Rare is the prediction that can be guaranteed, but here is one I can promise you:
The 2026 World Cup will be the most-watched World Cup in United States television history.
No, I’m not Nostradamus. The next World Cup will be held in the United States, Canada and Mexico, which means massive interest among U.S. sports fans and perfect broadcast windows for Fox Sports to maximize viewership. The marketing and public relations build-up will be massive. Organizationally, the horrible lords of FIFA have significant financial incentive to push their brand in host countries, and that will add a big element to the awareness campaign. Celebratory coverage will not be under the same scrutiny, as Fox will escape (at least for the most part in the U.S.) the sportswashing charges they did when they punted on covering anything beyond the field in Qatar. I would not be surprised to see a U.S. group stage game reach 20 million viewers on Fox alone. If the U.S. goes on any kind of run, watch out for crazy, NFL numbers.
The reality is Fox Sports has to change literally nothing from its coverage in Qatar to ensure that its 2026 World Cup will be a massive viewership success. It’s also guaranteed to be a financial windfall for Fox given the ad rates they’ll be able to charge. The company landed a home World Cup at a discount rate — the 2026 bid was not made open — because FIFA wanted to avoid a lawsuit over the Qatar World Cup.
After watching an absolutely thrilling World Cup final, after marveling at Leo Messi and Kylian Mbappé like the rest of the planet, I thought I’d offer a couple of suggestions for Fox’s coverage four years from now as well as some final thoughts on the Qatar coverage. I have no doubt Fox Sports executives will dump these items into the trash after reading — and I can respect that. Fox Sports goes its own way on most things, and that spirit has led to a lot of triumphs and economic success. So this is mostly an exercise for you — the readers who watched the coverage over the last month. I’m interested in your thoughts on Fox’s coverage, and please put them in the comment section.
1. There’s not much left to be said about Fox’s World Cup studio coverage that hasn’t been said by so many, whether on social media or the many places writing about the coverage. Fox Sports PR can spin all they wish, they can send out online surveys about the public liking their coverage, but you don’t need to be Ferdinand Magellan to discover the sentiment. One thing I’d implore Fox Sports to do in 2026: have a deeper studio bench of people, especially those based in other countries, so you can bring on those analysts for your audience when the assignment is warranted. How great for viewers would it have been to have ex-managers or ex-players who had deep knowledge of Argentina, Croatia, France and Morocco as we hit the money rounds? Imagine going deep on the roster constructions or tactics of those countries for present-day and beyond. Throughout the month, viewers got little of that. That was one of the massive strengths of ESPN’s World Cup coverage. The network hired, among others, international analysts such as Roberto Martinez, Efan Ekoku, Gilberto Silva, Michael Ballack, Steve McManaman and Santiago Solari. It would be immeasurably better for the coverage if Fox had a much deeper studio analyst group. This was a massive missed opportunity to educate viewers.
2. Fox made a tremendous acquisition bringing Ian Darke on as one of its game-callers (and props to ESPN for allowing it to happen). He’s obviously a world-class game-caller and found nice chemistry with Landon Donovan. The same goes for when Fox brought in Derek Rae four years ago. The network has really upgraded its game commentary since it acquired both the men’s and women’s World Cup. Fox Sports management should do whatever it can to bring Darke back and continue to find similar opportunities to enhance its game booths.
3. Top executives have always been clear about wanting American voices for soccer. (You saw that with the short-lived Gus Johnson experiment.) That’s fine. The sport has matured in the U.S. to where there should not be an automatic call for a British voice on everything. But where that really hurts Fox is when there is little diversity on set. There were only former U.S. men’s national team players in the studio for a World Cup final between Argentina and France. Did you as a viewer feel you were educated on those teams prior to the game? At the half? Yes, we all know sports media rightsholders will not lose viewers for their game coverage based on who is on their studio set prior to or after a game. But how you as a viewer process and come away from the coverage should be of vital importance to content executives.
4. Speaking of game coverage: I like John Strong and Stu Holden. You may disagree, and that’s fine. Having an American booth call the World Cup’s biggest games makes more sense to me as a corporate directive if that’s indeed your charter, as Fox has said it is. Do I think Strong is as good as Darke, Rae, Peter Drury, or Jon Champion as a game-caller? I do not. But it’s all subjective. You probably like a ton of other sports writers more than me. Strong is absolutely good enough, at least in my mind, to lead Fox’s World Cup package and I would keep him and Holden as the No. 1 team in 2026.
5. A story: The late Grant Wahl invited me out to dinner once in New York City with Alexi Lalas and Taylor Twellman. It was the first time I had met Lalas and Twellman, and it was a lovely night. It gave me a view of Lalas beyond the wrestling-heel persona he often exhibits on Fox’s coverage. My thought has always been this: If you are going to make Lalas the focal point of your studio soccer coverage, which Fox clearly has done, the production would be served much better if either analyst or host pushed back on Lalas more. I wish Fox could cut a deal with ESPN to loan out Twellman because I think he would do that. I also think Kate Abdo would do it as a host, or at least as much as a host will do it in that role. I’m not suggesting creating cheap heat or some B.S. “Embrace Debate” nonsense. I’m saying that Donovan (who I liked in the studio) and Clint Dempsey are not going to do that. At least they didn’t when I watched on this go-around.
6. Maurice Edu and Kelly Smith: Here’s hoping Fox gives each more airtime in 2026. They stood out to me when I saw them on the main set because they talked tactics on non-U.S. games.
