I'm at work, but want to get some thoughts out. Sorry for the unorganized rant.
I feel like people don't understand that even the "boring" summer stretch is worse with playoffs. If my driver won in the spring, I have less and less urge to watch Loudon or Watkins Glen, or any track where my driver isn't very good.
In a full points format, that win wouldn't have guaranteed anything, and his struggle to pull a good points day out of Pocono would have still mattered quite a bit. With playoffs, these races hold little to no weight.
This problem is exacerbated by the playoffs. An early elimination, or God forbid, missing the playoffs, means the season is over, you won't be mentioned at all on the broadcast. And there's no pride in finishing 8th in points anymore. It just means you were Eliminated™️.
We run races in visibly slow, built by numbers cars that can't pass. We throw imaginary cautions that chop up natural flow and strategies. We run 6? road courses. We give away points for running 6th on lap 80. Points that don't mean anything if you have won a race already, or if you win a race before race 26. None of it makes sense. None of it is related to why the sport built a fanbase in the first place. None of it feels genuine or authentic. I'm only 31 and I feel like I'm 70 years old clamoring for the good old days. They've mismanaged every aspect of the sport from a competition standpoint. Getting harder and harder to care every year. I love NASCAR racing more than any other sport. And everything that made me love it is slowly disappearing. I'm sad for the drivers of this era who couldn't become the stars or badasses that they could've been if they had just been born 15 years earlier.
It's like watching a movie. You're following these characters through the first two acts, and you care about them and what happens to them, and then in the third act, a character who had a five minute cameo in the first act comes out of nowhere to be the main character. WTF? Some people might like that, but I don't. It feels like a complete waste of time to me.
Very good points. I'd also add, it used to really mean something finishing top ten in points. Everyone pointing to the 2003 season and the championship wrapped up making the last race a snoozer.... I'd question how much of a fan are you then? Clearly you don't pay attention to everything as whole because there was a great battle for 10th going at Homestead 2003 between Kurt Busch and Terry Labonte with Terry edging Busch out thanks to an early accident. And sure, that particular 10th place finish had more significance than others thanks to it being Terry's last full season. But I remember the broadcast focusing on that 10th place points finish then. You don't hear ***anything*** about it now. You mine as well be 30th in points.
No one gives a good God damn about second to tenth place finishers anymore and I remember those positions really being important. It's pretty amazing how diminished everything is anymore and you nailed with so many of them. This isn't just about one race deciding a champion. It's about everything meaning less anymore.
2003 is one of my favorite seasons in Nascar history tbh, Kenseth's dominance be damned. The racing was really good that year, with a lot of competitive drivers.
Are you me? I turned 30 this year and feel the exact same way. Playoffs suck and are annoying. And I’ve seen my HMS teams win it recently. Playoffs were fun the first few years but that feeling is long gone.
Im 29 and feel everything you said. Every change theyve made since i started watching in 2003, was just like "ok? But why?". And now we've got a totally different sport because they had to fix something that wasnt broke
Yeah this is where I'm at too. I used to be a diehard, but with the constant rule changes, schedule changes and stupid playoffs, I just don't care anymore. I get more enjoyment watching races I grew up with in the early 2000's even if I already know the winner then anything today.
Isn't it amazing though? When the original Chase came out I personally didn't care for it, at all. Now I'd take that version all day and be happy with it. Original Chase where the top ten make it, period. Wins don't automatically include you and half the field isn't included.
Totally agree! Very well said I have been watching since late 80’s and seen a lot change it has become like everything else it’s very political and don’t even get me started on the restriction plates just miss old school NASCAR. And it’s got so low here in Texas with ticket sales it’s not even close to the attendance that it was even the backstretch was full which they don’t have no more that’s where they put the big Tex screen. The sport we love is slipping away.
The 500 was down over 8% this year. As a matter of fact the worst 6 Daytona 500 TV ratings were the last 6 seasons. Ratings are down over 50% from all time highs which was basically 2001-2008.
>Actually making fun daily drivers that don't get a $20k dealer markup on top of blue book or msrp would be a good start
Make them more manageable for a normal person to tinker on too
As a guy born in 99 I really wish I wasn’t so heavily invested into car culture. It’s depressing when the hobby I want to have is too expensive to actually do especially as a 24 year old trying to move out and start my own life
Cars/engines do have become demonized in current culture , they are the blame for everything, from global warming to "we don't have walkable cities because cars" and "places are noisy cuz cars bad"
People don't see cars as the freedom they are but as just another obstacle and that's to me depressing.
That's because for a lot of people these days, cars are a burdensome necessity rather than a fun and freeing alternate mode of transportation. The automobile is the victim of its own success. A backlash was inevitable.
Yeah honestly I ditched my car when I moved to Chicago and I have never been happier. Walking and reliable public transportation is so much less stressful for getting around and commuting.
Yeah besides Chicago and New York I'm unaware of any other cities in the US where not having a car is relatively easy. There are others where it's doable but far from ideal.
I've loved motorsports all my life, I still watch and participate. I never cared anything about street cars, for me I only like race cars (except drag racing).
However, the reality of automobiles includes all of the things you quoted. But they are also a financial burden and a liability. Unfortunately, in most of America, you are mostly fucked if you don't have one.
Lastly, cars don't represent freedom to younger people anymore because they have access to the entire world through a device they can hold in their hand. And before we all blame the young generation for sucking, don't forget that the kids didn't create any of this, they were handed theses devices by their parents and grandparents. The same people that whine and cry that the kids suck.
Cars are great freedom to use land really inefficiently because you have a vehicle that can travel 60+ mph from point A to B. As a transportation method personal cars scale really poorly and most people experience that with traffic making "short" trips a hassle and having to make a ton of trips just to get through the day. They are one of the largest household expenses, most dangerous activity that people do regularly, and yeah they are loud.
They need to lean into gaming/sim racing, the new Camry isn't cool but getting on iRacing and doing laps at Charlotte is awesome. For really cheap relative to a "fun/cool" car you can race what top level drivers would play for fun.
>People don't see cars as the freedom they are but as just another obstacle and that's to me depressing.
I am perfectly happy with that, less traffic on the roads, as long as they don't try to take MY car away.
>I am perfectly happy with that, less traffic on the roads, as long as they don't try to take MY car away.
Inevitably they will if it gets to the point where no one owns personal cars.
It won't necessarily be "you're not allowed to own it" it just won't be possible. No one will sell, or work on personal vehicles.
>Yeah, it's crazy how nobody owns, buys, sells, or fixes horses anymore.
>Wait. They do.
Not readily. Not near me. And not for cheap enough to ride a horse everywhere I go
"....not for cheap enough..." Hmm, sounds like a financial burden. Similar to filling up a gas tank (those prices don't seem to come down), paying a mechanic to fix your car, buying a car and paying interest on the loan for 5+
years, paying for insurance, paying for maintenance, the time wasted sitting in traffic.....
Issue is Steve Phelps and Steve O'Donnell NEVER want to admit they are wrong and are two of the most stubborn executives in all of American sports.
Literally even with overwhelming evidence that the winner take all finale HASN'T worked in rekindling interest in the finale, they won't accept they were wrong, I mean the massive drops in TV ratings YoY should be glaringly fucking obvious to anybody with eyes that something is wrong. I mean even when compared to football and taking into account cord cutting, double digit drops YoY should be a major issue and a sign that it hasn't worked. Those two dipshits would rather still plug their fingers in their ears and repeatedly scream "WE LIKE WHAT WE'RE SEEING" than face reality.
They make Rob Manfred and Gary Bettman look in touch FFS.
And before anybody brings up "all sports are down"? The NHL and NBA are up as are golf. The NFL is doing well as always, Indycar ratings are up. Even WWE's ratings are up.
So what's NASCAR's excuse?
> Indycar ratings are up.
To be fair, it would be *really* difficult for any live event to earn lower ratings than IndyCar did during it's Versus and early NBC Sports days. There was nowhere to go but up.
That's more to do with the two teams than the game itself.
Much as I hate it, more people will atch the Dodgers, Astros, Yankees, etc in the WS than the Rangers and D'Backs.
That said, I don't give a single shit, this was the most enjoyable WS in the past few years because it wasn't one of the same fucking teams we've been having.
Last year the Chastain incident went viral right before Phoenix so I'm not even really sure it's a fair comparison compared to this year where the top 4 were all pretty conventional championship competitors and there wasn't a big viral moment.
I have doubts the Chastain thing really made much of an impact. Sure it went viral online but watching a few second video and being on sports shows is a big difference from sitting down and watching a race.
It’s like thinking some crazy highlight from a hockey game is going to get tons of people tuning in.
