Versus President Says Partnership With IRL Is Strong And Growing

Davis Says IRL Deal Has Been A Success

Versus President Jamie Davis "insists his channel's partnership with the Indy Racing League is strong, worthwhile and growing," according to Curt Cavin of the INDIANAPOLIS STAR. Davis indicated that with Versus increasing its per-event coverage to seven hours over the course of three shows, "more people already have watched the IndyCar Series this season (26.7 million) than did last year on ESPN or ESPN2 (25.9 million)." Davis: "This first season has been a huge success for us. I could not be happier with how it's gone." Cavin reports Versus' 11 race broadcasts have averaged a 0.39 rating, which equates to "about 400,000 households, the number Davis projected for the first year of this 10-year deal." Davis said that the "absence of 14 million DirecTV subscribers as of Sept. 1 has mostly been made up by 9 million new Dish Network subscribers and 1 million via traditional cable suppliers" (INDIANAPOLIS STAR, 9/25). Cavin in a special to AUTOWEEK wrote Versus' IndyCar coverage "has looked sensational" this year, but the ratings "suggest that only loyal fans are watching" (AUTOWEEK.com, 9/22).

MORE AND MORE GAMES BEING LOST: In L.A., Diane Pucin writes this is "about the time when the Versus-DirecTV spat will become annoying to those who aren't getting Versus now as part of their DirecTV package." Versus is broadcasting Saturday's Cornell-Yale football game at 12:00pm ET and Arizona-Oregon State at 7:30pm (L.A. TIMES, 9/25). Also, the dispute "threatens to leave customers ... without" Versus' 54 NHL regular-season telecasts, including exclusive coverage of the Blues-Red Wings game from Stockholm on October 2 (ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, 9/25).