- The first USA Basketball exhibition game drew decent numbers. Team USA’s blowout victory over Canada drew a 0.8 national rating (1.0 cable rating) and 1.1 million viewers on July 25. The rating is on par with the Monday and Wednesday night baseball broadcasts on the network that week; ESPN drew a 0.8 with 1.2 million for Brewers/Cardinals on July 21 and a 0.7 with 918,000 viewers for Phillies/Mets on July 23.
- TBS is averaging a 0.6 cable rating with 663,000 viewers through 17 Sunday afternoon MLB telecasts. To put that in perspective, the network averaged a 0.8 cable rating for Braves telecasts last year. In recent weeks, the network drew a 0.6 cable rating for Orioles/Red Sox (July 13) and a 0.7 for A’s/Yankees (July 20).
- With the new, live editions of SportsCenter set to debut in under ten days, Multichannel News reports that the current morning repeats of the previous night’s SportsCenter have averaged a 0.5 rating so far this year, “with a 0.6 peak in the 10 a.m. (ET) hour.” Viewership for live editions (6 PM, 11 PM and 1 AM) is up 10%
ESPN acquires expanded Players Era tournament
What is quickly becoming one of the highest-profile early season college basketball events is now moving to ESPN.