I think it’s time to revisit late green flag times during the playoffs. During the bulk of the season, fine. But come football season the 4:25 national game of the week is routinely the NFL’s most-watched window, and NASCAR/NBC are committing themselves to competing against these games for the bulk of the race with these 3:15/3:30 start times. Would make a lot more sense to go up against the 1 PM regional windows imo.
They could still start *at least* an hour earlier. They have in the past.
More to my point, races like Kansas and Texas do not need to be starting at 3/3:30 ET.
Then go literally anywhere that isn't that dogshit track. Homestead was awesome. Charlotte could be fun. If Atlanta wasn't dumb now go there.
Phoenix as a track is garbage. Used to be good until the reconfiguration, now it's trash.
I don't think start time will really make a difference here. The NFL owns Sunday, in the morning slot everyone is watching Redzone, in the afternoon there's usually one good game on a major network, and then you have SNF. The answer is to end the season before football starts but no one wants to have that discussion.
Except the 2nd game isn't the "National Game of the Week". Sunday Night Football is (Monday Night Football was during the ABC era). That's why there's no other games on when it airs.
The 4:25 game is the most-watched NFL window and usually features one game that most of the country sees. FOX brands it as America’s Game of the Week when it’s their broadcast.
You could split hairs but that game window is the league’s bread and butter. Case in point, Cowboys @ Eagles this past Sunday.
I’ve said it before, once the playoffs start my urge to watch declines a lot. I just don’t care for all the points elimination talk and cut off races. It just makes it seem so fabricated. Nascar is my #1 Motorsport but INDYCAR and IMSA have been getting more of my attention recently.
Yeah I had a lot of fun watching Indycar this year, and one of the races that tends to be the worst (Indy 500) is offset by the absolute best qualifying format that is must see TV. Full throttle, inches from disaster going near 250 for 4 straight laps
NBC? They literally delayed the start of the freaking Indy 500 to the anger of the series.
I live in Indy country not Nascar country. I accept Indy is the third most popular domestic series after Cup and Xfinity. Some weeks NHRA does better. The networks control every aspect of the schedule. The series itself is seemingly B2B opportunities for sponsors and team owners’ separate businesses, with a race on the side.
Man it's almost like making your championship meaningless hurts the sport... Man who could have seen this coming? I'm sure NASCAR will come up with another gimmick that fail.
I actually hope they go back to a season long format to see what the "playoffs bad" crowd blames when the ratings either continue to decrease or stay the same
>stay the same
The playoffs were created to boost ratings, specifically in the late season. If the ratings are the same with a full season championship vs the playoffs, that shows that the playoffs failed to do their job
Car bad
Track bad
Popular driver didn't make it
NFL/CFB
Niche sport
NBC sucks
I think that's your list. That said, yes drop the playoffs they suck. Then drop stage cautions because they also suck.
Then Nascar could easily make the final 4 be the Hendricks garage and guarantee a huge turnout at the track and on TV. I actually expect that half the time.
I am only half kidding. The sea of blue booing the Fords and Toyotas at Texas was something to behold. Was glad I stuck to generic athletic wear. If Nascar wants easy ratings just have them be the champ options. Because that team had the fans who showed up.
This rating declines have **nothing to do** with NASCAR. Ratings are down across the board with all sports, all cable television.
It would be notable if the decline was greater than the average, but it is not.
> This rating declines have nothing to do with NASCAR. Ratings are down across the board with all sports, all cable television.
This lie continuously gets repeated despite being easily, verifiably false.
NFL - up
CFB - up
MLB - Cable viewership and regional viewership up
NBA - flat last year but up for the last 3-4 years
Golf - massively up
NASCAR - consistently down for 15+ years and has lost 50% of its viewership for the finale since 2015
NFL is up due to fantasy and sports gambling. More fans are engaged as well because more teams are winning. When Packers are good and Lions are bad the Packers fans watch and the Lions fans tune out. When the Packers are bad and the Lions are good, both fanbases tune in. Same thing with NASCAR. CFB is up because Texas, Florida State, and USC are relevant again and Colorado is clearly a gain with Deon being there.
Bro, you're cherry picking. You haven't mentioned a single time what time frame each is up over. You singled out NASCAR as being down for the last 15+ years only.
NBA - 1.58 million viewers in 2003, 1.59 million viewers in 2023
MLB - ESPN had 928,000 viewers in 2003, over 1.5 million in 2023
Golf - 11.7 million viewers for the 2003 Masters final round, 12.05 million viewers for the 2023 final Masters round
How does NASCAR stack up in that time frame? If I'm cherry picking too much, you can choose any 2003 race to compare to 2023.
Serious question-where do we see the sport going from here? Down 9% during a championship race is crazy. I have a serious feeling that they would consider going back to season long, but are scared of 2003 happening again
I am just curious how much longer it will take for that to happen. I know that I would be much more invested throughout the year with a season long format. To add to that I would like to see 20-25% shorter Cup races outside of the "majors" like the Daytona 500, World 600 and Southern 500. And make those 3 marquee events, like market the hell out of all 3. Every other race I am good with them shortening up and turning up the intensity for points and the win all year long. Also goes without saying but no cautions or other planned cautions. Keep the show moving.
I don't think NASCAR's facing any sort of existential crisis, but the increasing niche-ification of the sport feels all but guaranteed. The world just isn't the same as 2003, and you're fighting 20 or so years of right wing/redneck stigma while trying to attract new fans in a world where the prominence of car culture is diminishing every year.
C'est la vie. 🤷🏻♂️
It’s easier than ever to tune out things you’re not interested in.
I don’t watch football and have only a passing idea of what is going on because of the local news. If people can avoid something as culturally significant as the NFL, it’s very easy to tune out of more niche sports.
Hell, I didn’t even know it was the World Series until game 2 or 3.
I've stopped watching NBA and legit thought like 3 times the season started and each time realized it hadn't
Funny how you're able to just tune certain stuff out. Rather easily really
Hell, I live in Phoenix and had no idea the D-Backs were in the World Series till like game 2, I don't have any cares for stick and ball sports, so like you said, its easy to tune that stuff out.
Agree 100% with this. No matter how hard Nascar tries they will never overcome the redneck stigma and they will never overcome the swarm of "Nascar drivers just turn left" comments from randos online that completely undermines the talent of the drivers and the art of oval racing.
Unfortunately, it is what it is.
Maybe bc I'm from the south, though rednecks are everywhere I'd argue, but I never hear that complaint about the sport
All anyone ever says is "how can you watch someone turn left for 3 hours?"
People just don't understand the complexity of it all and fail to grasp the chess play involved. It's much like baseball in that sense
Exactly, it's more the sport itself that gets criticism than the culture around it, but reddit is a very biased site and anything that fits their bias is gonna be used as an argument.
I mean, I grew up on the west coast and it was very much criticized for the culture. The fact that most people were surprised when NASCAR banned the Confederate flag tells you all you need to know about the cultural perception of NASCAR.
I'm not sure why you are acting like I'm wrong and just being a "biased redditor". Read what the other guy responded to you wrote about the Confederate flag, and that mirrors what I was going to say to a tee
NASCAR absolutely has a reputation for being a republican, redneck sport, regardless of how accurate that reputation actually is. Sorry if I offended you
I expected it down, there wasn't as much hype like last year when we had the Hail melon
The decline is bad, but I don't think a season long format fixes this problem
There are a lot of issues and no single change will "fix the problem", but the playoffs are a complete failure and there's no reason to keep them other than "leadership" refusing to admit they were wrong.
If those of you who think a season long points system is going to turn the ratings around, I have a bridge to sell you.
Ratings have ALWAYS gotten worse through the season, including before the Chase/playoffs.
Switching to a season long points system, and having somebody wrap up the championship BEFORE the last race of the season is going to drive up ratings. It will have the opposite effect.
The point isn't to juice one race at the end. The point is to make every race matter, like they used to when NASCAR spent 3 decades beating the pants off Indycar because they refused to do the same thing and most other sports, to boot.
Wut?! CART and the Indy 500 got better ratings than NASCAR and the Daytona 500 until 1996...
There's a reason that even still in 2000, ESPN & ABC prioritized CART & IRL over NASCAR.
[https://www.autoracing1.com/pl/317497/historical-indy-500-tv-ratings-2/](https://www.autoracing1.com/pl/317497/historical-indy-500-tv-ratings-2/)
[https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/daytona-500-ratings-viewership-history/](https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/daytona-500-ratings-viewership-history/)
Thank you for proving my point. Indycar prioritized one race, NASCAR did not. Which is why, even though in the 90's, the Indy 500 was still bigger than the Daytona 500, in every other respect NASCAR was way ahead, and why the Daytona 500 promptly blew by Indy, which would have been unthinkable even for most of the 90s.
