VA Pilot - TV ratings game is the only competition Skins excel in

[TK]

http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=61512&ran=239866

TV ratings game is the only competition Skins excel in

The Virginian-Pilot

© October 26, 2003

With no Redskins game on the NFL schedule today, hardcore faithful of the burgundy and gold may find themselves casting about for alternative entertainment experiences that can come close to duplicating the feeling of watching Steve Spurrier’s 3-4 team on TV.

Some possibilities: Pass a kidney stone.

Have a tattoo removed.

Toss yourself off Niagara Falls.

Wait a minute. That’s what life on most Sunday afternoons in the fall is already like for Hampton Roads football fans who don’t fancy the Redskins.

In recent years, maybe nothing has been more responsible for the sale of satellite dishes and the growth of sports bars in this area than the continuing tradition of force-feeding Skins games to Southeastern Virginia TV viewers.

You say that Hampton Roads has always been a big part of Redskins Nation? Well, sure.

This is what happens when TV spends 50 years beating the drums for one team.

Several generations of Virginians grow up not knowing any better.

Today, then, comes welcome relief from the usual programming. In the 1 o’clock slot on Fox affiliate WVBT usually reserved for the Redskins is a nationally appealing match-up between the defending Super Bowl champion Tampa Bay Bucs and the resurgent, Bill Parcells-coached Dallas Cowboys.

Broadcasting the highly anticipated Bucs-Cowboys game in place of standard Redskins fare is like sticking George Clooney’s face over a picture of the Hunchback of Notre Dame.

“There’s no question,” says Joe Weller, programming coordinator for WAVY and WVBT, “that every once in a while we get calls from people saying, 'We’re tired of watching the Redskins. They’re no good.’”

The reaction is natural. More than many areas of the country, or even other parts of Virginia, we are a community of people from other places, people who bring with them allegiances to teams other than the Skins.

But the weary protesters would have a better chance of stealing the visor from Spurrier’s head than changing local TV policy. Starting next week, the Redskins’ schedule of 12 games on Fox resumes. And the ratings, as always, will be robust.

Viewing habits, it seems, are hard to break, even after the local favorite goes more than a decade without fielding an interesting or accomplished team. Over the last 11 seasons, counting this year, the Skins are a combined 72-94-1.

In that time, the ratings game is the only competition the Skins have managed to master.

Among all NFL games shown in Hampton Roads, “the Redskins ratings,” Weller says, “are demonstrably the best.”

For the Skins’ recent loss to the Bucs, WVBT registered a 35 share, meaning that 35 percent of all television sets in use in Hampton Roads during the game were tuned to the action at FedExField.

For the Eagles game, the Skins brought in a 33 share; for the loss in Buffalo last week, a 29 share.

These are Joe Millionaire-type numbers. Meanwhile, many games that go head-to-head against the Skins on CBS are lucky to draw an audience half as large.

The message is clear. Unless you’re a Skins fan or a masochist — often the same thing — probably the best route to a satisfying afternoon of NFL viewing leads to a sports bar showing several games or to the roof to install a dish.

Wait a minute. How can anybody complain about the relentless local broadcasting of Redskins games when they create such healthy Nielsens? Well, have you seen the team play in recent years?

“If you look at it over the long haul from a ratings perspective,” Weller said, “there’s only one game in town.”

Anybody interested in a bus ticket to Niagara Falls?

Reach Bob Molinaro at 446-2373 or at bmolinar@pilotonline.com

[Skeletor The Invincible]

Thank god they don't stop showing Skins games down here in Newport News.

I'd friggin go down to the station and complain in person.

This is Redskins country and anyone who disagrees is in the far minority.

[Ancalagon the Black]

Man, talk about having an agenda.

Next they're going to say that DC is full of transplants who want to watch other teams' games, so we shouldn't show Skins games there.

[Glenn X]

It's called regional interest, f*ckstick (a.k.a. Bob Molinaro). If you don't like it, Bobsy, get DirecTV and sign up for the NFL Sunday Ticket.

Or, better yet, move to L.A., where there is no local NFL team. But brace yourself, Bobsy, because regional interest is in play there, too. So prepare yourself for a heavy dose of Chargers, Raiders, and Niners games.

[Blade]

Beautiful reply Glenn. That should be emailed to the schmuck.

[The Sisko]

True dat Glenn X. However, that same argument (in part anyway)has kept baseball out of DC for far too long. I guess the gods of "regional interest" giveth and they taketh away as well.

I hate baseball, but the thought that that rat hole B-More has a team (if you use the term veeery loosely) and DC doesn't just puckers my arsehole.

Rant over. Please resume your regularly scheduled activities.

[SonnyJ]

I feel the same way about having the Ravens forced on me.

Only I, like most people, am intelligent enough to realize why we are so "fortunate" as to see all of the Ravens' games.

[Jimmythehair]

True dat Glenn X. However, that same argument (in part anyway)has kept baseball out of DC for far too long. I guess the gods of "regional interest" giveth and they taketh away as well.

I hate baseball, but the thought that that rat hole B-More has a team (if you use the term veeery loosely) and DC doesn't just puckers my arsehole.

I was born in D.C. and have lived in the area my whole life. We should have a team but the reason we don't is we have already lost 2 of them.

[Leonard Washington]

i remember when WVBT became a "cable" channel and you couldn't get the redskins games if you had rabbit ears. i was sick.