NBC Sports looking to extend winning streaks

STAMFORD — This week marks the return of the TV show that has reigned No. 1 in primetime for a decade and a companion program that is also watched by millions. Both are produced by a Stamfordbased broadcaster.

With the kickoff Thursday of the 2021 NFL season, NBC Sports is aiming to maintain the dominance of “Sunday Night Football,” the most-watched prime-time program, for a record 10th-straight year, and “Football Night in America,” which has ranked as the most-watched sportsfocused weekly studio show for the past 15 years. Amid the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic, those shows’ audience numbers decreased last season — but NBC Sports officials are bullish about the new campaign, with scores of Stamford-based staffers playing a crucial role in those shows.

“We are really excited for the season,” Sam Flood, who oversees FNIA as executive producer and president of production for NBC and NBCSN, said on a media conference call this week for his show. “Seeing this group together, fired up to get the season going, is a lot of fun.”

Key role for Stamford HQ

Headquartered at 1 Blachley Road on Stamford’s east side, NBC Sports has assigned a total of about 140 Stamford-based employees to work on FNIA and SNF this season.

FNIA is filmed in Studio 1 at the headquarters and at the stadiums where the

SNF games are played. It precedes SNF each Sunday, with a program airing from 7 to 8:20 p.m.

This season, FNIA has made two major on-air recruits: Drew Brees and Maria Taylor. The longtime quarterback of the New Orleans Saints, Brees retired at the end of the past season after an acclaimed career that included as a member of the winning Super Bowl XLIV team in 2010 and being named MVP of the same game. Taylor worked eight years at ESPN in roles including host of “NBA Countdown.”

Brees will join FNIA host Mike Tirico and analyst Tony Dungy, a Super Bowlwinning head coach, at the desk in Studio 1. The trio will discuss the day’s NFL action and preview that night’s SNF game.

“Getting fans back in the stands — there’s so much buzz down here in Tampa where I live for those fans to be back,” Dungy, who coached the Indianapolis Colts team that won the Super Bowl in the 2006 season, said on his show’s call. “I think that’s going to be great for the schedule we’ve got.”

Taylor will co-host FNIA and often team up in Studio 1 with analyst and former NFL quarterback Chris Simms.

On his show’s call, Tirico described Taylor as an “awesome addition” and Brees as “the perfect fit.”

NBC Sports’ coverage of the season will culminate with its broadcast of Super Bowl LVI on Feb. 13 at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif.

While most FNIA and SNF viewers still watch on NBC’s broadcast network, digital platforms account for a growing share of the audience. FNIA and SNF will stream for the first time on the Peacock Premium service every week.

“I think at the end of the day we just want to do it better, and if there is new technology that allows us to make the game more enjoyable or make it more understandable or make the experience of the viewer just better, we would obviously do it,” SNF Executive Producer Fred Gaudelli said this week on the media call for his show. “But I don’t know that that’s any different than any other season we would do it. The Super Bowl does afford you some opportunities you wouldn’t have in a normal season, but for us, I think the operative word is better, not different.”

Longtime No. 1

SNF’s run as the No. 1 prime-time program has lasted far longer than earlier dynasties. “American Idol,” which previously held the record for the longest No. 1 run, ranked at the top from 2005 to 2011.

The popularity of SNF extends to many audience groups, including 11 straight seasons as the No. 1 show among viewers in the 18-to-49 age range, a demographic highly valued by advertisers.

SNF’s viewership, however, dropped about 15 percent from 2019. A number of factors contributed to the decrease including the show competing on several nights with playoff games in Major League Baseball and the NBA. The NBA Finals were postponed from their traditional June timeframe because the 2019-20 NBA season was suspended during the first wave of the pandemic.

“A lot of people will come up to me and say ‘The ratings were down, how do you feel?’ et cetera, et cetera. I go, ‘Boy, we went all the way from No. 1, and we dropped down to No. 1,’” SNF play-by-play announcer Al Michaels said on his show’s call. “But I think we were No. 1 by a larger margin over the No. 2 show than we had been in a number of years.

“All of the ratings across the board on all shows are down, and as long as we maintain that top position, I think everybody is pretty happy,” Michaels said.

SNF still easily secured the No. 1 position again, with an average audience totaling 17.4 million viewers across broadcast and digital platforms.

Similarly, FNIA’s viewership dipped last season, but it remained No. 1 among sports-focused weekly studio shows. The show averaged 6 million viewers during the 7:30-8:15 p.m. timeframe and 10.4 million from 8-8:23 p.m. In the 2019 season, its viewership, respectively, averaged 7.3 million and 12.2 million in those time periods.

“If you look at the national windows in the first five or six weeks of the (2021) season, those games are populated with really attractive games,” Gaudelli said. “I think the NFL wanted to really jump-start the ratings at the beginning of the season to get people enthusiastic again and to get them in front of sets.

“I really feel it’s going to be better than last year, and I’m hopeful we’re going to be back to where we were in the years prior,” Gaudelli said.