This years World Series of Poker (WSOP) TV ratings, on ESPN, are showing a 16% decrease from last years ratings which also fell.
The overall ratings for the first six weeks of WSOP coverage on ESPN have garnered a 0.67 rating, with a rating of 1.0 meaning that approximately 1.1 million viewers were watching a program. This would give the WSOP on ESPN an average of 737,000 viewers over the first six weeks of broadcasting. Compared to 2009, when the first six weeks pulled in a 0.79 rating (869,000 viewers), the ratings have dropped approximately 16%.
No surprise here, as the ratings continue to drop. It seems as if more people want to play poker now than watch poker on TV. This rating is still higher than hockey games and ESPN has a deal to air the WSOP through 2017, so this will air until nobody is left watchin.
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This rating is not higher than hockey games. You are either using old data or the lowest hockey games. Plus, the WSOP has the benefit of being on ESPN which in itself gets you another 100,000 or so viewers by default. This is not good news for the WSOP. But that’s okay for hockey (which does not need ESPN to grow), they just turned down ESPN’s very lucrative offer after it was matched by NBC/COMCAST Sports and Versus etc..
If you can provide data that shows Versus or other cable channels being greater around the same time period I’ll gladly update the post and credit you with the finding. I did see today that ratings and earnings were up for the NHL this year.