Fox Sports 1 and PBC (Interesting Tidbit)

Deadspin has a writeup (LINK) about some of the struggles FS1 is having. In spite of being in almost as many homes as ESPN, it's having problems with drawing viewers. The tidbit might explain the rumors of the sudden willingness by Fox to lock PBC up exclusively. Looking at the spreadsheet in the link, the PBC shows have some of the higher ratings for the network during the timeframe, outperforming FS1's college basketball offerings. (The Ultimate Fighter is doing real well for the netowrk): **SNIP** But Fox Sports Live isn’t the only FS1 program in search of viewers. Ratings across the network’s program schedule rarely rise above the “scratch” level, which Nielsen defines as having enough viewers to be accurately recorded. Even worse, FS1 programming is regularly beaten in the ratings by programs on networks with far fewer potential viewers—and even other Fox Sports-operated channels. **SNIP** As you can see, Fox Sports 1 reaches more homes than any sports network not named ESPN or ESPN2, and is available on tens of millions more televisions than many of its competitors. That hasn’t stopped those competitors from regularly beating FS1 in the ratings. **SNIP** FS1's only reliable ratings draw is PBC boxing—which, given its airtime purchase nature, is essentially an infomercial for Al Haymon—and the daily, live NASCAR Race Hub. UFC programming is also strong, though it doesn’t manage to beat out the likes of women’s volleyball, President’s Cup golf, or a Bucks-Kings game on NBATV during our ratings sample period. Fox Sports 1 is available in 84 million households; it should rarely if ever lose ratings hours to programs on Univision Deportes or (especially) Fox Deportes, but that’s exactly what happens. **SNIP**