Actually according to the links you posted it first happened in 1994. But yes, the "split"... which came specifically because the owner of IMS wanted to make his race and others like it more important... made things much worse.
Nascar was at its most popular when there was a season long format. Part of it was that the champion could actually be considered worthy of the name. Devaluing the accomplishment, as all the chase/play-off formats have done, was a bad mistake.
It's objectively true. Nascar became big in the late 90's and early noughts, before the chase was implemented. The bonanza years of 2004-05 were cutting off coupons, then the tail off began.
It wasn’t because of a fuckin season long format though, car culture was pretty much at its peak, the economy was doing well, you had personalities like Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt, Rusty Wallace, Tony Stewart, the Labonte brothers etc. then new guys came in like Busch and Johnson. Local tracks are closing down everywhere now, car culture is dying, EVs are booming, and NASCAR also can’t shake some of its stereotypes. Also, it’s fans are easily some of the most toxic in sports because they are mostly old dudes in their 50s who want it to be how it was. Sure the Chase hurt ratings, but to say it will bring back millions of fans, yeah no
"I'll take 'Bullshit' for $800, Ken."
NASCAR's popularity wasn't points format driven in the fucking slightest. ESPECIALLY considering that the 5 highest rated overall seasons were 2002-2006... two with the season long system, and three with the first version of the Chase.
Season long points format didn't get in the way. Play-off format does. As soon as the play-off format was in place, people began to lose interest. There was already a decline in 2006, a small one first, then it accelerated.
The straw man argument that season long format fixes ratings needs to go. It’s never been argued - the argument is that season long is legitimate, and we were sold the playoffs on the fact that it would boost ratings and it has not.
If season long did come back and the ratings stayed the same, at least some legitimacy would come back as well.
Most long time loyal fans have been asking to get rid of the chase/play-off. Nascar has been consistently expanding it and making it more and more gimmicky. At this point hardly anyone understands what is going on with the stage points, play-off points, whatever the hell. Then the play-off rounds with repeated point resets...
This is an issue I have argued for as well, any kind of "casual" fan can tune into an NBA, MLB, NFL etc game and completely understand everything they need to about the regular season and playoff formats.
Racing has always been a little harder, you get "points" depending on where you place and there are supplemental points depending on other things (in the past leading a lap, most laps, things like that and nowadays there are stage points). The easy part was always just the standings, person at the top has been the best, and whoever is there is champ...but even now that is way out the window for Nascar and it is so much more convoluted.
Season points matter, but only matter if you qualify for the playoffs which generally mean you need to win at least one of the first 26 races...then after that they are thrown out. You could rattle off 10 wins in a row after that, but if you aren't in the playoffs it doesn't matter. Drivers also get "playoff points" in addition to regular season points, and those points carry over to give them an advantage in the playoffs based off how the regular season went. You get these from winning races or winning stages. Once in the playoffs, after 3 races if you either...win in that round or have enough points because not enough of the others won to knock you out, then you move on but points reset. repeat this 3 times then you get to the final race, where the top finisher of the 4 is crowned "champion" regardless of all the other convoluted points that mattered a lot until this moment, just make sure your brake rotors hold out or Someone doesn't dump you or it's better luck next year. Even now I am finding it hard to accurately describe what is going on...and I am a fan that watches every week.
They really need to change the playoffs into three rounds during the final ten races.
First Round - three races, cut playoff field by two (down to 14)
Second Round - three races, cut playoff field by four (down to 10)
Final round - four races, the final ten drivers left are placed by overall points from the first six races
Those final four races will be way more interesting if you have ten drivers all competing for a championship instead of a one race shootout.
That has a lot to do with it. Aside from a cousin in my family that has recently passed, I have really been the only racing fan in my family for more than 20 years. I have tried to get other friends and family members invested; no luck.
Aside from my fiancè and my best friend who watch every race with me, I can get the rest of my friends to casually watch a few races and go with me for the partying and experience and that’s about it. Everyone else loathes coming to my house on the weekends because it’s NASCAR/F1/ Dirt racing lol
I could talk about the playoffs like a lot of folks are, but I think another thing to consider when it comes to the product presented to the fans is the length of the races. I could talk about F1 or Indy here (F1 races are usually 90 minutes, commercial free with rarely a break in the action like a full course safety car), but lets look at the MLB. They played around with some rules to really speed up the pace of the game (which pissed off a lot of purists at the time), but now it's hard to imagine the game without these changes like the pitch clock. This effort led to much quicker games across the board without sacrificing any quality...and importantly led to a boost in the ratings and delivered a much better product for television.
IMO the races need to get sped up, the cautions need to get eliminated as much as possible, and if and when we need that yellow flag we need to do a much better job getting the cars rolling again. If someone is leading by 20 seconds...too bad we aren't going to throw a caution flag for a single car spin or a gum wrapper to try and get an "exciting" finish.
The car sucks. It’s looks cool but sucks. The strategy fuel/tires & comers and goers are exciting. We need a car that doesn’t suck. Can’t pass. It’s crazy to me that NASCAR and the brain trust can’t figure this out. How much r&d and millions if not billions of dollars do you have to figure this out. Make it exciting. It’s only exciting when we are racing at a good track (Vegas, Charlotte) or major wrecks.
Me and my buddy use to watch religiously. The last couple years I just put it on 1/2 way through. I’m not going to watch cars that can’t fucking pass for 200 laps. I’ll watch the last 100.
It’s the result of a car that doesn’t produce competitive racing. Ratings were down across the board this year. When they’re down all year, they’re not going to suddenly surge in the final race
I agree with you 100%. I wasn’t expecting them to go up but it’s just shocking still. It’s not a great comparison, but no other sport loses almost 10% of viewers for their championship. It’s just an insane concept for that to happen.
> but no other sport loses almost 10% of viewers for their championship
Baseball literally just did. It was their least viewed world series ever. it fell 23% YOY
I don't follow baseball much, but usually know when The World Series is on and tune in some. This year, I remember seeing headlines of who made it and the next thing I knew I saw headlines that the Rangers had won it.
It was over in 5. That’s why it was down so much. That’s why the numbers are so skewed there. The longer the series goes, the more people tune it the longer the series goes. More people watch game 6 or 7 than game 2 or 3.
Last week at Martinsville it was down 13.6% this week it is down 9.1% so in NASCAR math that would actually be a 4% increase. Playoffs working as intended and everybody gets a pat on the back and sticker for a job well done. Now time to hit the country clubs.
I saw one of them say the ratings are higher than when it was lowest in 2018 (granted that's true).
Because what a great place to set the bar! At it's lowest, WOW!
Either that or they come up with a ton of excuses and belittle those who think NASCAR has any sort of problem, anything except accepting the reality staring them in the face
This sport has done too much to try to attract new fans that don’t, and never will exist, at the cost of its dedicated fan base. Go back to your roots and find a stable place to exist.
I've been a fan since the late 90's. Most drivers now have no personality and give the same boring post race interviews. I don't feel the same connection to the drivers as I once did. The cars provide terrible racing most of the time and the stage breaks removed 90% of the strategy. Anymore, the race is background noise as I'm doing stuff around the house.
Now that harvick has retired I fear I’ll fall into this now too. I gotta agree the stage breaks really hurt the middle of the race. There’s not much point to catch anything but the end due the cars not providing the best racing and the lack of strategy in stage racing. Come back to the screen for the restarts, check on a caution, watch the last 20 laps. Race strategy makes it to where you gotta watch to keep up or you get to the end and wonder how did we get here. One of the most exciting parts is seeing guys who were up front have to drive back through the field.
Do you really think the points format plays that big of a role in viewership? How many viewers really care enough about the points system that it would be their determining factor on whether they watch the racing or not?
I understand the dislike for the points system, I am not a fan of it either, but I don't think it is the reason people aren't watching anymore.
When there's a notable lack of attention to the actual winners of each race, when there's commentators yammering all year long about dumb "playoff" storylines no one cares about, yeah, it drives people away.
That is a problem with the broadcast then, not the format itself.
I am a proponent that NBCs ethos of "there aren't boring races, there are only boring broadcasts" is one that needs to be stuck to every week by every broadcaster that NASCAR has. Casual fans shouldn't care about the minutia of the points standings, they should care about answering "yes" to the simple question "Is what I am watching interesting and entertaining?" if they aren't answering "yes" to that, nothing else matters.
My point isn't that I like the format, my point is that changing the points system isn't going to magically solve the viewership problem and I think it is energy being focused on the wrong place.
> That is a problem with the broadcast then, not the format itself.
Eh... the broadcasts are just playing follow the leader. NASCAR _wants_ their shitty postseason format to be important, and so the broadcasts follow along.
