Which might explain why, despite the denials, the people who are descendants of Big Bill France, the man who started it all, are quietly shopping the company around and hoping to get out while the goings good. The cars already were mostly spec at that point, and the sport was doing just finebooming even. . As a result, teams with more resourcessuch as Hendrick Motorsports and Roush Racingwon big for years. What might have been acceptable, even colourful, in the last century just doesnt cut it today. The declines were less pronounced with the record-low Daytona 500 excluded. Interestingly, it has been said that NASCAR has been getting younger (the drivers) and older (the fans) at the same time. by both sides, angered fans but they were particularly angry at NASCAR, which onceelevated Jeff Gordon to the Chase field when he hadnt qualified for it. NBC was slightly ahead of last years pace before the Nov. 10 race at Phoenix, but it drew 2.567 million, the least-watched Cup race on broadcast television since 2001 (not counting rainouts). Their retirements are a reason for the ratings decline in 2018. And it will be pretty hard to turn back the clock on either of those. Professional sports adapted as well, understanding, and learning, how to measure viewership and show that value to their stakeholders. The disappointing ratings continue a downward trend in Daytona 500 viewership, which has been steadily declining since Fox scored 18.7 million viewers in 2005 with a household rating of 10.9 . FONTANA, Calif. Most of NASCAR's Cup Series drivers feel like they're saying their final goodbye to a dear old friend this weekend. However, sources said that it is "likely because of the network's longstanding relationship" with the PGA Tour. NASCAR blew off fan demand for picture-in-picture commercial breakssomething theyve since embracedwhile Fox Sportss indifference to fans went completely unchecked. However, NASCAR attendance numbers have fluctuated over the last decade. I also suggested a solutionthat NASCAR emulate how baseball exploded in popularity after the opening of Camden Yards. So that's a positive viewership increase of 2%. . I'm just . Atlanta has had some classics, but that was partly by virtue of the venue hosting the championship race, such as Alan Kulwickis unforgettable title win in 1992. NASCARs 2020 champion is also its most popular driverfor the first time since 1988. The current NBA broadcast deal nets the league $2.6 billion a year, however, a new report says the next one may be closer to $8 billion annually. OutKick reported: The NBA ratings are worse Overall, NASCAR brought in 114.231 million average viewers throughout the entire 2022 season which marks its. This comes after an all-time low for a non-delayed Daytona 500 one week ago. NASCAR tv ratings for the Bristol Motor Speedway dirt track. Its safe to say this is not ideal for the sport and there should be some concern on why ratings continue to fall. The previous two races the Daytona Roval and Homestead-Miami posted double-digit increases over the same Cup Series stops last season, but those races had the benefit of moving up from the lower-rated summer portion of the schedule. Should there be concerns with the current trend of viewership? That would have a big effect on viewership overall. Danica Patrick just retired. Next:10 NASCAR Drivers With The Most Wins (& How Much They Won). Stats. In other words, twice as many watched the title race in 2015 than this year. In that time, I witnessed the beginning of the sports slide into near-extinction. With the current playoff point structure, drivers are also somewhat rewarded for strong season-long performances as wellwhile the Chase completely disregarded excellence during the season. The decision . Compared to the last time the Brickyard 400 was run in July (the 2017 race), Sunday's ratings were down 21 percent and viewership was off 23 percent. Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. In fact, the current car lends itself to some pretty good racing. The previous days Xfinity Series finale drew a 0.6 (flat) and 1.01 million (+3%) on NBCSN and last Fridays Truck Series finale drew a 0.30 (+3%) and 473,000 (-4%) on FS1. 1) Just like all the other major racing series in the world, NASCAR has become a money deal. HOMESTEAD, FLORIDA - NOVEMBER 17: Kyle Busch, driver of the #18 M&M's Toyota along with his wife [+] Samantha and son Brexton pose with the trophy after winning the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Championship at Homestead Speedway on November 17, 2019 in Homestead, Florida. It took time, maybe too much time, but NASCAR is finally addressing the three biggest reasons for the decline of the sport. And he had a very large fan base. A Former Reporters Thoughts, fly into a catch fence and injure spectators, I really got the point across with this one, that profoundly irritating cartoon gopher, baseball exploded in popularity after the opening of Camden Yards, that didnt suffer a significant ratings drop, Professional Cornhole Beyond The Parking Lot, Staying Green ex-Patriots Champion Jarvis Green, Terry Kath 1946-1978: The Heart of Chicago. You will find all of your NASCAR ratings coverage at Sportsnaut. In NASCAR's pre-1990s heyday, when it was still very much a regional sport, manufacturer identity was a big thing. | The 2021 NASCAR Cup Series season averaged 2.93 million viewers across FOX, FS1, NBC and NBCSN, down 4% from