Audience figures for the New Year's Six bowl games were "hardly optimal results, but given that ESPN makes the bulk (about 70%) of its ratings guarantees against the aggregate deliveries for the New Year's Six and National Championship Game, the make-good situation isn't anywhere near as dire as the 37% playoff drop might otherwise suggest," according to Anthony Crupi of AD AGE. An ESPN exec "declined to offer any specifics re make-goods." But the source said that the net "builds protection into its guarantees." Crupi noted inventory "set aside for late scatter buys can be used as a hedge" against audience deficiency units -- those which result in make-goods. But for "all the wrack and ruin" of the CFP schedule, the weekend "wasn't a total loss for ESPN." The net is "eagerly awaiting" next Monday's CFP Championship. Ratings for the Clemson-Alabama matchup are "likely to impress." Meanwhile, official CFP sponsors like AT&T, Allstate, Dr Pepper and Ford were "predictably visible" during the CFP semifinals, alongside bowl title sponsors Capital One and Goodyear. Other advertisers in Thursday's games included movie studios such as Columbia Pictures ("Concussion"), Twentieth Century Fox ("The Revenant") and Lionsgate ("Dirty Grandpa"), as well as "representatives from disparate categories" like gaming (Activision), the armed forces (Navy, Army), tech and consumer electronics (Apple) and QSRs (Wendy's) (ADAGE.com, 1/5).
THAT'S ABSURD! In N.Y., Richard Sandomir writes by sticking to their original plan, CFP execs "got a New Year’s Eve flop." It can be "reasonably argued that the viewership was affected by factors unrelated to the day it was played: two games that turned into blowouts; two universities, Clemson and Michigan State, that are not national forces among viewers, and the playoffs’ lack of novelty in their second season." But there also is a "touch of absurdity to this -- knowing in the creation of the new Playoff that New Year’s Eve has a tradition all its own yet trying to buck it almost every year" through '26. CFP Exec Dir Bill Hancock said of the lower semifinal audience figures, "We don’t make decisions based on television numbers. I don’t have a TV number that influences my measurable for success." But Sandomir writes in the end, TV numbers, ad sales and digital viewing are "how ESPN measures success." So Hancock's view "must seem almost heretical to ESPN" (N.Y. TIMES, 1/6).