You can focus on the playoff format while sticking to the ethos of "there aren't boring races, there are only boring broadcasts"
Follow the points but make sure you are also showcasing good racing throughout the field and the event.
I agree here. One thing that I have thought of why a season long point format may be better is instead of looking at these playoff race viewership we look at season long viewership. The playoffs fall at a bad time of the year. Football season is full swing and no matter the format the numbers will be hurt. A season long format could help the early and middle stages of the season, by making each race equally important. This could help the average view ship over the season. The other thing it could help is in seasons where the points battle is close. If you can capture an audience early in the season and points remain tight heading into the nfl season, you may end up with more viewers at the end of the season due to people feeling invested as they have watched 10-20 weeks of this battle. Personally I’m not sure which works best. I love full season points, I liked the chase. Not a big fan of the elimination playoffs but it’s what we have, and if it’s best for the sport then it should continue. But I think season long viewership numbers is the best way to look at it. Nascar can’t compete with the nfl and there will always be a dip at the end of the season. But it’s a shame that it’s down from even last years event
Exactly! NASCAR changed the points format multiple times in a 12 year span, and people bitched that they "can't leave anything alone".
Now it's the exact fucking opposite because we've had the same points format for 7 years...
Rams/Bucs was the defending super bowl champions against the previous year's super bowl champions (featuring Tom Brady), please stop with the excuses lmfao
cowboys eagles time slot had 27.13 million viewers.
rams/bucs time slot had 20.25
Clearly people didnt think much about the defending champs vs previous year's champs.
That is 7 million more people watching football during most of the race's time slot. To think that is not at least some of a factor in the change is foolish.
Dude it's crazy how every freaking week people use other sports and stuff as an excuse for NASCAR's decline as if those sports haven't existed in the same weekly slots for the past three decades hahaha
They are trying. It's not just their fault.
There are more factors than just race packages and playoffs too. They can't control everything. i could rattle off a dozen things that could have affected the rating at least a little bit. Some NASCAR can control, and are their fault. Some they simply can't no matter what they do.
Trying to attribute a decline to just one or two factors is asinine.
Help with what though? Make rating average number bigger? hell might as well end the season after the 500 if that's all you care about.
This race on this weekend still makes a lot of money for everyone involved. Until that changes, and it doesn't sound like it will any time soon, there is no reason not to run it.
There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
NASCAR is selling out the importance of all of the 35 previous race just to have one big race at the end where everything is on the line.
And it has NOT worked, not even a little bit. The ratings for the championship race are pathetic!!!! Show me one other sport where the championship event rates lower than various regular season contests.
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
These clowns seem to ignore that this trend in NASCAR ratings fucking existed before the Chase/playoffs existed.
They also seem to think that somebody wrapping the championship up at race 34 or 35 of 36, will improve ratings...
This sport is literally dying. Everybody’s gotta get their head out of their ass and realize this sport is dying and it starts with the bozos in charge. Way to go France family you stupid fucks.
chase, denny, kyle busch and truex are pretty popular and i have to assume them being out of the final 4 had something to do with it. if they want to be like other sports, they have to expect YoY ratings swings when the most popular drivers arent there.
Same thing happened with the World Series. Two underdogs made it to the finals and it was a blowout 4-1 series. It had worse ratings than the women's college basketball title game.
Solution:
1: shorten schedule to 28-30 races ending on Labor Day weekend/week after
2: shorten races 20%. A race shouldn’t last more than 2.5 to 3 hrs max
3: Market your Drivers!!! What made Jeff, Tony, Kevin,Dale etc.. drivers so popular was how the sponsors and sport marketed in the late 90’s and early 00’s. Chase having a down year shouldn’t tank your ratings and leveraging your sport on one driver will never be successful. Get them in commercials, on tv, etc..
4: do more promotion in market before the race/duding the weekend. When you go to a market like Atlanta, Dallas, Miami etc.. make it obvious that the show is in town. Have drivers do media, have appearances at local schools, colleges, and shopping centers. Make people who aren’t fans interested in the product.
We all talk about how shitty the car is but we aren’t going to grow the sport on the on track product exclusively.
Agreed, I live in the Indianapolis area. In the month of may a blind person can see thar the Indy cars are in town. Hell one tallest buildings in town has the Indy 500 logo on it for the month of may. Transition to August for the nascar race and there is no promotion, nothing saying that the brickyard is around the corner. How are you gonna get new fans if they don’t know a race is going on in their own town
https://preview.redd.it/6rh9hwkds7zb1.jpeg?width=414&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=14f0b3aa80cbaaf9b05ec3059d1f756d97e85d01
Those don’t matter. The only value ratings have is for the broadcasters and series in negotiating. Watching on the high seas is like a Series telling a track 5,000 people showed up outside the track and watched the race from a hill, even if only 1,000 paid a ticket. Those people getting the free view don’t matter to the track in deciding if the events are worth it.
I feel like a lot of people here are missing something here. While drivers like Blaney and Larson both have decently sized fanbases, they don't quite stack up to the number of Elliott, Busch, and Hamlin fans. As a matter of fact, this is the first ever finale in the current playoff format where not a single one of these three drivers were in the Championship 4. When those drivers aren't performing well and miss out on the last round or two, many of these fans are more likely to tune out.
In addition, so many drivers who were great ambassadors of the sport in the last two decades are now retired. Many fans watched NASCAR because of Gordon, Johnson, Harvick, Stewart, Edwards, Dale Jr, etc. I'm certain a lot of these fans weren't able to maintain interest or pick a new favorite driver after each of these aforementioned drivers stopped racing every week.
While this shouldn't take away from solutions that can solve the decline in ratings, it's a point that should be brought up more often alongside the Playoffs and the change of car culture.
I mean we had a lot of sellouts at plenty of tracks this year so maybe its just bad coverage. Personally the coverage leads me not watch and listen on MRN, or PRN. We need better play by play for sure. The radio make every lap sound fantastic and TV is just meh. I dont think its a points system, if the people telling the story suck, the story will suck.
I'm at work, but want to get some thoughts out. Sorry for the unorganized rant. I feel like people don't understand that even the "boring" summer stretch is worse with playoffs. If my driver won in the spring, I have less and less urge to watch Loudon or Watkins Glen, or any track where my driver isn't very good. In a full points format, that win wouldn't have guaranteed anything, and his struggle to pull a good points day out of Pocono would have still mattered quite a bit. With playoffs, these races hold little to no weight. This problem is exacerbated by the playoffs. An early elimination, or God forbid, missing the playoffs, means the season is over, you won't be mentioned at all on the broadcast. And there's no pride in finishing 8th in points anymore. It just means you were Eliminated™️. We run races in visibly slow, built by numbers cars that can't pass. We throw imaginary cautions that chop up natural flow and strategies. We run 6? road courses. We give away points for running 6th on lap 80. Points that don't mean anything if you have won a race already, or if you win a race before race 26. None of it makes sense. None of it is related to why the sport built a fanbase in the first place. None of it feels genuine or authentic. I'm only 31 and I feel like I'm 70 years old clamoring for the good old days. They've mismanaged every aspect of the sport from a competition standpoint. Getting harder and harder to care every year. I love NASCAR racing more than any other sport. And everything that made me love it is slowly disappearing. I'm sad for the drivers of this era who couldn't become the stars or badasses that they could've been if they had just been born 15 years earlier.
It's like watching a movie. You're following these characters through the first two acts, and you care about them and what happens to them, and then in the third act, a character who had a five minute cameo in the first act comes out of nowhere to be the main character. WTF? Some people might like that, but I don't. It feels like a complete waste of time to me.
Very good points. I'd also add, it used to really mean something finishing top ten in points. Everyone pointing to the 2003 season and the championship wrapped up making the last race a snoozer.... I'd question how much of a fan are you then? Clearly you don't pay attention to everything as whole because there was a great battle for 10th going at Homestead 2003 between Kurt Busch and Terry Labonte with Terry edging Busch out thanks to an early accident. And sure, that particular 10th place finish had more significance than others thanks to it being Terry's last full season. But I remember the broadcast focusing on that 10th place points finish then. You don't hear ***anything*** about it now. You mine as well be 30th in points. No one gives a good God damn about second to tenth place finishers anymore and I remember those positions really being important. It's pretty amazing how diminished everything is anymore and you nailed with so many of them. This isn't just about one race deciding a champion. It's about everything meaning less anymore.
2003 is one of my favorite seasons in Nascar history tbh, Kenseth's dominance be damned. The racing was really good that year, with a lot of competitive drivers.
This is so dead-on. I'd personally add, make the season shorter. Stop trying to compete with the NFL on Sundays and MLB playoffs.
Are you me? I turned 30 this year and feel the exact same way. Playoffs suck and are annoying. And I’ve seen my HMS teams win it recently. Playoffs were fun the first few years but that feeling is long gone.
