ESPN drew 2.4 million viewers for Yankees-Red Sox this past Sunday night, marking the network’s best audience of the season for “Sunday Night Baseball” and the most-viewed “SNB” game since the same matchup last August drew 2.77 million viewers. Sunday night’s game is up from the same matchup on ESPN in early June (1.97 million viewers). The game is one of three Yankees-Red Sox matchups slated for "SNB" in the second half of the season; the second of those broadcasts is set for this coming Sunday night. The "SNB" franchise so far this season is averaging 1.59 million viewers, up 1% from the same period last season (Austin Karp, THE DAILY).
POOR TIMING: SI.com's Dan Gartland wrote Sunday's broadcast featured "some kind of animation" that was "supposed to show" what makes Red Sox SS Xander Bogaerts a good hitter. It could be a "really great feature for a broadcast ... when done correctly." However, this was used in the bottom of the ninth inning. Bogaerts had just singled off of Yankees P Aroldis Chapman, and the broadcasters "should have been building the tension of the moment by harping on Chapman’s recent struggles and showing fans in the stands" (SI.com, 7/29).
HAVE YOUR CAKE AND EAT IT TOO: SI.com's Jimmy Traina wrote "SNB" is "all about spicing up the broadcast with bells and whistles." ESPN has "milked the Alex Rodriguez-Jennifer Lopez relationship for all it's worth," with Lopez on Sunday coming into the booth to give Rodriguez a birthday cake (SI.com, 7/29). Audience Network's Rich Eisen said it is "clear somebody from ESPN ‘Sunday Night Baseball’ said, ‘Let’s buy a cake and let’s give it to J-Lo and let’s put J-Lo and his beautiful daughters on-screen and give them a cake.’” Eisen: "If you had told anybody at ESPN when I was there J-Lo would be front-and-center on ‘Sunday Night Baseball,’ they would be like, ‘What?’” (“The Rich Eisen Show,” The Audience Network, 7/29).
TELL US HOW YOU REALLY FEEL: WEEI’s Mike Mutnansky last night made it known he is not a fan of the current state of "SNB." He said of analyst Jessica Mendoza, “We’ve been down that road a million times. She is what she is, she is not good. In my opinion, she is there because she is a woman." Mutnansky added play-by-play announcer Matt Vasgersian is "the one that I don’t understand," as he calls games "the way they were done in the ‘80s and the ‘90s." Vasgersian "sounds the exact same and he doesn’t get the best" out of either Mendoza or Rodriguez. Meanwhile, he brought up Rodriguez' birthday celebration from Sunday night and asked, “What the hell are we doing here? The idea that we’re going to celebrate an adult male’s birthday on TV, a guy who's worth millions of dollars, just seems silly to me instead of focusing on what’s going in front of you, instead of trying to make the broadcast better” (“Mut at Night,” WEEI-FM, 7/29).
