Super Bowl Scores Badly For CBS
The folks over at CBS thought that they would be smiling from cheek to cheek because of expected high ratings due to people staying home cause of the COVID-19 pandemic, people staying indoors due to horrible weather affecting a good part of the country, and then you factor in that this year’s Super Bowl would feature a battle between two marquee quarterbacks.
That was not the case.
The ratings for this year’s Super Bowl tanked as it failed to crack the 100 million viewership mark. This was the first time since 2009 that the broadcast did not reach that number. According to Nielsen an average of 96 million people watched the game across the various CBS networks and its streaming platforms.
The drop in numbers is even more glaring when solely looking at CBS’ linear broadcast of the game — that number stands at 91 million viewers. This represents a 9% drop from 2020 when 100 million viewers watched the Kansas City Chiefs defeat the San Francisco 49ers.
The release of the numbers created its own drama as Nielsen waited until Tuesday morning to release them. Typically, the numbers are released the Monday after the Super Bowl, but with them being delayed till the next day it made NFL and CBS executives very angry and lead to speculation, on social media, that the numbers were bad.
That speculation turned out to be true.
Why the steep drop? One reason was that the game did not match the hype - it was basically over before the half as Tampa Bay outmuscled and stifled Kansas City’s high-scoring offense. The second half was just horrible to watch.
Another reason could be that there was “Brady fatigue” — not that many people were interested in seeing Tom Brady win his seventh ring. For sports enthusiasts, Brady winning equated to watching history as it firmly cemented his status as the GOAT. For casual viewers though, there was no appeal to witness this.
Make no mistake about it, in today’s world 96 million viewers watching one singular product is still a big deal — it’s just that CBS expected much more based on the circumstances. With the emergence of more entertainment options, attracting and keeping casual viewers engaged to the big game is going to be even more challenging for the game’s broadcasters.
It was not all bad news for CBS as the game was the most streamed NFL game ever generating an average of 5.7 million viewers per minute, which was up 65% from 2020. It was also the first game in NFL history to total more than 1 billion streaming minutes.
(Steven Zeitchik/Twitter, MediaPost, Deadline, Richard Deitsch/Twitter, John Ourand/Twitter, Front Office Sports)
RECAP
BBC World News Banned In China
In what looks like an episode of tit for tat the Chinese government on Thursday banned the BBC World News TV channel after the U.K. government withdrew the operating license of the China Global Television Network. The ban is in effect because the Chinese government accuses the network of a "slew of falsified reporting" — the BBC published a news report about the women in Xiajing being sexually abused, raped, and tortured within the intermittent camps. BBC World News was only available in hotels and a small number of residential homes in China. (Yahoo! News)
CNN Looking To Change Anchors At New Day
CNN has been on a ratings surge since the election, but one daypart has proven to be a challenge for the network. CNN’s marquee morning show, New Day, is set to undergo another anchor change as Alysin Camerota is looking to leave the show. She would be replaced by afternoon anchor, and rising star, Brianna Keilar. It’s been said that Camerota has gotten tired of the morning grind and is the one requesting the move. New Day was supposed to be Jeff Zucker’s golden show but it has proven to be problematic as it has failed to gain the type of traction he was looking for and it already has been through a bunch of anchor changes. (Variety)
Disney Plus Grows to 95 Million Subscribers
Look out Netflix, Disney Plus is on your tail! The streaming service from the house of Mickey this past week said that it has 94.9 million subscribers and it’s still growing. Bob Chapek, CEO of Disney, revealed during its earnings call that Disney Plus added 8.1 million subscribers during the month of December. The animated movie Soul and The Mandalorian helped bring in subscribers for the streaming service. Elsewhere in Disney’s streaming universe, Hulu grew to 39.4 million subscribers and ESPN Plus now has 12.1 million subscribers. (MediaPost and The Hollywood Reporter)
QUICK RECAP
ESPN’s Pedro Gomez passes away. (Matt Barrie/Twitter)
Atlanta Hawks to honor Sekou Smith. (Awful Announcing)
Layoffs hit Bloomberg News. (Variety)
Longtime anchor Sue Herera is reducing her role at CNBC. (Talking Biz News)
David Trulio hired as Fox News managing editor and head of strategy. (TVNewser)
NBC Sports to broadcast the Opening Ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics live. (Sports Business Daily)
CBS News to launch a streaming edition of 60 Minutes on Paramount Plus. (Bloomberg)
CNN to host a town hall with President Biden in Wisconsin on Tuesday. (CNN Public Relations/Twitter)
Fox News re-signs its CEO, Suzanne Scott, to a multi-year deal. (Variety)
Larry Kudlow’s new show will start on February 16 and air at 4 p.m on Fox Business. (Talking Biz News)
Mike Memoli and Carol Lee are named White House correspondents by NBC News. (TVNewser)
Profile: Abby Philip is CNN’s newest star. (Washingtonian)
Wendy Fisher promoted to Senior VP of newsgathering at ABC News. (ABC News Public Relations)
David Verdi promoted to executive VP of global newsgathering at NBC News. (TVNewser)
Media companies set to hold virtual upfronts in May. (AdWeek)
Is Jason Whitlock going to Fox News a possibility? (Front Office Sports)
HBO Max to launch in Latin America and the Caribbean in June. (MediaPost)
Former ESPN exec Connor Schell joins Peter Chernin to form a new content studio. (The Hollywood Reporter)
NBCUniversal wanted to start a streaming service with WarnerMedia; AT&T said no! (CNBC)
NFL is looking to finalize its TV rights deal before March. (Awful Announcing)
Part 1: What does AT&T want to do with CNN? (The Hollywood Reporter)
Part 2: What does AT&T want to do with CNN? (NBC News)
Fox News moving Greg Gutfield to weeknights at 11 p.m. (TVNewser)
Colin Cowherd was in the ER during the Super Bowl weekend. (The Big Lead)
CBS Sports & Turner Sports announce their March Madness schedule. (Awful Announcing)
NBC News Digital wins a duPont Columbia Award. (NBC News Public Relations/Twitter)
Stanley Tucci is trying to fill the huge hole at CNN left by Anthony Bourdain. (The Hollywood Reporter)
CBS This Morning is catching up to its morning rivals. (ViacomCBS Press Express)
Netflix announces new kids show featuring Michelle Obama. (Alex Zalben/Twitter)
Fox News and its anchors file motions to dismiss Smartmatic’s lawsuit. (Ben Mullin & Variety)
Six Nations Rugby moves to Peacock. (NBC Sports Group Press Box)
Amazon reorganizes its TV department. (The Hollywood Reporter)
Thanks for reading the Coverage Notes newsletter - subscribe & share.
Let us know what you think here - love it or hate it we'll learn to deal with it and make it better.
A MarkHenry Media LLC publication - 2021