Ratings are Down - Is Football Still King?

In many places, this passes for 'Football'.  In America we know that the 

little guy in the picture is not playing with a football.

Ratings for American Football are trending downwards.  Is the gridiron and all the associated drama, still our favorite pastime? 

The answer really isn't that easy to come by.  If you go by attendance, football is not the reigning champ.  For an explanation, we need to examine two factors: attendance and revenue. 

More than 110 million people went to a professional baseball game in North America  this season.  The 32 major league teams annually draw more than 70 million fans, while the 200 minor- league ball clubs add another 40 million to the total. In addition to the ticket sale funds, baseball gets another 2 billion dollars from television revenues along with many more millions from local radio and TV stations.

Football, with only 16 games, does not match baseball’s revenue collected from its 162 games, but it does get more TV money than baseball.  The National Football League gets a mammoth check from the networks – more than 3 billion dollars.

Football is extremely popular across the 48 interlocking United States, especially on cold winter, Sunday afternoons.  But the crowds drawn to football are far less than the total baseball attendance.  The American and National Baseball leagues pull in some 74 million paying customers while football gets about 17 million. Hockey and basketball each attract about 20 million fans per season. 

The figures come from an ESPN study.

Judging by attendance revenues, it would seem that baseball is the richest sport, but today’s pro teams have multiple revenue streams (think $35 tee shirts from the NFL Store).  When all revenue factors are added to the pot, the NFL tops all sports by about two billion dollars.

The NFL pulls in a total of about 14 billion annually, while baseball comes in second with ten billion dollars.  So, in terms of total money generated, Football is indeed the Number one sport in the U.S., with base ball a close second. Basketball is next with 7 billion dollars.  Hockey places fourth with 4 billion dollars.  For those who think Soccer popularity is sweeping the nation, the figures show that it is still far behind the major sports.  Pro soccer took in 800,000 million, from its 20 teams.   

The ESPN figures are a few years old so it’s likely that soccer in 2018 will reach the billion dollar mark.  But it’s still a billion dollar baby compared to the Four major sports.

North of the border, the Canadian Football League, with just nine teams, manages to generate 200 million dollars of revenue.  Nascar Racing, which like football, could perhaps be called ‘a contact sport’ regularly fills the seats of major speedways and drags in some 700 million dollars annually.

Golf, Tennis, Bowling and similar activities are not included in this article because they are not sports in the same sense as the 4 majors. It is pretty much an agreed fact that anyone can throw a ball down an alley, whack a tennis ball, or ride around in an electric cart for 18 holes, followed by a leisurely stroll to the 19^th.