At some point, someone is going to realize that there just may not be a public appetite for the XFL. The league’s ratings are struggling through three weeks of the season. ESPN is making adjustments to the schedule in hopes that meeting viewers where they are will make a difference.
XFL games have aired on ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, and FX. All of the networks are owned by Disney. That gives Disney the power to change what is not working.
The company is hoping that by moving games originally scheduled for FX to the ESPN networks, they will find a bigger audience.
On March 6, the Houston Roughnecks and the Seattle Sea Dragons will play on ESPN. On March 27, the Roughnecks will visit the DC Defenders on ESPN2. Both of those games were originally scheduled for FX.
Week 3 action in the XFL averaged 571,000 viewers. That is a 13% drop from Week 2. It is also a significant drop from the initial attempt to reboot the XFL in 2020. Games in Week 3 of that season averaged more than 1.6 million viewers.
Ratings in 2020 left many optimistic. Pat McAfee, who was part of the ESPN broadcast crew, has gone on record saying that Covid is the only thing that stood in the league’s way.
FX has not aired sports since the first decade of this century. When FOX still owned the cable network, some NASCAR races and Major League Baseball games were hosted there. Disney believes that part of what has the XFL struggling is that people are not used to going to FX to watch football.