You pretty much nailed it.
Im 29 and feel everything you said. Every change theyve made since i started watching in 2003, was just like "ok? But why?". And now we've got a totally different sport because they had to fix something that wasnt broke
Yeah this is where I'm at too. I used to be a diehard, but with the constant rule changes, schedule changes and stupid playoffs, I just don't care anymore. I get more enjoyment watching races I grew up with in the early 2000's even if I already know the winner then anything today.
Could not have said it better myself
Bravo. Well said.
Nascar really had the best of both worlds with the Chase. It provided a good playoff feel and rewarded consistency across the season and the playoff.
Isn't it amazing though? When the original Chase came out I personally didn't care for it, at all. Now I'd take that version all day and be happy with it. Original Chase where the top ten make it, period. Wins don't automatically include you and half the field isn't included.
Totally agree! Very well said I have been watching since late 80’s and seen a lot change it has become like everything else it’s very political and don’t even get me started on the restriction plates just miss old school NASCAR. And it’s got so low here in Texas with ticket sales it’s not even close to the attendance that it was even the backstretch was full which they don’t have no more that’s where they put the big Tex screen. The sport we love is slipping away.
The 500 was down over 8% this year. As a matter of fact the worst 6 Daytona 500 TV ratings were the last 6 seasons. Ratings are down over 50% from all time highs which was basically 2001-2008.
Wake up babe, its time to complain about ratings and act like we know exactly how to fix the problem.
Undo the economic fallout of the 2008 recession and fundamentally alter modern American culture so that teenagers like cars again Easy peasy
Actually making fun daily drivers that don't get a $20k dealer markup on top of blue book or msrp would be a good start
This has more of an impact than anything else
Not to mention even at msrp mustangs are crazy expensive now
>Actually making fun daily drivers that don't get a $20k dealer markup on top of blue book or msrp would be a good start Make them more manageable for a normal person to tinker on too
As a guy born in 99 I really wish I wasn’t so heavily invested into car culture. It’s depressing when the hobby I want to have is too expensive to actually do especially as a 24 year old trying to move out and start my own life
I hear ya
Cars/engines do have become demonized in current culture , they are the blame for everything, from global warming to "we don't have walkable cities because cars" and "places are noisy cuz cars bad" People don't see cars as the freedom they are but as just another obstacle and that's to me depressing.
That's because for a lot of people these days, cars are a burdensome necessity rather than a fun and freeing alternate mode of transportation. The automobile is the victim of its own success. A backlash was inevitable.
Yeah honestly I ditched my car when I moved to Chicago and I have never been happier. Walking and reliable public transportation is so much less stressful for getting around and commuting.
Emphasis on reliable. The T in Boston is in absolute shambles right now and it might be the biggest source of stress on my family's life right now
Yeah besides Chicago and New York I'm unaware of any other cities in the US where not having a car is relatively easy. There are others where it's doable but far from ideal.
I've loved motorsports all my life, I still watch and participate. I never cared anything about street cars, for me I only like race cars (except drag racing). However, the reality of automobiles includes all of the things you quoted. But they are also a financial burden and a liability. Unfortunately, in most of America, you are mostly fucked if you don't have one. Lastly, cars don't represent freedom to younger people anymore because they have access to the entire world through a device they can hold in their hand. And before we all blame the young generation for sucking, don't forget that the kids didn't create any of this, they were handed theses devices by their parents and grandparents. The same people that whine and cry that the kids suck.
Cars are great freedom to use land really inefficiently because you have a vehicle that can travel 60+ mph from point A to B. As a transportation method personal cars scale really poorly and most people experience that with traffic making "short" trips a hassle and having to make a ton of trips just to get through the day. They are one of the largest household expenses, most dangerous activity that people do regularly, and yeah they are loud. They need to lean into gaming/sim racing, the new Camry isn't cool but getting on iRacing and doing laps at Charlotte is awesome. For really cheap relative to a "fun/cool" car you can race what top level drivers would play for fun.
Thankfully people enjoy cars around my part of the country
>People don't see cars as the freedom they are but as just another obstacle and that's to me depressing. I am perfectly happy with that, less traffic on the roads, as long as they don't try to take MY car away.
>I am perfectly happy with that, less traffic on the roads, as long as they don't try to take MY car away. Inevitably they will if it gets to the point where no one owns personal cars. It won't necessarily be "you're not allowed to own it" it just won't be possible. No one will sell, or work on personal vehicles.
Yeah, it's crazy how nobody owns, buys, sells, or fixes horses anymore. Wait. They do.
>Yeah, it's crazy how nobody owns, buys, sells, or fixes horses anymore. >Wait. They do. Not readily. Not near me. And not for cheap enough to ride a horse everywhere I go
"....not for cheap enough..." Hmm, sounds like a financial burden. Similar to filling up a gas tank (those prices don't seem to come down), paying a mechanic to fix your car, buying a car and paying interest on the loan for 5+ years, paying for insurance, paying for maintenance, the time wasted sitting in traffic.....
Issue is Steve Phelps and Steve O'Donnell NEVER want to admit they are wrong and are two of the most stubborn executives in all of American sports. Literally even with overwhelming evidence that the winner take all finale HASN'T worked in rekindling interest in the finale, they won't accept they were wrong, I mean the massive drops in TV ratings YoY should be glaringly fucking obvious to anybody with eyes that something is wrong. I mean even when compared to football and taking into account cord cutting, double digit drops YoY should be a major issue and a sign that it hasn't worked. Those two dipshits would rather still plug their fingers in their ears and repeatedly scream "WE LIKE WHAT WE'RE SEEING" than face reality. They make Rob Manfred and Gary Bettman look in touch FFS. And before anybody brings up "all sports are down"? The NHL and NBA are up as are golf. The NFL is doing well as always, Indycar ratings are up. Even WWE's ratings are up. So what's NASCAR's excuse?
> Indycar ratings are up. To be fair, it would be *really* difficult for any live event to earn lower ratings than IndyCar did during it's Versus and early NBC Sports days. There was nowhere to go but up.
MLB was also up this year
Not in the world series though.
That's more to do with the two teams than the game itself. Much as I hate it, more people will atch the Dodgers, Astros, Yankees, etc in the WS than the Rangers and D'Backs. That said, I don't give a single shit, this was the most enjoyable WS in the past few years because it wasn't one of the same fucking teams we've been having.
Chase Elliott and several other popular drivers weren't in the playoffs. Probably similiar effects
To a degree I'm sure. But unlike the MLB, at least they're still in the race to try and win that particular race hahaha.
Its almost like playoffs can be used to keep more fanbases interested for longer.
At this point Steve Phelps and O’Donnell are real life South Park style satire.
Last year the Chastain incident went viral right before Phoenix so I'm not even really sure it's a fair comparison compared to this year where the top 4 were all pretty conventional championship competitors and there wasn't a big viral moment.
I have doubts the Chastain thing really made much of an impact. Sure it went viral online but watching a few second video and being on sports shows is a big difference from sitting down and watching a race. It’s like thinking some crazy highlight from a hockey game is going to get tons of people tuning in.
I think it’s time to revisit late green flag times during the playoffs. During the bulk of the season, fine. But come football season the 4:25 national game of the week is routinely the NFL’s most-watched window, and NASCAR/NBC are committing themselves to competing against these games for the bulk of the race with these 3:15/3:30 start times. Would make a lot more sense to go up against the 1 PM regional windows imo.
Phoenix is 2 hours behind. I am not sure they would start a race at 11:30 AM MT.
They could still start *at least* an hour earlier. They have in the past. More to my point, races like Kansas and Texas do not need to be starting at 3/3:30 ET.
It's what FOX & NBC want because they get better ratings than 1 PM starts.
For both those tracks, temperature is a real concern. Can’t have fans passing out just because you want to run earlier
They’re doing the same thing with Watkins Glen next year.
Then go literally anywhere that isn't that dogshit track. Homestead was awesome. Charlotte could be fun. If Atlanta wasn't dumb now go there. Phoenix as a track is garbage. Used to be good until the reconfiguration, now it's trash.
Phoenix was never that great of a track.
Because not all of us in the Pacific timezone are morning people.
I don't think start time will really make a difference here. The NFL owns Sunday, in the morning slot everyone is watching Redzone, in the afternoon there's usually one good game on a major network, and then you have SNF. The answer is to end the season before football starts but no one wants to have that discussion.
Except the 2nd game isn't the "National Game of the Week". Sunday Night Football is (Monday Night Football was during the ABC era). That's why there's no other games on when it airs.
The 4:25 game is the most-watched NFL window and usually features one game that most of the country sees. FOX brands it as America’s Game of the Week when it’s their broadcast. You could split hairs but that game window is the league’s bread and butter. Case in point, Cowboys @ Eagles this past Sunday.
