Crashing NFL Advertising Revenue Takes Bite Out of Fox Sports with Big Budget Cuts

by Terresa Monroe-Hamilton | December 11, 2017 5:40 pm

This is definitely going to hurt Fox Sports. They are about to have to undergo large budget cuts because they have lost millions in advertising revenue for the NFL over the last two seasons. Los Angeles staffers are dreading impending layoffs and budget cuts over all this. I would say they can blame ‘Kneelgate’ to a large extent for this. One cutback is rumored to affect FS1 stars Skip Bayless and Shannon Sharpe. NBC has won the showing of the upcoming Super Bowl. So, it is being bandied about that Fox won’t send its top name staffers to broadcast from Minnesota for Super Bowl 52. They’ll keep their broadcasters and crew at home and save the expense of the trip.

Back in February when Fox televised Super Bowl 51, they promoted their new FS1 programming lineup by sending all of its studio shows to Houston, including “Undisputed” with Bayless, Sharpe and Joy Taylor, “Speak for Yourself” with Colin Cowherd and Jason Whitlock and the now canceled “Garbage Time with Katie Nolan” and “Fox Sports Live” with Jay Onrait and Dan O’Toole. That won’t happen this year because things are just too tight.

With ad revenue nosediving and interest from fans evaporating, along with boycotts, Fox Sports is going to be forced to slash its spending targets. Sporting News had this to say: “Through Week 13, the ‘NFL on Fox’s’ average TV audience fell 12 percent to 17.4 million viewers from the same period in 2016. The TV audience for the network’s ‘America’s Game of the Week’ between the Saints and Panthers on Dec. 3 plummeted 20 percent to 20.2 million viewers. To illustrate the strength of NFL programming, however, the telecast still ranked as the most-watched program of the week on TV, according to the network.” They added, “The NFL has lost roughly 1 in 5 viewers since 2015, according to Nielsen.”

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Fox Sports’ profits were also whacked when Team U.S.A. was eliminated from the FIFA World Cup. Fox Sports spent a ton of money to get the broadcast rights for the World Cup. All for nothing. The U.S. team lost early in the playoffs eliminating them from soccer’s biggest tournament. But Fox Sports shouldn’t feel alone out there… ESPN is being devastated as well. They just laid off another 150 employees after getting rid of 100 in 2016. ESPN has shed themselves of over 550 employees since 2015.

The latest statistics out show that ESPN has lost 480,000 subscribers in October alone. At that rate, they can’t stay afloat for long, even as big as ESPN is. And all of this leads back to Colin Kaepernick, who has upended the NFL and has acted as a one-man wrecking crew for sports. Fox Sports is just one more victim of social justice.

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Endnotes:
  1. [Image]: https://rightwingnews1.wpenginepowered.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Sports.png
  2. [Image]: https://rightwingnews1.wpenginepowered.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Sports1-e1513030706962.jpg

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