Ratings for last nights playoff games: In the dumper.....

[Victor E. Bell]

The Orange Bowl between Clemson and Oklahoma, which kicked off about 4:10 p.m. EST on ESPN, drew a 9.1 rating, a 38.5 percent drop compared to last year's Rose Bowl, which got a 14.8 rating. The number of viewers dropped 44.5 percent from 28,164,000 for the Rose to just 15,640,000 for the Orange.


The Michigan State-Alabama Cotton Bowl drew a 9.6 rating for ESPN compared to 15.2 for Ohio State-Alabama in the Sugar Bowl last Jan. 1 - a 36.8 percent drop. Total viewership crashed 34.4 percent, going from 28,271,000 to 18,552,000.


Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/sports...4cee8ebae3e4908d62c0.html#OMJABxximqOFxhsY.99

 

[fairfaxlion2]

A huge hit for ESPN, cable, and the playoff concept in general.

 

[bmejnes]

New Years Eve? Not sure what they were thinking

 

[jp3272]

I thought the Playoff game schedule on NYE was questionable.

 

[Ranger Dan]

This is no surprise. My wife likes football and watches games with me all the time. We are not night owls and rarely go out on the town... even she gave me a hard time for wanting to stay in and watch the games.

I heard on Sirus College Sports radio that the big problem was the Rose Bowl. Apparently, when the TV contracts were renewed / signed, nobody thought to include the stipulation that the Rose Bowl would give up their 5:18 time slot on New Years Day. When it came time to work out the scheduling for this year, the Rose Bowl wouldn't move and they couldn't force them to.

 

[Ranger Dan]

They should have had the playoff games on January 2nd....

 

[BobPSU92]

A huge hit for ESPN, cable, and the playoff concept in general.

That makes me want to cry.

 

[NittPicker]

The semifinals are better suited to the traditional bowl day of January 1st. That's where the ratings are. In the past New Year's Eve was when they played the more minor bowls which weren't expected to draw millions of viewers anyway since people had other things going on. I remember games like the Bluebonnet Bowl being played on December 31st. I recall thinking then it was an odd night to play a bowl game. Maybe the people in charge will give up on the December 31st experiment and move the games back to January 1st. It was boring today with only five bowl games being played. Channel surfing was fun with the first three games but it sucked later with only one game at a time being played. The reality is most fans don't want to watch one game at a time unless they support one of the teams. The fun of New Year's Day bowls was the all day variety of games to watch.

 

[MtNittany]

 

[Nittany Ziggy]

That makes me want to cry.

Fu@k crying. WHERE. IS. THE. OUTRAGE?

 

[PhillipintheValley]

It didn't help that the games were not competitive. I switched to Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.

 

[rjg82]

Maybe the ratings were down because the games stunk?
Seriously not one good game out of any big bowls yesterday or today. Embarrassing for the committee.
You knew some of these match ups were going to suck. Stanford vs Iowa was a complete mismatch. Florida vs Michigan was a joke too. The best game of the day was the Ohio state game as that was closer than expected .