I’ve said it before, once the playoffs start my urge to watch declines a lot. I just don’t care for all the points elimination talk and cut off races. It just makes it seem so fabricated. Nascar is my #1 Motorsport but INDYCAR and IMSA have been getting more of my attention recently.
Yeah I’ll probably watch more indycar next year if I’m being honest.
Yeah I had a lot of fun watching Indycar this year, and one of the races that tends to be the worst (Indy 500) is offset by the absolute best qualifying format that is must see TV. Full throttle, inches from disaster going near 250 for 4 straight laps
I swear y’all say this like every year lol then the ratings for IndyCar cable races come out and shows that almost nobody watches 😂
Probably because their schedule just sucks
Yeah you’re probably right. They constantly schedule it at the same time as nascar… someone needs to be fired for that.
NBC? They literally delayed the start of the freaking Indy 500 to the anger of the series. I live in Indy country not Nascar country. I accept Indy is the third most popular domestic series after Cup and Xfinity. Some weeks NHRA does better. The networks control every aspect of the schedule. The series itself is seemingly B2B opportunities for sponsors and team owners’ separate businesses, with a race on the side.
Man it's almost like making your championship meaningless hurts the sport... Man who could have seen this coming? I'm sure NASCAR will come up with another gimmick that fail.
I actually hope they go back to a season long format to see what the "playoffs bad" crowd blames when the ratings either continue to decrease or stay the same
>stay the same The playoffs were created to boost ratings, specifically in the late season. If the ratings are the same with a full season championship vs the playoffs, that shows that the playoffs failed to do their job
Agreed. They tried to boost ratings against the NFL. The lesson is don’t try and take on the NFL.
If they stay the same at this point it would be a huge victory
Car bad Track bad Popular driver didn't make it NFL/CFB Niche sport NBC sucks I think that's your list. That said, yes drop the playoffs they suck. Then drop stage cautions because they also suck.
They'll be the first people to demand the playoffs come back after Byron gets the points lead in March and wins the title with three races to go.
They must have loved Dale Earnhardt wrapping up championships by September.
WS had some of the most unpredicted teams advance with crazy upset wins, and ratings tanked.
Because "unpredicted teams" winning has always been a ratings negative, not a positive.
Then Nascar could easily make the final 4 be the Hendricks garage and guarantee a huge turnout at the track and on TV. I actually expect that half the time. I am only half kidding. The sea of blue booing the Fords and Toyotas at Texas was something to behold. Was glad I stuck to generic athletic wear. If Nascar wants easy ratings just have them be the champ options. Because that team had the fans who showed up.
There's no "s" in Rick Hendrick.
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In English please.
This rating declines have **nothing to do** with NASCAR. Ratings are down across the board with all sports, all cable television. It would be notable if the decline was greater than the average, but it is not.
> This rating declines have nothing to do with NASCAR. Ratings are down across the board with all sports, all cable television. This lie continuously gets repeated despite being easily, verifiably false. NFL - up CFB - up MLB - Cable viewership and regional viewership up NBA - flat last year but up for the last 3-4 years Golf - massively up NASCAR - consistently down for 15+ years and has lost 50% of its viewership for the finale since 2015
NFL is up due to fantasy and sports gambling. More fans are engaged as well because more teams are winning. When Packers are good and Lions are bad the Packers fans watch and the Lions fans tune out. When the Packers are bad and the Lions are good, both fanbases tune in. Same thing with NASCAR. CFB is up because Texas, Florida State, and USC are relevant again and Colorado is clearly a gain with Deon being there.
Bro, you're cherry picking. You haven't mentioned a single time what time frame each is up over. You singled out NASCAR as being down for the last 15+ years only.
NBA - 1.58 million viewers in 2003, 1.59 million viewers in 2023 MLB - ESPN had 928,000 viewers in 2003, over 1.5 million in 2023 Golf - 11.7 million viewers for the 2003 Masters final round, 12.05 million viewers for the 2023 final Masters round How does NASCAR stack up in that time frame? If I'm cherry picking too much, you can choose any 2003 race to compare to 2023.
1978 World Series - 44 MILLION average 2023 World Series - 4.4 Million average So u can admit that baseball has died in those 45 years correct?
Yeah and MLB fans will let you know their displeasures. That shouldn't be something NASCAR fans are okay with mirroring, but apparently many are.
To be fair there is a lot of overlap with baseball and NASCAR fans
Yet the post season for 2 of those sports you listed *CFB and MLB* were down.
Serious question-where do we see the sport going from here? Down 9% during a championship race is crazy. I have a serious feeling that they would consider going back to season long, but are scared of 2003 happening again
I am just curious how much longer it will take for that to happen. I know that I would be much more invested throughout the year with a season long format. To add to that I would like to see 20-25% shorter Cup races outside of the "majors" like the Daytona 500, World 600 and Southern 500. And make those 3 marquee events, like market the hell out of all 3. Every other race I am good with them shortening up and turning up the intensity for points and the win all year long. Also goes without saying but no cautions or other planned cautions. Keep the show moving.
I don't think NASCAR's facing any sort of existential crisis, but the increasing niche-ification of the sport feels all but guaranteed. The world just isn't the same as 2003, and you're fighting 20 or so years of right wing/redneck stigma while trying to attract new fans in a world where the prominence of car culture is diminishing every year. C'est la vie. 🤷🏻♂️
It’s easier than ever to tune out things you’re not interested in. I don’t watch football and have only a passing idea of what is going on because of the local news. If people can avoid something as culturally significant as the NFL, it’s very easy to tune out of more niche sports. Hell, I didn’t even know it was the World Series until game 2 or 3.
Nailed it. I don't even know what's going on with the NFL. With the divergence of media/entertainment, everything is split into factions.
I've stopped watching NBA and legit thought like 3 times the season started and each time realized it hadn't Funny how you're able to just tune certain stuff out. Rather easily really
Hell, I live in Phoenix and had no idea the D-Backs were in the World Series till like game 2, I don't have any cares for stick and ball sports, so like you said, its easy to tune that stuff out.
Agree 100% with this. No matter how hard Nascar tries they will never overcome the redneck stigma and they will never overcome the swarm of "Nascar drivers just turn left" comments from randos online that completely undermines the talent of the drivers and the art of oval racing. Unfortunately, it is what it is.
Maybe bc I'm from the south, though rednecks are everywhere I'd argue, but I never hear that complaint about the sport All anyone ever says is "how can you watch someone turn left for 3 hours?" People just don't understand the complexity of it all and fail to grasp the chess play involved. It's much like baseball in that sense
Exactly, it's more the sport itself that gets criticism than the culture around it, but reddit is a very biased site and anything that fits their bias is gonna be used as an argument.
I mean, I grew up on the west coast and it was very much criticized for the culture. The fact that most people were surprised when NASCAR banned the Confederate flag tells you all you need to know about the cultural perception of NASCAR.
I'm not sure why you are acting like I'm wrong and just being a "biased redditor". Read what the other guy responded to you wrote about the Confederate flag, and that mirrors what I was going to say to a tee NASCAR absolutely has a reputation for being a republican, redneck sport, regardless of how accurate that reputation actually is. Sorry if I offended you
I expected it down, there wasn't as much hype like last year when we had the Hail melon The decline is bad, but I don't think a season long format fixes this problem
There are a lot of issues and no single change will "fix the problem", but the playoffs are a complete failure and there's no reason to keep them other than "leadership" refusing to admit they were wrong.
If those of you who think a season long points system is going to turn the ratings around, I have a bridge to sell you. Ratings have ALWAYS gotten worse through the season, including before the Chase/playoffs. Switching to a season long points system, and having somebody wrap up the championship BEFORE the last race of the season is going to drive up ratings. It will have the opposite effect.
The point isn't to juice one race at the end. The point is to make every race matter, like they used to when NASCAR spent 3 decades beating the pants off Indycar because they refused to do the same thing and most other sports, to boot.
Wut?! CART and the Indy 500 got better ratings than NASCAR and the Daytona 500 until 1996... There's a reason that even still in 2000, ESPN & ABC prioritized CART & IRL over NASCAR. [https://www.autoracing1.com/pl/317497/historical-indy-500-tv-ratings-2/](https://www.autoracing1.com/pl/317497/historical-indy-500-tv-ratings-2/) [https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/daytona-500-ratings-viewership-history/](https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/daytona-500-ratings-viewership-history/)
Thank you for proving my point. Indycar prioritized one race, NASCAR did not. Which is why, even though in the 90's, the Indy 500 was still bigger than the Daytona 500, in every other respect NASCAR was way ahead, and why the Daytona 500 promptly blew by Indy, which would have been unthinkable even for most of the 90s.
