Original Article: Sports Business Journal, by John Kosner and Ed Desser, May 27th, 2024

We started our careers in the early 1980s, a time of “shelf space” scarcity, with just three national commercial broadcast networks. Each carried some major league sports, almost exclusively on weekend afternoons, with only occasional prime-time coverage of crown jewel events such as the World Series, Super Bowl and Olympics. The 1981 NBA Finals were shown late-night, on tape delay! Fox would launch in 1986. ESPN and cable TV were in their infancy, neither well-distributed nor considered a proper host for major events. John held a programming position at CBS, which was the broadcast home of the then-struggling NBA, where Ed worked as head of broadcasting.

Like today, sports content deals then revolved around TV dollars and exposure, but sports divisions were dismissively considered the toy department in their own shops — a less profitable, distant priority behind what mattered: prime-time entertainment, national and local news and daytime soap operas. Led by the NFL, sports ultimately forged such a strong connection with viewers that it dominated all other programming. In 2023, 96 of the top 100 TV programs were sports. This performance also has been aided by Nielsen’s inclusion of out-of-home viewing, which disproportionately favors live games. Exempting sports, network average prime-time adult 18-49 ratings are now down to under a half a ratings point each.

We are advocates for best practices, constantly searching for incremental sports media value. With streamers circling and reduced cable penetration, it’s time to rethink the playbook for network TV sports:

• With the exception of NFL (and some events on lesser-viewed Friday/Saturday nights), broadcast sports continues to air mostly noon-6 p.m. on weekend afternoons (9 a.m.-3 p.m. Pacific), still “protecting” local/network news, access shows like “Jeopardy,” and of course, prime-time entertainment programs, with few non-playoff sports on weeknights. Any financial analysis of sports in prime time requires consideration of entertainment programming’s “preemptive impact.”

• Sports properties are valued by viewership and must look to maximize that. On the second and third Sundays of the NBA Playoffs, ABC aired a spectacular 47-point performance from Jalen Brunson and then a Game 7 between Cleveland and Orlando at 1 p.m. ET (10 a.m. PT), just as spring weather beckoned everyone outside. Last Sunday’s Knicks-Pacers Game 7 finished around 6 p.m. ET, when we believe it should have started, providing no lead-in for TNT’s Wolves-Nuggets Game 7. Those games had the most national appeal of anything on ABC’s schedule and would have drawn 50%-100% larger audiences had they been at 5:30 or 8 p.m. ET.  NBA ratings were down 12% for the first two rounds.  Exposure matters — especially to showcase emerging teams and stars to larger audiences.  The 5:30 p.m. ET weekend time period has not been used since NBC lost NBA rights 22 years ago. Putting NBA Playoffs in that slot would have also given ABC’s “American Idol” an enormous lead-in.

• We made the same point recently about ABC airing Caitlin Clark’s record NCAA women’s basketball championship game at 3 p.m. ET, not in prime time. The men’s championship also misses an opportunity by starting on Thursday afternoon, and has no Sunday CBS prime-time windows, still “protecting” what was once the top prime-time show franchise in a bygone television era, “60 Minutes” (though still among CBS’s highest-rated). Meanwhile, ABC aired the NFL Draft on a Thursday night, helping it draw 12.1 million viewers.

• In 2019, when Fox sold its studio and announced a recasting of its broadcast network around sports and events — NFL (at the time) on Thursday, WWE on Friday, and college football on Saturday night — it nevertheless hired a new entertainment programming executive. Why, when Fox programmed just nine remaining weekly prime-time entertainment hours (versus 22 for the other networks)? Instead, it could have easily filled those hours with sports it owned, including MLB and college basketball. Most broadcast networks continue to operate on what we believe is ’80s-dated inertia, before widespread cable, VCRs or streaming, when they collectively held a 90% prime-time audience share!

To their credit (and sports’ benefit), NBC is more aggressive. Its use of the Olympic rings to brand the network has set the standard for sports/TV integration. The Kentucky Derby post time was traditionally 5:40 p.m. ET. Earlier this month, NBC aired the 150th running at 7:02 p.m. ET, drawing 20.1 million viewers. The originators of “Breakfast at Wimbledon,” NBC has established weekend morning network coverage of the Premier League, helping to elevate international football. Look for the NFL to program weekly Sunday games from Europe, 9:30 a.m.-1 p.m. ET, by the end of the decade. Should NBC reclaim the NBA from Warner Bros. Discovery, it would mark the first time a major cable package migrated back to broadcast. It won’t be the last.

It’s not that NBC faces any issues different from its competitors, but it does think differently, highly valuing the power of live sports. When NBC pioneered the early weekend evening 5:30-8 p.m. ET NBA window (home to many classic Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant games), it helped address potential preemptions by offering its local stations a highly rated and sellable news insert at halftime (similar to what the NFL has done in its late Sunday afternoon window).

The alchemy of sports media deals always involves reach and revenue. As traditional pay-TV subscribers shrink, broadcast networks with theoretical 100% reach are even more in vogue for rights holders. Sports dominated the 2024 upfronts — even for Netflix. It’s perfect timing for new network thinking, delivering the best games to the biggest audiences.

Ed Desser is president of consultancy Desser Sports Media Inc. (www.desser.tv). John Kosner is president of consultancy Kosner Media (www.kosnermedia.com). Together they developed league TV strategy and ran the NBA’s media operations in the ’80s and ’90s.