NBC averaged a 1.7 overnight Nielsen rating for its two NHL Stanley Cup conference semifinal telecasts this past weekend, marking its best figure for the first weekend of the second round in eight years. The net averaged a 1.9 overnight for Devils-Flyers Game One yesterday from 3:00-6:00pm ET, up 13% from the comparable Red Wings-Sharks Game Two last year. The net also averaged a 1.5 overnight for the first game of the Capitals-Rangers series, flat compared to the Bruins-Flyers opener last year (Austin Karp, THE DAILY).
VOICES CARRY: In N.Y., Bob Raissman reported Yankees radio announcers John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman “will be back in the booth for the 2013 season no matter who owns the Yankees’ radio rights.” Sources said that “despite all the criticism" of the pair, people within the organization “consider Sterling and Waldman part of the Yankee family.” A source indicated that as part of "any radio rights deal they sign, the Yankees will make sure they have control of who the broadcasters are.” CBS is paying $13M per year under the current contract. Sources said the team has "a very good relationship" with current rights holder WCBS-AM, and "a sense of loyalty." Sources said the Yankees “will more than likely exercise the option to stay with the station through 2013” (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 4/29).
LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON: Dodgers Manager of Spanish Radio Broadcast Sales Jorge Jarrin has joined the team's Fox Deportes TV broadcast team. Jarrin, the son of Dodgers HOF announcer Jamie Jarrin, will join analyst Manny Mota as the play-by-play announcer for 50 Dodger games this season (THE DAILY).
GRID LOCK: In N.Y., Brian Stelter profiles Dan Abrams’ Abrams Media Network of websites that includes Mediate and SportsGrid and writes it has been "slow going for one of his seven sites,” SportsGrid. Abrams said that the “others had attracted brand advertisers, like Ralph Lauren on Styleite and Intel on Geekosystem, his technology site.” Web measurement firm Quantcast shows that Abrams’s network receives “about eight million monthly visitors,” and at least a third of “those visitors are actually located on other Web sites where Mediaite and SportsGrid’s video players are posted with advertisements attached -- demonstrating how valuable aggregation can be to the business models of Web networks” (N.Y. TIMES, 4/30).
