MLB ASG notebook: Expect plenty of drones on ESPN for Home Run Derby
ATLANTA -- ESPN’s coverage of this year’s T-Mobile Home Run Derby is set for ESPN at 8pm, with a StatCast Edition airing simultaneously on ESPN2 (sources tell SBJ to watch for lots of drone coverage tonight, especially on The Deuce). Mariners C Cal Raleigh, a switch hitter known as “Big Dumper” who ...
FIFA Club World Cup audience for TNT Sports just under a half-million viewers ahead of finale
TNT Sports is averaging 418,000 viewers for its FIFA Club World Cup games heading into Sunday’s final, and that figure jumps to 476,000 when only looking at weekday primetime and weekend games (14 such matches). TNT had a sublicense for select DAZN matches (the streamer carried them all; HBO Max did...
ESPN eyes big Summer League audience with Flagg
The NBA 2K26 Summer League begins tonight from Las Vegas, and the marquee game to tip things off is Cooper Flagg and the Mavericks playing Bronny James and the Lakers on ESPN. That’s one of 35 games that will air from Vegas across ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNU over the 10-day event. The “NBA Today” studio s...
Audience Analysis: MLB national partners all seeing gains headed into All-Star break
MLB is seeing its strongest viewership numbers in years heading into the All-Star break. First, Fox is having its best numbers since 2021 (2.06 million viewers) and is up 1% from the same point last year. One example: Fox averaged 2.51 million viewers Saturday night for regionalized action featuring...
Hot Dog Contest, Bananas score big ESPN numbers
The return of Joey Chestnut helped the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest on July 4 to its best audience in 11 years. ESPN2 drew 1.62 million viewers for the event, which is the best audience since The Deuce drew 2.78 million in 2014 (which had the benefit of a lead-in from a FIFA World Cup game). This...
Mexico-U.S. final marks best Gold Cup game ever in English, helps Fox Sports to record tourney audience
Fox drew 3.73 million viewers for Mexico’s win over the U.S. in the final of the Concacaf Gold Cup on Sunday night, marking the best English-language soccer match on U.S. airwaves since 6.02 million viewers watched Argentina-Colombia in the Copa America final last summer on Fox. Mexico-U.S. is also ...
ESPN, Big East reunite with streaming rights deal
The Big East and ESPN are reuniting in a six-year deal that will give added content from across 22 sports to the network’s direct-to-consumer platform set to launch in the fall. The pact, which will be with ESPN+, does not include a linear component, as those deals were struck a year ago with Fox, N...
Audience Analysis: Wimbledon starts hot; F1 stays hot; ION hot even without Caitlin Clark
ESPN got off to a hot start on Monday with Wimbledon, averaging 539,000 viewers from 6am-4pm ET. That marks the network’s best Day 1 on record for Wimbledon, and an increase of 37% from Day 1 last year.
NHL Draft draws second-best audience on record in U.S.
The NHL Draft drew its second-best audience on record in the U.S. on Friday night, which saw the Islanders take D Matthew Schaefer with the No. 1 overall pick. ESPN averaged 534,000 viewers for the telecast from 7:00-11:36pm ET, up 6% from last year’s 502,000 viewers (the Sharks took C Macklin Celeb...
SBJ Media: ESPN sees big value in storytelling from drafts
SBJ Media: ESPN sees big value in storytelling from drafts