last year (3.06M), down 6% from 2019 (3.11M) and the least-watched season on record. Schedule/Results. Ill start with a few things that I dont believe caused the decline of NASCAR, then Ill share what I think really did. And one other thing about NASCAR in those days: the races were open to anybody who could qualify. A shot that shows the overall value sponsors receive. News. Its possible that the most popular driver not performing well hurt the sport, given the sports fan demographic. There are still 11 races on intermediate tracks, but its finally moving in the right direction. That is a decrease of nearly 50%, and in some races this kind of decline could be seen in the stands too. It was the first time in a while where we didn't have a decline on NBC. In a piece published in the Athletic last week, Ethan Strauss reported that the ratings for network NBA broadcasts have declined by 45 percent since 2011-12. The Great Recession that swept across the landscape starting in 2008 changed everything. . NASCAR rose to prominence in the 1980s and 90s as TV became more and more involved. In the early 2000s, NASCAR was soaring. And we wont get into the murdering of the English language that goes on week after week, ad nauseum. But the ratings decline is hitting all of the leagues hard (including MLB, which has not embraced the movement on the field nearly as much as the WNBA, NBA, and NFL). It is not unusual to see speedway grandstands half empty and only several million will tune in from home. As NBA ratings have declined over the current season, a new poll shows that more than 30 percent of Americans say they have watched less sports over political and . That's the first time in a decade that that has happened, Hebrst said. Or Jeff Gordon, again, living in a Manhattan penthouse with his second wife, a model, instead of in North Carolina, where he lived beside a lake with his first wife, a deeply religious woman who was Born Again. (Busch would have still won.). The 2023 NASCAR season is underway and it is bound to be very exciting in the second year of the NextGen car. The XFL's ratings were disappointing in Week One. 2.27.2023. NASCAR looks beyond declining attendance, TV ratings They were even more upset when NASCAR changed its playoff system in January 2014 to create a winner-take-all race among four drivers in. And you hear more and more about this today. After sweeping claims of a toxic work environment throughout 2020, the star and her show have been scrambling to make things right. Last year's 500 was still the. 500 MOMENTUM:Daytona 500 TV ratings: NASCAR opener ends two-year viewership decline. The Nielsen ratings for NASCAR's most-watched races, such as The Daytona 500, have plummeted in recent years. But theyve also improved the schedule, the broadcasts, and the method of determining a champion. The XFL also had a better Week 2 performance than the 2019 Alliance of American . The 2016 race from Homestead had 6.1 million viewers, the 2015 race had 7.643 million. NASCAR needs side-by-side commercials during green-flag racing and then full-screen commercials during yellow flags. We all know what Im talking about. While the 2023 NASCAR season kicked off Sunday with Daytona 500 winner Ricky Stenhouse Jr. racing his way into the May 21 NASCAR All-Star Race, North Wilkesboro Speedway construction crews are . It's no secret that NASCAR is experiencing a variety of issues related to its popularity, despite a slight recent uptick in TV ratings. Digital and social consumption is as important now, as it's ever been; probably more important now than it's ever been, he said. Veterans like Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick are future Hall of Fame drivers with fairly large followings, and a strong crop of young drivers are making names for themselves. In some ways the Recession came at a most inopportune time for sports TV. "While it's easy to cite 'cord-cutting' as a catch-all explanation for what's going on, keep in mind, Nielsen ratings do incorporate streaming services, albeit imperfectly . But the initial Chase, an artificial and contrived points reset, was despised by fans. Next years championship race will be held in Phoenix, and even though the 2020 race should draw a packed house of 42,000, or 7,000 more than the estimated crowd at Homestead, fans have said they dont like the racing at Phoenix as much. When you think of the venues that have showcased the most memorable events in the sports history, Daytona, Darlington, and Bristol often come to mind. The various platforms of social media have been a convenient and fast way to obtain information and entertainment on a particular sporting event. They got famous because of word-of-mouth (Hey, didja hear about that new kid blowin em away over at Hickory?), weekly newspapers like National Speed Sport News (called simply Speed Sport and whos Editors Notebook by the late Chris Economaki was a Must Read) and magazines like Stock Car Racing. These figures paint a troubling trend that NASCAR is on a long term downtrend it has yet to recover from. Not all, of course, but most. We try to do is take the complex and boil it down to something that is more easily understood by the fanbase.. It was a successful year as the sport averaged over three million average viewers per race. Where . What other big American sport has ongoing action behind a commercial? Yet instead of focusing their marketing on Johnsons unequaled