The NFL’s TV ratings appear to have weathered any potential major hit from election season, as the league is reporting big numbers heading into Week 12 of the regular season.

Through 11 weeks of action, the NFL is averaging 17.5 million viewers per game, when excluding international games on NFL Network and exclusive streaming broadcasts on ESPN+ and Peacock. That 17.5 million figure is the highest through Week 11 since the 2015 season.

In 2016, NFL ratings fell 8% from the prior year. That was the most recent presidential election not impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic (TV numbers were down across almost every sports league in 2020).

This season, when looking at the NFL’s major TV windows in the two weeks before and after the Nov. 5 election, things have remained quite steady. 

In the two weeks before, primetime games (on Amazon Prime Video, NBC, and ESPN) and the late Sunday afternoon window (on CBS and Fox) averaged 18.48 million viewers, according to Nielsen data cited weekly by Sports Media Watch. In the two weeks following Election Day, those same windows were nearly flat, averaging 18.18 million viewers.

Week 11 was boosted by the most-watched game of the season, as 31.14 million viewers tuned in to the Bills’ 30–21 victory over the previously unbeaten Chiefs. 

Big D: Disappointing Dallas Still Draws

Despite Sunday’s loss to Buffalo, Kansas City extended its lead over the Cowboys as the NFL’s No. 1 TV team. Here are the five most-watched games of the season through Week 11:

• Chiefs-Bills: 31.14 million viewers
• Ravens-Chiefs: 29.2 million viewers
• Bengals-Chiefs: 27.9 million viewers
• Ravens-Cowboys: 27.3 million viewers
• Chiefs-49ers: 27.1 million viewers

The Cowboys have still drawn well, though, in the two lopsided losses since quarterback Dak Prescott sustained a season-ending torn hamstring in Week 9. This week, ESPN got 17 million viewers for the Texans’ 34–10 win over the Cowboys, which was the most-watched Week 11 Monday Night Football broadcast since 2006. Last week, CBS drew 24.61 million viewers for the Eagles’ 34–6 victory over Dallas.

Comcast is making good on its recent pledge to deal with the ongoing decline in linear television, unveiling a formal plan to spin off most of its cable networks.

Just three weeks after first mentioning even the possibility of such a move, the NBC parent company will place the bulk of its cable network holdings such as USA Network, CNBC, MSNBC, and E! into a separate, publicly traded company, currently carrying the working name of SpinCo. The new entity will also include certain digital assets such as the online booking service GolfNow and the youth sports registration platform Sports Engine.

The move certainly carries a defensive posture, as it moves linear TV businesses that have been battered by accelerating cord-cutting away from healthier and faster-growing assets in the Comcast portfolio, such as its broadcast television holdings, theme parks business, and the Peacock streaming service. But Comcast insisted there is an opportunistic bent to the effort, too, suggesting it could ultimately lead to a variety of deals with other networks or private investors, including potential purchases of other networks. 

“With significant financial resources from day one, SpinCo will be ideally positioned for success and highly attractive to investors, content creators, distributors, and potential partners,” said Comcast chair and CEO Brian Roberts. 

Still, the move also is something of a clear acknowledgment of how dramatically the traditional pay-TV universe has declined, now standing at about 54 million U.S. households, roughly half the level of a decade ago.

Investors were essentially neutral on the news, with Comcast shares declining 0.2% in early Wednesday trading. Completion of the spin-off will require about a year. Other critical assets, such as NBC Sports and the NBC broadcast network, will remain as is within NBCUniversal, which is still a core part of Comcast. 

Sports Focus

Sports will be a meaningful pillar of SpinCo, as the inclusion of USA Network and Golf Channel in the new company includes live rights to a variety of top-tier properties, including the Premier League, NASCAR, PGA Tour, LPGA, and multiple conferences in college basketball. 

The involvement of GolfNow and Sports Engine also brings perhaps less glamorous, but steadily performing and more transactionally oriented businesses into the new entity.

“When you combine our assets, talented management team, and balance sheet strength, we are uniquely positioned to set both SpinCo and NBCUniversal up to play offense in a complex and evolving media landscape,” Comcast president Mike Cavanagh wrote in a memo to employees. 

Will Others Join?

Perhaps the most pressing question is whether any other major media company such as Fox or Disney will make a similar move with its linear cable assets. ESPN parent Disney has arguably come closest, inviting outside inquiries into equity partnerships for some of its networks, most notably the sports media giant. 

During the recent run of quarterly earnings reports, each of Comcast’s main contemporaries was queried by analysts in some fashion about the possibility of making a similar spin-off move. Thus far, the answer appears to be generally no, though Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav said the TNT Sports parent company is exploring “all things operationally and strategically to ensure shareholder value.” But should SpinCo show some success, copycat endeavors could surface—ultimately inviting a potential of broader mergers of cable networks currently held by different companies.

“I don’t see how we could ever do that,” said Fox executive chair and CEO Lachlan Murdoch about the prospect of pursuing a similar cable spin-off. “I think breaking apart a part of the business would be very difficult, both from a cost point of view and from a revenue and a promotional synergy point of view.”

Days after missing out on the No. 1 pick in the 2025 WNBA draft, the Los Angeles Sparks hired their next head coach. L.A. dipped into the college ranks and signed Lynne Roberts from Utah as the replacement for Curt Miller.

Roberts is the second head coach in a week hired in the WNBA from the NCAA women’s basketball ranks—despite the season starting on Nov. 4—after the Atlanta Dream hired Karl Smesko from Florida Gulf Coast last Wednesday.

Roberts had a 162–115 record in nine full seasons as the Utes coach, including three consecutive NCAA tournament appearances since 2022. Utah’s last tournament appearance before Roberts’s tenure was in 2011.

Her departure comes despite signing a contract extension in the summer with Utah through 2030. But there’s been a ton of tension in the college ranks given NIL (name, image, and likeness) and realignment—and Utah was one of the affected schools, moving from the Pac-12 to the Big 12 in August. The Utes were also a target of a pair of racial hate incidents during last year’s NCAA tournament.

The WNBA Coaching Market

The financial details of Roberts’s deal with the Sparks are unknown. There are varying reports as to what her salary was with the Utes. According to USA Today, she was expected to earn $709,500 with a $305,000 maximum bonus this year for a potential total north of $1 million. In 2022, USA Today pegged her to have a $410,000 salary with a $190,000 bonus, while The Salt Lake Tribune reported Roberts made $695,000 that year.

Only two WNBA head coaches made more than $1 million last season—Nate Tibbetts of the Phoenix Mercury (approximately $1.2 million) and Becky Hammon of the Las Vegas Aces ($1 million). The Athletic reported before Smesko was hired by the Dream that the low-end salaries for WNBA head coaches last season were $350,000.

The market for salaries is expected to rise as the league continues to grow and as the money from the new $2.2 billion media-rights deal is already expected to come in by 2026. It may not be enough to lure in the biggest names in women’s college basketball—Kim Mulkey, Geno Auriemma, and Dawn Staley all make north of $3 million—but it’s clear the market for WNBA coaches is going up.

“There’s no better time to join the W than right now,” Smesko said during his introductory press conference Tuesday. “This is the most exciting time for the league.”

Three WNBA head coaching positions are still available: the Connecticut Sun, Dallas Wings, and Washington Mystics.