The overarching story of the 2022 Winter Olympics has been NBC’s declining ratings for the Beijing Games. Beginning with a record-low audience for the opening ceremony, the audience for NBC’s coverage has been among the lowest numbers for any Olympics telecasts.
But NBC’s plan all along was to tie the Winter Olympics and Super Bowl LVI together in a sports bonanza for viewers. And the hope among executives was that a Super Bowl lead-in on Sunday would give a boost to the remainder of the Beijing Games.
That strategy appears to have paid off. Despite many fans dismay at NBC abruptly breaking away from Super Bowl post-game coverage to the women’s monobob, a majority of viewers appeared to stay with the network.
According to Sports Media Watch, Sunday night’s Olympics coverage drew the best ratings of the Winter Games thus far. The primetime telecase averaged a 9.8 rating and 21.28 million viewers after Super Bowl LVI. That number was higher than any single night of last year’s Tokyo Summer Olympics coverage.
But Sports Business Journal‘s John Ourand believes Olympics ratings will be on the upswing for future Games. Appearing Tuesday morning on 106.7 The Fan’s The Sports Junkies, Ourand pointed to Paris, Italy, then Los Angeles as locations far more beneficial to NBC and viewers.
“NBC knew, they had Tokyo last year, Beijing this year, they knew this was going to be tough,” said Ourand. “The next one is going to be in Paris; it’s going to be huge. Then there’s a Winter one in Italy, and then they come to L.A., which is going to be really big. So I’m not one that’s going to bury the Olympics at all… It’s going to bounce back in a big way.”
As Ourand pointed out. the 2024 Summer Olympics take place in Paris followed by the 2026 Winter Games in Italy. Both locations have a six-hour time difference from the U.S. Eastern time zone, compared to the 13-hour gap in Beijing, which should be a significant improvement for TV audiences. Then the 2028 Summer Games will be played in Los Angeles, which figures to be a huge event for NBC.
Ian Casselberry is a sports media columnist for BSM. He has previously written and edited for Awful Announcing, The Comeback, Sports Illustrated, Yahoo Sports, MLive, Bleacher Report, and SB Nation. You can find him on Twitter @iancass or reach him by email at iancass@gmail.com.
