Alex Cora questioned why Red Sox-Yankees are playing on ESPN’s ‘Sunday Night Baseball’ for second straight weekend
“Back-to-back Sunday night games? With all the respect to ESPN, come on."
The Red Sox and Yankees are set to face off on ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball” for the second time in as many weeks on Sunday. But even though the Red Sox are set to play in one of the league’s big TV slots again, Alex Cora is disappointed in his former employer.
The Red Sox manager questioned why both teams are playing each other on “Sunday Night Baseball” again.
“Back-to-back Sunday night games? With all the respect to ESPN, come on,” Cora recently told reporters. “There’s other teams out there people want to watch. You know how good the ratings are gonna be on Father’s Day for Red Sox, Yankees.
“But back-to-back weekends, you’re probably gonna do something else with your parents with your family, you know, because you just saw it last weekend.”
Cora might not be alone in feeling that way as the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry has been prominently featured on “Sunday Night Baseball” over the years. Even this season, both teams are getting a primetime spot against each other, as they might not be as intriguing as usual. The Red Sox are 35-35 entering Sunday’s doubleheader, and while the Yankees are 39-31, their offense has been lackluster as of late with Aaron Judge on the injured list.
Of course, it should be noted that ESPN picks its “Sunday Night Baseball” games for the first few months of the season prior to Opening Day. So, it didn’t know that Judge, arguably the game’s biggest star, would be hurt at the time.
And it also should be pointed out that Red Sox-Yankees games rate better than just about every matchup in the majors. Red Sox-Yankees games on ESPN have averaged 1.9 million viewers over the last three years, which is 30 percent better than the average viewership of non-Red-Sox-Yankees game, according to ESPN via The Athletic.
Even with the Red Sox struggling and the Yankees without Judge, last week’s “Sunday Night Baseball” game averaged 1.94 million viewers, the best audience for “Sunday Night Baseball” this season.
The Red Sox-Yankees rivalry was also the most watched matchup on national television games last season, a year in which the Red Sox finished below .500. Seven of the 10 highest-rated national television games in the 2022 MLB season were Red Sox-Yankees games.
There are also fewer Red Sox-Yankees games this season than in years past. With MLB introducing a new schedule format in 2023 that allows every team to face each other for at least one series, the Red Sox and Yankees will only have four series against each other this season as opposed to the usual six.
Luckily for Cora, who worked at ESPN as an analyst before beginning his coaching career with the Astros in 2016, Sunday’s game is the last time the Red Sox and Yankees are scheduled to play each other on the four-letter network this season. Still, he shouldn’t anticipate the Red Sox-Yankees not playing on “Sunday Night Baseball” too often anytime soon.
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