Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Canceled

MLS has been canceled on Thursday nights at least.

Thursday night soccer will no longer be part of the weekly soccer landscape, which I think is a good thing. I'm probably in the minority but I never liked Thursday night soccer. It just didn't work. The ratings were a disaster and games were moved to Thursdays to accommodate a non-existent television viewership instead of being played Saturday when teams could better prepare for their respective encounters.

I understand the need to have MLS out there, to be on a major sports network. But when it bombs out, that makes it even more painful to endure.

LA Times' Grahame Jones wrote about the possibility of ESPN bidding for the rights to English Premier League games, and how that would seemingly trouble MLS suits more than the outright cancellation of their Thursday night TV slot. He also described MLS as the "always hypersensitive" league, and how they went on to issue their own release to counterbalance the effects of the word "cancel."

But canceled MLS was. Cancel, cancel, cancel. The ratings were awful, and that MLS Primetime Thursdays lasted as long as it did is sort of remarkable.
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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

There are still going to be 10 games on Thursdays and 27 games will be aired throughout the season. Seems a little disingenuous to bring up the cancellation w/o giving full context.

an actual article on the matter - http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article.printArticle&articleId=61231

January 21, 2009 at 1:16 PM
L.B. said...

If you broke up with your girlfriend but still saw her every now and then, it wouldn't change from the fact that you guys broke up.

ESPN called it off with MLS. So they'll see each other now and again. ESPN is still done with their Thursday soccer show.

January 21, 2009 at 2:29 PM
Anonymous said...

I dunno, having a game here and there on a Saturday might be better for the league...I know I would be more inclined to watch on a Saturday afternoon then say Thursday night.

January 21, 2009 at 3:10 PM
Malcolm said...

Cancellation means no more shows on this network at any time. MLS is still having 27 games broadcast the majority of which will end up on Thursday nights. You make it sound like they lost their deal.

Your whole girlfriend analogy is silly.

January 21, 2009 at 6:07 PM
Anonymous said...

You guys criticizing LB obviously haven't read the LA Times article, or fail to understand what LB is saying. The Thursday night MLS game is canceled, meaning that Thursday will not be the only weekday night to show soccer, it'll be spread out throughout different days of the week. Thursday will no longer be deemed a "soccer specific night" like it was last season. The MLS were trying to do a Monday Night Football type deal and it failed.

A better analogy would be, let's say ESPN decided that Monday Night Football wasn't cutting it, so they'll only show 5 games on Monday next season, and the other games that were supposed to be scheduled for Monday Night Football got moved to Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, etc. Yes there will still be games on Monday night, but essentially Monday Night Football as a permanent fixture was canceled. Understand now?

January 23, 2009 at 5:37 AM

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