5 Possible Reasons Major League Soccer TV Ratings Are Disappointing Early In 2022

There have clear highlights of the first month the Major League Soccer season, including Charlotte FC’s record-setting home debut, solid overall attendance numbers considering and some truly engrossing games.

However, outside the stadium, it still feels for American soccer enthusiasts like frustratingly few fans are paying attention.

So far in 2022, MLS TV ratings for national English-language broadcasts are mixed overall and down in some categories from last year, with the most troubling numbers perhaps coming from ESPN’s first two telecasts in early March.

The timing of that news is not ideal for Commissioner Don Garber and league headquarters, which sees its current TV rights agreements expire at the end of the season and is hoping to negotiate a new package worth $300 million annually, per reporting last December from CNBC. (The expiring deal is worth $90 million annually.) But more recent reporting from The Athletic suggests MLS does not have that many interested suitors in the new package outside of ESPN and Univision, who are both longtime league partners.

Reasons for year-to-year TV rating fluctuations can be hard to pin down, especially when then the product is virtually unchanged. But here are five factors that might be contributing

1) ESPN Going Light on Promotion for Leverage?

This is speculative, but one potential explanation for poor numbers on ESPN could be what some observers see as a lack of internal promotion of MLS games on the network.

To the extent that’s a legitimate complaint, the reason for it could be that ESPN knows it is essentially bidding against itself in the new deal, and doesn’t want to drive up the price with stronger than expected numbers in 2022.

2) The Migration of American Stars to Europe

While MLS has never challenged the top leagues in Europe in terms of talent and star power, it has been the home to at least a plurality of US men’s national team players for nearly all of its 27 years.

But on current USMNT nears qualification for the 2022 FIFA World Cup, there has never been a time with fewer key faces on the team based domestically. Even during previous times when there were more Americans playing in Europe, there were always at least one or two U.S. stars playing domestically — for example, Landon Donovan during most of his career.

Who exactly are USMNT fans tuning in to watch now? Center backs Miles Robinson and Walker Zimmerman are probably the only MLS-based players nearly certain to start when healthy.

3) The Shifting Schedule

Two years ago, MLS opened in February for the first time in its history. Then the Covid-19 Pandemic and related labor issues delayed the start of the 2021 season until mid-April. Then the start returned to the last weekend in February this year.

This isn’t to suggest there’s a huge number of people who simply don’t know the league has started, and would watch if they did. But TV viewership is a habit, and as such it might help for MLS to build some more concrete traditions around when the season begins, when the playoffs start and so forth.

4) The End of NBC Sports Network, Launch of Peacock

Premier League rights holders NBC launched their streaming service Peacock in the summer of 2020 and shuttered NBC Sports Network at the end of 2021. In the process, it moved most of its EPL telecasts to USA network.

The result is those broadcasts appear in a few million more homes than previously on NBCSN, which was not as widely distributed. And with Comcast Xfinity subscribers given free Peacock access, the combination of the streaming service and cable TV gives fans who have Xfinity access to any EPL game in 2021-2022.

For viewers who only want to devote so many hours a weekend to watching soccer, this could lead to the EPL making up a greater part of the total allotment.

5) Expansion and Unintended Consequences

Major League Soccer has added 10 clubs in the last eight years to grow to 28 total, with the total expected to continue growing to 30 in the next few years.

Garber has repeatedly said expansion was needed to truly establish a national MLS footprint. And the local reception to expansion teams has mostly justified his strategy.

But perhaps as more markets have the chance to buy MLS tickets, they become less interested in national narratives. We’ve seen similar hyper-regionalization among Major League Baseball and the National Hockey League fans in recent decades.

Rapid expansion has also contributed to a poor on-field product in some markets the league would like to showcase. That can put the league into a tough spot of deciding between broadcasting a game of high quality on the field, or of great atmosphere off it.