Winter Olympics Games continue to lose its ever-shrinking audience

The ratings are in. Not good. Double-digit drop in viewership against the 2014 Sochi Games. Sochi had their own double-digit drop against the 2010 Vancouver Games.

Let’s enumerate the key issues with the PyongChang Games, at least for NBC.

1. Time delay: It took Mikaela Shiffrin 2 minutes, 20 seconds and 2 hundredths of a second to complete her two giant slalom races and win her gold medal. Like Shiffrin’s GS victory, most winning runs in the various Olympic competitions are 2 minutes or less. Why bother to tune in to watch the NBC version of her winning run when the results are already all over Twitter and available for streaming online?
2. Where have you gone Nancy Kerrigan?: Dorthy Hamill, Peggy Fleming, Kristi Yamaguchi. The US women figure skaters are traditionally the largest audience draw for the Winter Olympics. This year, the Stars and Stripes were not on display during the medal ceremonies after the ladies’ event.
3. NHL skips the games. This year, the NHL stars were absent from the games. The US hockey team failed to advance beyond the round of 8.
4. Netflix and skip. Reed and Co are looking to kill another category. After making quick work of Blockbuster and the video rental industry, the Netflix team has its sites set on a bigger target. Ad-based television, especially the big networks, are in danger as viewers are increasingly dividing their time to other video and TV options. Despite one of the most exciting Super Bowl games, the viewership dropped to its lowest point in 7 years.
5. US team falls short. Sure, we captured the bragging rights for curling, but overall, the team turned in disappointing results. The team did not perform well in speed skating and figure skating, which had been strong events for past teams.
6. Competition or clock watching? In the summer games, a field of athletes race each other to determine the best in the world. In the Winter Olympics, we watch as some dudes jump in a sled and wait to see if they have finished microseconds ahead of previous sliders. Time-based competitions lack the immediacy and the drama of head-to-head competitions. In other events, again the athlete has the stage to themselves. In these events, the athlete waits for a panel of judges to determine if their twirls, jumps and spins are more perfect and impressive than other contestants. Was that a good performance? Yes, at least according to the Slovakian judge. Yawn.

The Olympics are a global sporting event. I understand the desire for the IOC to appeal to Asian audiences. It just doesn’t make for exciting TV for those supporting the red, white and blue. Guess when the next real-time (non-tape delayed) Olympic Games will be?

Good news! They are in Los Angeles.

Bad news, won’t be till 2028.