supremacy, NASCAR chose to put all of their marketing eggs into the Danica Patrick basket, believing a swimsuit model who could drive a racecar would save the sport. But in a relatively short time, NASCAR corrected the car and the multiple issues with its design, and while the cars dont differ by manufacturer like they once did, at least were not seeing disastrously awful races just because of the cars construction. This isnt to say that the initial Car of Tomorrow wasnt a disasterit wasbut at the time, fans were plenty vocal about safety after the loss of the sports biggest icon. The last race at. Why poll the fans if youre just going to ignore them? Nascar, he wrote . Danica turned out to be a huge bustas many people who followed the sport closely, including yours truly, predicted she would be. Saturday afternoon, they held a round of the NASCAR Xfinity Series there and there were so few people in the stands that they should have introduced them to the drivers instead of the other way around. One of Brian Frances very first acts as CEO of NASCAR sealed his doom as a respectable heir to a business, and nothing he did for the rest of his tenure would change that perception. However, these deals may be stopping the brand from adapting to consumers' changing viewing habits. The XFL's ratings were disappointing in Week One. which is a 50 percent decline . These fans would attend a race, then go sightseeing around the town so as to make the trip more worthwhile and as a result, even more money is required to be put in the budget in order to cover the costs for a dew days hotel stay. I wonder why Truck Series and Xfinity viewership(even from 2019) is up but Cup Series viewership is down. The fan base that is paying attention to our sport now than probably two or three years agopart of that is the economic model of our sport is a little bit more sounder, on solid footing; the introduction to the Next Gen car, it brings on new owners like Justin Marks and Michael Jordan, Pitbull et cetera. The problem was the tracks that replaced themnearly all of them were characterless, cookie-cutter speedways where aero package ruled the day. Unfortunately, the rising number and lengths of these commercials have become a source of frustration for their fans. Far from it. Removing the Toyota logo and Supra badge, one would be hard-pressed to identify, and in actuality, to associate with the caron what it is supposed to represent. Last years Xfinity race at the track aired on FS2 and had a 0.21 and 341,000. You couldnt entirely blame NASCAR for no longer holding events in places like North Wilkesboro or Rockingham or even Darlington, which lost a race on the schedule for several years. It is understandable that throughout its existence, rule changes have been implemented at NASCAR, and the reasons for such have varied from safety, technological, or as organization initiatives to provide more challenges or add excitement to the races. One shining example was a 2010 Dover racea playoff race, no lesswhere ESPN broke away with 11 laps to go in a very much undecided event for an ad break. Having followed the sport in the time frame when it began, I can offer what I believe are the real reasons for the decline of NASCAR. Unless you are a die-hard fan of the sport, people would rather watch condensed snippets of the race or read the highlights instead of actually spending time watching or subscribing to NASCAR real-time races. 1) Just like all the other major racing series in the world, NASCAR has become a money deal. Photo credit: Darryl W. Moran Photography on Visual Hunt / CC BY-ND Earlier this month, NASCAR said the Confederate flag no longer will be allowed at its events. NASCAR moved the Brickyard 400 to September . Which meant that other drivers didnt win a lot. It could be argued that Junior was the sports last link to its tobacco-chewing, Southern past; once Jeff Gordon tore up the sport, drivers started to appear from every corner of the country. Many fans, especially those who might want to disparage the sport, dont understand that just because the TV numbers are down or not at the sky-high levels they once were, doesnt mean NASCAR is facing any sort of loss of popularity. NBC said its season viewership averages of 18 Cup races in 2019 (except for weather-affected races at Daytona and Darlington) was 2.57 million, the same as in 2018. Along with that came an all-important metric: the Nielsen ratings. For instance: The non-stop promotion of Danica Patrick, as if she was the Second Coming (she wasnt), turned off a lot of fans. Now, they buy their way in. The broadcasts have also improved. Below, we take a look at the NASCAR ratings over the course of the 2023 season with an up-to-date analysis of each event. Photo credit: Zach Catanzareti Photo on Visualhunt / CC BY-SA And maybe this time, they will have learned from their mistakes. Photo credit: PresidenBertho on Visualhunt.com / CC BY-SA As streaming services provide instant entertainment whileNASCARhas scheduled andlengthy race events,thecomparison is similar toordering drive-thru (cheap and convenient) versusdining at a fine restaurant (pricier and takes longer before you can eat). Her show have been scrambling to make things right came at a most inopportune time for sports TV throughout! Credit: Zach Catanzareti photo on Visualhunt / CC BY-SA and maybe this time, but NASCAR is a. 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