Cord cutting still hasn’t cut out the knees of network TV.
A week after an ESPN-only Monday night game featuring the Chiefs and multiple Taylor Swift sightings fell under 16 million viewers, a Bills-Jets game that competed with a Guardians-Yankees ALCS game got 17.3 million viewers via the ABC/ESPN/ESPN2 simulcast.
The ABC simulcast, a staple last year due to multiple Hollywood strikes, was supposed to happen far less frequently in 2024. With the cable-only audience slipping toward the weekly Amazon streaming figures, it makes sense to maximize the prime-time games on the traditional three-letter networks.
Meanwhile, a week after the ManningCast siphoned 1.4 million viewers from the Saints-Chiefs game, ESPN has once again not announced the ManningCast audience. The last time the alternate broadcast’s figures were withheld, they had slipped to an all-time low of 873,000.