ESPN is entering the hot summer months with some ratings momentum fueled by year-to-year audience increases from its NBA Finals and NHL Stanley Cup Finals coverage on broadcast network ABC and its coverage of the Wimbledon tennis tournament.

ABC’s June coverage of the six-game Golden State Warriors-Boston Celtics NBA Finals averaged 12.4 million viewers, up 22% from last year’s COVID-delayed Milwaukee Bucks-Phoenix Suns finasl and the most-watched NBA Finals in three years, according to Nielsen. ABC’s Colorado Avalanche-Tampa Bay Lightning Stanley Cup Final last month averaged 4.6 million viewers, posting an 84% average viewership increase from NBC’s July 2021 Lightning-Montreal Canadiens final. 

Heading into Wimbledon’s finals weekend, ESPN was averaging nearly 620,000 viewers across ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC, up 41% from 2021’s coverage of the Grand Slam tournament. 

With Major League Baseball’s Home Run Derby, the WNBA’s postseason and the start of the 2022 college football campaign, ESPN is bullish about its summer ratings run, according to network senior VP of programming and planning Freddy Rolón, who recently spoke to Multichannel News. An edited version of the interview appears below: 

MCN: Do the strong ratings gains for the NHL and NBA Finals signal that the TV sports industry has returned to normal two years after the pandemic? 

Freddy Rolón: I feel like what we're seeing is the steady comeback of sports and sports viewership. There's a tendency to talk about pre-pandemic versus today, but it still feels like we’re in the pandemic. We were able to get through the [NBA and NHL] finals, but it’s easy to forget how a few months ago the NHL’s scheduled Olympic break became a COVID break. So we're still dealing with some of the effects of COVID even though we were lucky enough to kind of keep both seasons on track in terms of where they fell on the schedule. I think we as fans — both as viewers and as programmers — are still trying to deal with getting back to normal. Thinking through 2020, it seems like centuries away but we’re still coming out of it. We're getting there, but I think we may have a little short term memory on how close we are to it still. 

MCN: Having said that, were you surprised at the ratings performance for both the NBA and NHL postseason?

FR: Honestly, I would say surprised and very pleased. The playoff runs for the NHL and NBA helped fuel ESPN’s second-quarter ratings, which were up 22% in primetime — the best since 2014. We topped cable viewers 18-49 for total day, and a lot of that was driven up not only by the live playoff games, but the studio shows which gave us a lift. The ability to talk about what was happening in games allows us to continue the conversation with fans beyond the live games throughout the quarter. 

MCN: How do the ratings for the two finals bode for the importance of live sports programming on linear TV? 

FR: It shows that there is an audience that is seeking this content on linear platforms. With the NHL especially, all of the games were available across platforms, but live sports has been a driver for us consistently on linear. We can point to our success in college sports this past season, which were up consistently across the board on our linear platforms. Just in the second quarter alone, WNBA games were up 15% year to year; the NBA Draft was up 28%; and PGA Championship golf coverage was up 12%. Our Formula One races on ESPN were up 11%. Our women’s softball coverage had its best ratings since 2011 and the men’s baseball playoffs were up 20%. There’s a consistent story that we have to share of how sports are consistently drawing bigger audiences. 

MCN: How do you then balance your success on the linear side with reaching fans with live sports content on the digital platform?

FR: [ESPN president] Jimmy Pitaro says it really well with regards to operating on parallel paths here — growing one does not have to come at the expense of the other. There’s nothing that stops us from growing both businesses and working with audiences across those platforms. The strategy for those platforms differs sport by sport. With Wimbledon, for example, the Centre Court matches are on ESPN, and ESPN Plus covers the matches on the other courts. That expands our coverage of the event. We’re able to deliver more sports content through ESPN Plus that gives fans a deeper dive into the sports that they love that might not be available on ESPN. So from my standpoint, there’s room for both. They’re not necessarily competitive, but additive for us.

MCN: How do you see the network continuing to build its ratings momentum throughout the rest of the summer? 

FR: We’ve had great ratings for Wimbledon and I’m excited to see how [baseball's] Home Run Derby does. We’re also looking forward to the college football season, which is just around the corner — I think that’s going to help us continue the trend.  ■

The National Football League kicks off its 2020 season tonight (Sept. 10) with NBC’s live coverage of Houston Texans-Kansas City Chiefs game, adding to what is emerging as a cornucopia of live sports content for fans to watch on broadcast and cable networks during the fourth quarter as the entertainment industry continues to recover from the COVID-19 outbreak.

The next few months will be an exhilarating and exhausting period for sports fans and network sports producers as the NBA Finals, NHL Stanley Cup finals, baseball’s playoffs and World Series, The PGA Masters Tournament, the Preakness Stakes -- the third leg of horse racing’s Triple Crown races -- and live NFL and college football regular season games are all scheduled to hit the field. That doesn't include the numerous live boxing, mixed martial arts, tennis and other pro sports events that are also set for action through the end of the year. 

With the launch of the traditional fall broadcast television season mostly on hold due to the pandemic-delayed production of scripted series, networks will lean on those live sports events to help fill the original programming void in primetime.

Just this past Sunday, three of the four major broadcast networks featured live sports programming in a primetime block usually reserved for new, original entertainment content. ABC aired the Houston Rockets-Los Angeles Lakers NBA Western Conference Semifinal game; NBC offered the first game of the Dallas Stars-Vegas Golden Knights NHL Western Conference Finals and Fox stepped into the boxing ring for a live fight card. Ratings have at least been solid and in some cases show there was pent-up demand: NBA games in primetime after the July restart were 80% ahead of the viewing before the March shutdown, the Wall Street Journal reported.

“Usually everybody in the sports business works hard not to have major sports events bump into one another,” said sports analyst Lee Berke. “It’s going to be less so this year because of the pandemic. At the same time you’re going to have primetime nights of the week that are going to be bereft of original programming if not for sports.” 

The sports schedule is getting so packed for NBC that it will move a Sept. 19 Notre Dame-South Florida primetime telecast to sister cable service USA Network so it can televise a live NHL Stanley Cup playoff game.

Berke says while the glut of sports programming could dampen ratings for some live sports events, he believes there is a huge audience of sports fans willing to watch the games, particularly events that feature familiar and popular players and teams. 

“I think there is a big enough audience for all of it,” he said. “Some events will suffer, particularly if the events don’t have stars in place, but the flip side is the cupboard is bare on the entertainment side. You’ll have a much broader audience that will tune into live sports for the foreseeable future.”

The NBA Finals and the NHL Stanley Cup Finals jumped out to strong ratings starts in their respective best of seven series.

Thursday’s game one telecast of the Cleveland Cavaliers-Golden State Warriors NBA Finals drew 17.7 million viewers, a record for a Game 1 telecast on ABC, said Nielsen.

The game, in which Golden State won in an overtime thriller, was up 21% from 14.6 million for last year’s San Antonio-Miami game, according to Nielsen.

Game 2 of Cavaliers-Warriors airs Sunday on ABC.

Online, NBA Finals Game 1 on ESPN3 delivered a record 677,669 unique viewers, which is up 117% from Game 1 in 2014.

NBC’s game 1 Chicago Blackhawks-Tampa Bay Lightning Stanley Cup Finals Wednesday averaged 5.5 million viewers, the most watched game 1 telecast ever for NBC and the most watched, non-overtime game 1 telecast in 18 years, according to Nielsen.

The game, won by the Blackhawks, was up 16% compared to last year’s New York Rangers-Los Angeles Kings game 1 telecast.

The Blackhawks and Lightning will hit the ice for game 2 Saturday night on NBC.