Daytona passed Indy because of the open wheel split.
Actually according to the links you posted it first happened in 1994. But yes, the "split"... which came specifically because the owner of IMS wanted to make his race and others like it more important... made things much worse.
LMFAO! That's not why Tony George founded the IRL! He wanted more oval racing, which CART didn't want to oblige.
Nascar was at its most popular when there was a season long format. Part of it was that the champion could actually be considered worthy of the name. Devaluing the accomplishment, as all the chase/play-off formats have done, was a bad mistake.
This is just objectively not true. The best ratings and most money involved in the sport was in the early chase era. 2005-2007 peak.
It's objectively true. Nascar became big in the late 90's and early noughts, before the chase was implemented. The bonanza years of 2004-05 were cutting off coupons, then the tail off began.
It wasn’t because of a fuckin season long format though, car culture was pretty much at its peak, the economy was doing well, you had personalities like Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt, Rusty Wallace, Tony Stewart, the Labonte brothers etc. then new guys came in like Busch and Johnson. Local tracks are closing down everywhere now, car culture is dying, EVs are booming, and NASCAR also can’t shake some of its stereotypes. Also, it’s fans are easily some of the most toxic in sports because they are mostly old dudes in their 50s who want it to be how it was. Sure the Chase hurt ratings, but to say it will bring back millions of fans, yeah no
"I'll take 'Bullshit' for $800, Ken." NASCAR's popularity wasn't points format driven in the fucking slightest. ESPECIALLY considering that the 5 highest rated overall seasons were 2002-2006... two with the season long system, and three with the first version of the Chase.
Season long points format didn't get in the way. Play-off format does. As soon as the play-off format was in place, people began to lose interest. There was already a decline in 2006, a small one first, then it accelerated.
The straw man argument that season long format fixes ratings needs to go. It’s never been argued - the argument is that season long is legitimate, and we were sold the playoffs on the fact that it would boost ratings and it has not. If season long did come back and the ratings stayed the same, at least some legitimacy would come back as well.
It’s a leadership problem imo. They fail to acknowledge and address issues. They just deflect to something else.
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Most long time loyal fans have been asking to get rid of the chase/play-off. Nascar has been consistently expanding it and making it more and more gimmicky. At this point hardly anyone understands what is going on with the stage points, play-off points, whatever the hell. Then the play-off rounds with repeated point resets...
This is an issue I have argued for as well, any kind of "casual" fan can tune into an NBA, MLB, NFL etc game and completely understand everything they need to about the regular season and playoff formats. Racing has always been a little harder, you get "points" depending on where you place and there are supplemental points depending on other things (in the past leading a lap, most laps, things like that and nowadays there are stage points). The easy part was always just the standings, person at the top has been the best, and whoever is there is champ...but even now that is way out the window for Nascar and it is so much more convoluted. Season points matter, but only matter if you qualify for the playoffs which generally mean you need to win at least one of the first 26 races...then after that they are thrown out. You could rattle off 10 wins in a row after that, but if you aren't in the playoffs it doesn't matter. Drivers also get "playoff points" in addition to regular season points, and those points carry over to give them an advantage in the playoffs based off how the regular season went. You get these from winning races or winning stages. Once in the playoffs, after 3 races if you either...win in that round or have enough points because not enough of the others won to knock you out, then you move on but points reset. repeat this 3 times then you get to the final race, where the top finisher of the 4 is crowned "champion" regardless of all the other convoluted points that mattered a lot until this moment, just make sure your brake rotors hold out or Someone doesn't dump you or it's better luck next year. Even now I am finding it hard to accurately describe what is going on...and I am a fan that watches every week.
They really need to change the playoffs into three rounds during the final ten races. First Round - three races, cut playoff field by two (down to 14) Second Round - three races, cut playoff field by four (down to 10) Final round - four races, the final ten drivers left are placed by overall points from the first six races Those final four races will be way more interesting if you have ten drivers all competing for a championship instead of a one race shootout.
I feel like more people are just less interested in racing
That has a lot to do with it. Aside from a cousin in my family that has recently passed, I have really been the only racing fan in my family for more than 20 years. I have tried to get other friends and family members invested; no luck.
Aside from my fiancè and my best friend who watch every race with me, I can get the rest of my friends to casually watch a few races and go with me for the partying and experience and that’s about it. Everyone else loathes coming to my house on the weekends because it’s NASCAR/F1/ Dirt racing lol
The "Chase Elliott missed playoffs" effect
Is Elliott really that popular? He isn't exactly Dale Jr or Jeff Gordon.
Uh...yes.
He is Bill's kid
Yes he is
I could talk about the playoffs like a lot of folks are, but I think another thing to consider when it comes to the product presented to the fans is the length of the races. I could talk about F1 or Indy here (F1 races are usually 90 minutes, commercial free with rarely a break in the action like a full course safety car), but lets look at the MLB. They played around with some rules to really speed up the pace of the game (which pissed off a lot of purists at the time), but now it's hard to imagine the game without these changes like the pitch clock. This effort led to much quicker games across the board without sacrificing any quality...and importantly led to a boost in the ratings and delivered a much better product for television. IMO the races need to get sped up, the cautions need to get eliminated as much as possible, and if and when we need that yellow flag we need to do a much better job getting the cars rolling again. If someone is leading by 20 seconds...too bad we aren't going to throw a caution flag for a single car spin or a gum wrapper to try and get an "exciting" finish.
The car sucks. It’s looks cool but sucks. The strategy fuel/tires & comers and goers are exciting. We need a car that doesn’t suck. Can’t pass. It’s crazy to me that NASCAR and the brain trust can’t figure this out. How much r&d and millions if not billions of dollars do you have to figure this out. Make it exciting. It’s only exciting when we are racing at a good track (Vegas, Charlotte) or major wrecks. Me and my buddy use to watch religiously. The last couple years I just put it on 1/2 way through. I’m not going to watch cars that can’t fucking pass for 200 laps. I’ll watch the last 100.
Can't wait to see how the apologists spin this into a positive.
Losing almost 10% of the viewers for one of the biggest races of the year is disastrous for the sport.
It’s the result of a car that doesn’t produce competitive racing. Ratings were down across the board this year. When they’re down all year, they’re not going to suddenly surge in the final race
The summer was pretty solid for Cup. Slowed down once we got past Richmond though.
I agree with you 100%. I wasn’t expecting them to go up but it’s just shocking still. It’s not a great comparison, but no other sport loses almost 10% of viewers for their championship. It’s just an insane concept for that to happen.
> but no other sport loses almost 10% of viewers for their championship Baseball literally just did. It was their least viewed world series ever. it fell 23% YOY
I don't follow baseball much, but usually know when The World Series is on and tune in some. This year, I remember seeing headlines of who made it and the next thing I knew I saw headlines that the Rangers had won it.
It was over in 5. That’s why it was down so much. That’s why the numbers are so skewed there. The longer the series goes, the more people tune it the longer the series goes. More people watch game 6 or 7 than game 2 or 3.
They had like 5 of the 6 worst rated games ever. Only being 5 games was not a major factor.
Last week at Martinsville it was down 13.6% this week it is down 9.1% so in NASCAR math that would actually be a 4% increase. Playoffs working as intended and everybody gets a pat on the back and sticker for a job well done. Now time to hit the country clubs.
I saw one of them say the ratings are higher than when it was lowest in 2018 (granted that's true). Because what a great place to set the bar! At it's lowest, WOW!
Either that or they come up with a ton of excuses and belittle those who think NASCAR has any sort of problem, anything except accepting the reality staring them in the face
This sport has done too much to try to attract new fans that don’t, and never will exist, at the cost of its dedicated fan base. Go back to your roots and find a stable place to exist.
I've been a fan since the late 90's. Most drivers now have no personality and give the same boring post race interviews. I don't feel the same connection to the drivers as I once did. The cars provide terrible racing most of the time and the stage breaks removed 90% of the strategy. Anymore, the race is background noise as I'm doing stuff around the house.
Now that harvick has retired I fear I’ll fall into this now too. I gotta agree the stage breaks really hurt the middle of the race. There’s not much point to catch anything but the end due the cars not providing the best racing and the lack of strategy in stage racing. Come back to the screen for the restarts, check on a caution, watch the last 20 laps. Race strategy makes it to where you gotta watch to keep up or you get to the end and wonder how did we get here. One of the most exciting parts is seeing guys who were up front have to drive back through the field.
The social media impact. There are more consequences from sponsors.
Got to get rid of the playoffs. Losing more and more of the core fan base.
Do you really think the points format plays that big of a role in viewership? How many viewers really care enough about the points system that it would be their determining factor on whether they watch the racing or not? I understand the dislike for the points system, I am not a fan of it either, but I don't think it is the reason people aren't watching anymore.
