion-plus in revenue.

Steve Burke, the CEO for NBC Universal, thinks the company made a good deal.

“We thought getting four games rather than two was a big, big deal,” Burke said.  “We wanted to make sure that we got the games at a price that would not cause this company every two years to lose a lot of money.  And we believe we’ve done that. The way to think about the four future games is, we get those at the same price that we get London, adjusted for the fact that some are winter and some are summer. Basically, unlike other sports where there are very, very large increases in rights fees when they get renewed, we got a chance to get four more games at roughly the same price.

“So over time, as these properties become more and more valuable in a world that is increasingly fragmented, and over time as you get some media inflation, some other things, we think we’re going to make money on these games.”

It goes beyond money for NBC. Clearly, the Olympics are part of the fabric for everyone associated with the network.

Burke talked of his anxiety during the bid process that he endured in 2011 in Switzerland. He had just come on board after Comcast purchased NBC.

“We knew that it would be a binary moment,” he said. “We would either come home with the Games, or we would come home without the Games, and as the new sort of people showing up in this building, it would have been an awful thing to come home without the Games.”

Burke and NBC wound up with four more Games. It’s a big, big deal in more ways than one.

As Burke says, “They’re very, very much tied up with the brand of NBC, the way that the, this company operates, the soul of the company, the culture of the company.”

And it all begins tonight with 17 straight days of the Olympics.