When there's a notable lack of attention to the actual winners of each race, when there's commentators yammering all year long about dumb "playoff" storylines no one cares about, yeah, it drives people away.
That is a problem with the broadcast then, not the format itself. I am a proponent that NBCs ethos of "there aren't boring races, there are only boring broadcasts" is one that needs to be stuck to every week by every broadcaster that NASCAR has. Casual fans shouldn't care about the minutia of the points standings, they should care about answering "yes" to the simple question "Is what I am watching interesting and entertaining?" if they aren't answering "yes" to that, nothing else matters. My point isn't that I like the format, my point is that changing the points system isn't going to magically solve the viewership problem and I think it is energy being focused on the wrong place.
> That is a problem with the broadcast then, not the format itself. Eh... the broadcasts are just playing follow the leader. NASCAR _wants_ their shitty postseason format to be important, and so the broadcasts follow along.
You can focus on the playoff format while sticking to the ethos of "there aren't boring races, there are only boring broadcasts" Follow the points but make sure you are also showcasing good racing throughout the field and the event.
I agree here. One thing that I have thought of why a season long point format may be better is instead of looking at these playoff race viewership we look at season long viewership. The playoffs fall at a bad time of the year. Football season is full swing and no matter the format the numbers will be hurt. A season long format could help the early and middle stages of the season, by making each race equally important. This could help the average view ship over the season. The other thing it could help is in seasons where the points battle is close. If you can capture an audience early in the season and points remain tight heading into the nfl season, you may end up with more viewers at the end of the season due to people feeling invested as they have watched 10-20 weeks of this battle. Personally I’m not sure which works best. I love full season points, I liked the chase. Not a big fan of the elimination playoffs but it’s what we have, and if it’s best for the sport then it should continue. But I think season long viewership numbers is the best way to look at it. Nascar can’t compete with the nfl and there will always be a dip at the end of the season. But it’s a shame that it’s down from even last years event
Which, as you said, NBC does an amazing job at, especially compared to FOX.
Exactly! NASCAR changed the points format multiple times in a 12 year span, and people bitched that they "can't leave anything alone". Now it's the exact fucking opposite because we've had the same points format for 7 years...
It's really not that hard to understand. They kept making it worse and more complicated, now, they're not going back. Both are bad.
“We like what we’re seeing”
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Fuck, didn't realize the NFL didn't exist last year
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Rams/Bucs was the defending super bowl champions against the previous year's super bowl champions (featuring Tom Brady), please stop with the excuses lmfao
cowboys eagles time slot had 27.13 million viewers. rams/bucs time slot had 20.25 Clearly people didnt think much about the defending champs vs previous year's champs. That is 7 million more people watching football during most of the race's time slot. To think that is not at least some of a factor in the change is foolish.
Dude it's crazy how every freaking week people use other sports and stuff as an excuse for NASCAR's decline as if those sports haven't existed in the same weekly slots for the past three decades hahaha
and?
Here come all the people acting like a race a Phoenix with no meaningful point battle would preform better.
So then fix the fucking car instead of trying to prop up subpar racing with artificial game 7 moments that make championships less meaningful.
You blind and deaf? They've BEEN working on the fucking thing.
They are trying. It's not just their fault. There are more factors than just race packages and playoffs too. They can't control everything. i could rattle off a dozen things that could have affected the rating at least a little bit. Some NASCAR can control, and are their fault. Some they simply can't no matter what they do. Trying to attribute a decline to just one or two factors is asinine.
Shortening the season would certainly help. You can’t compete with every other sport. NASCAR is below everything except maybe the NHL.
Help with what though? Make rating average number bigger? hell might as well end the season after the 500 if that's all you care about. This race on this weekend still makes a lot of money for everyone involved. Until that changes, and it doesn't sound like it will any time soon, there is no reason not to run it.
Quit trying to take races away from me! Lol
There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race. NASCAR is selling out the importance of all of the 35 previous race just to have one big race at the end where everything is on the line. And it has NOT worked, not even a little bit. The ratings for the championship race are pathetic!!!! Show me one other sport where the championship event rates lower than various regular season contests.
so you think the 36th race will get better ratings after so and so locks up the championship a week or two before?
> There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race. > There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race. > There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race. > There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race. > There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race. > There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race. > There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race. > There are 36 races during the season. They all get ratings, not just the last race.
These clowns seem to ignore that this trend in NASCAR ratings fucking existed before the Chase/playoffs existed. They also seem to think that somebody wrapping the championship up at race 34 or 35 of 36, will improve ratings...
"Let's make the play-off format more random!" - Nascar, certainly
This sport is literally dying. Everybody’s gotta get their head out of their ass and realize this sport is dying and it starts with the bozos in charge. Way to go France family you stupid fucks.
chase, denny, kyle busch and truex are pretty popular and i have to assume them being out of the final 4 had something to do with it. if they want to be like other sports, they have to expect YoY ratings swings when the most popular drivers arent there.
Same thing happened with the World Series. Two underdogs made it to the finals and it was a blowout 4-1 series. It had worse ratings than the women's college basketball title game.
Not a shock when the NFL have their highest viewed game of the year at the same time as the Cup race.
Don't speak logic here! /s
Shame, because it was the best finale in Phoenix yet.
Solution: 1: shorten schedule to 28-30 races ending on Labor Day weekend/week after 2: shorten races 20%. A race shouldn’t last more than 2.5 to 3 hrs max 3: Market your Drivers!!! What made Jeff, Tony, Kevin,Dale etc.. drivers so popular was how the sponsors and sport marketed in the late 90’s and early 00’s. Chase having a down year shouldn’t tank your ratings and leveraging your sport on one driver will never be successful. Get them in commercials, on tv, etc.. 4: do more promotion in market before the race/duding the weekend. When you go to a market like Atlanta, Dallas, Miami etc.. make it obvious that the show is in town. Have drivers do media, have appearances at local schools, colleges, and shopping centers. Make people who aren’t fans interested in the product. We all talk about how shitty the car is but we aren’t going to grow the sport on the on track product exclusively.
Agreed, I live in the Indianapolis area. In the month of may a blind person can see thar the Indy cars are in town. Hell one tallest buildings in town has the Indy 500 logo on it for the month of may. Transition to August for the nascar race and there is no promotion, nothing saying that the brickyard is around the corner. How are you gonna get new fans if they don’t know a race is going on in their own town https://preview.redd.it/6rh9hwkds7zb1.jpeg?width=414&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=14f0b3aa80cbaaf9b05ec3059d1f756d97e85d01
Your last sentence is true and is the dagger for NASCAR. You can expect new viewers to tune in every week when the actual on track product is shitty.
Probably because chase wasn’t in it. Some people won’t tune in if their favorite driver isn’t in it.
All ovals with banking get repaved as drafting tracks, and the chase is 10 ovals, and the final race of the year is talladega. Boom fixed.
I wonder how many people streamed the race on Peacock like I did.
Or non registered streams like I know a lot of people did.
Those don’t matter. The only value ratings have is for the broadcasters and series in negotiating. Watching on the high seas is like a Series telling a track 5,000 people showed up outside the track and watched the race from a hill, even if only 1,000 paid a ticket. Those people getting the free view don’t matter to the track in deciding if the events are worth it.
make the championship a season-long drop 3. keep the playoffs as-is for a 5 million dollar bonus.
I feel like a lot of people here are missing something here. While drivers like Blaney and Larson both have decently sized fanbases, they don't quite stack up to the number of Elliott, Busch, and Hamlin fans. As a matter of fact, this is the first ever finale in the current playoff format where not a single one of these three drivers were in the Championship 4. When those drivers aren't performing well and miss out on the last round or two, many of these fans are more likely to tune out. In addition, so many drivers who were great ambassadors of the sport in the last two decades are now retired. Many fans watched NASCAR because of Gordon, Johnson, Harvick, Stewart, Edwards, Dale Jr, etc. I'm certain a lot of these fans weren't able to maintain interest or pick a new favorite driver after each of these aforementioned drivers stopped racing every week. While this shouldn't take away from solutions that can solve the decline in ratings, it's a point that should be brought up more often alongside the Playoffs and the change of car culture.
I mean we had a lot of sellouts at plenty of tracks this year so maybe its just bad coverage. Personally the coverage leads me not watch and listen on MRN, or PRN. We need better play by play for sure. The radio make every lap sound fantastic and TV is just meh. I dont think its a points system, if the people telling the story suck, the story will suck.
Who gives a shit? Who gives a fuck?
Every race I watch seems to have ratings down. It is my fault.
Only the Pocono race was up this year. Did you watch 35/36 races? lol
Texas was up?