7. Here is what Wahl (and thank you to Rob Stone for the genuine on-air tribute) wrote on his website on Sept. 17 on the subject of sportswashing: “Fox Sports and Telemundo, the U.S. TV rightsholders for World Cup 2022 in Qatar, could and should do the same thing right from the top when they broadcast the world’s biggest sporting event starting November 20. Their viewers care about Qatar’s record on migrant workers in the country (who now number 2.1 million and make up 95 percent of Qatar’s workforce) and its stance on LGBTQ+ rights and women’s rights. There’s still plenty of time for Fox and Telemundo to prepare journalistic packages on Qatar’s human rights record. But I have to admit, I’m not confident about that. In fact, I think there’s a much greater likelihood that they’ll put their heads in the sand entirely and instead broadcast sportswashing travel-themed packages — on dune-buggy rides, camel racing and falconry — that could have been produced by the Qatar Chamber of Commerce. Why? Well, there are tens of millions of dollars in sponsorship money in play for Fox and Telemundo, especially from groups like Qatar Airways, which is owned by the Qatari state — which is to say, the country’s authoritarian royal family.” Ask yourself if he was right on Fox.
8. Even with some segments that left many of us in disbelief, Fox’s coverage delivered a lot of lovely imagery on the pre and postgames including walk-outs and anthems. Fox doesn’t have its own game cameras there, so they didn’t control Messi not being shown for a bit immediately after Argentina won. They take the world feed — and then make decisions as to when to opt in and out.
Here’s another small touch from Fox that was really good. During the World Cup final postgame, they went long on the interviews (translated from Spanish) with Argentina goalkeeper Emi Martinez and coach Lionel Scaloni. These were incredibly emotional interviews as the men thanked their families while in tears. Great stuff for the U.S. audience. This is what a soccer fan wants to see.
9. A place where I thought Fox Sports excelled in Qatar was with its soccer-specific social media feeds. They were exceptionally quick on getting highlights and big moments on their social media platforms. Credit goes to Fox Sports digital senior vice president Michael Bucklin, executive director of digital and social production Nick Rago, and senior producer of social and short-form Frances Arthur. Rago and Arthur were in Qatar the whole tournament focusing on the “World Cup Now” show on Twitter and the @FOXSoccer Twitter account. Job well done.
10. This was the greatest World Cup final played. I don’t think that’s hyperbole. It was beautiful to watch, with an overarching storyline involving arguably history’s greatest player and the odds-on favorite for the sport’s next King. The Women’s World Cup is 213 days away from you reading this. The drumbeat for 2026 will come fast. Fox has an incredible opportunity, once-in-a-generation in many ways, to ride a wave of enthusiasm created by the magic we saw between Messi and Mbappé on Sunday. We’ll see what they do with it.
Additional notes:
• Telemundo’s Andres Cantor, who was born in Buenos Aires and came to the U.S. as a teenager, had one of the all-time calls upon Argentina winning. Thanks to DAZN’s Roberto Rojas for the translation.
Incredible: Witness Andres Cantor, Buenos Aries born Argentinan-American Broadcast legend calling the penalty which won World Cup for Argentina. All that is good about sports and life 🇦🇷🎙️🙌 pic.twitter.com/fLVFIyPgeR
— roger bennett (@rogbennett) December 18, 2022
• You can understand soccer fans upset in the moment on Fox’s decision to kick the trophy ceremony to FS1 at 1 p.m. ET given how momentous the game was and what it meant for global sport. Reality: The NFL is Fox’s most important property. There is no second property even close. The programming philosophy here is that Fox is serving its national audience best by maintaining the NFL schedule and moving the World Cup postgame elsewhere. I absolutely get on an emotional level wishing the ceremony stayed on Big Fox, but it was never going to happen. There are long-term contracts with the NFL in place, and if I were in the programming seat, I would have done the same thing as much as I would hate to do it.
• The World Cup semifinals averaged 6.53 million viewers on Fox (including pre-match coverage), up 27 percent from 2018 (5.15 million) and 22 percent from 2014 on ESPN (5.33 million). It is a record for semifinal coverage on a single network. France-Morocco averaged 6.59 million viewers on Fox, a record for a World Cup semifinal in the U.S. Argentina-Croatia one day earlier drew 6.47 million viewers (which was a record at the time). Telemundo said its Spanish-language World Cup coverage on Telemundo and Peacock averaged 4.5 million viewers for the semifinals versus 2.8 million in 2018. The Argentina-Croatia game drew 4.7 million on Telemundo/Peacock, including 1.7 million streaming the game. Important: This is the first World Cup since Nielsen began including out-of-home viewing in its viewership estimates.
• Prior to the tournament, I asked Fox Sports World Cup executive producer David Neal how Fox Sports would evaluate success for its World Cup coverage? “Hopefully viewers have become accustomed, and pleasantly so, to watching us and will have some withdrawal when the tournament is over,” Neal said. “Secondly, I hope we are proud of what we’ve done. I’m close to my fifth decade in the business and I’ve always believed that the best people in this business, whether in front of or behind the camera, are usually their own toughest critics. We will know when the show has gone well, and we will also know if the show hasn’t done well. I hope there’s an accomplishment and a sense of pride in what we’ve done when we get to that morning after the final.”
• Cool fact: Sirius XM FC soccer host and former U.S. national team keeper Tony Meola said Sunday on “Counter Attack” that he and his family watched the game with Jackson Holliday, the No. 1 pick in the MLB Draft. Meola’s son, Aidan, played baseball with Holliday at Oklahoma State.
The Ink Report
1. Episode 263 of the Sports Media Podcast features a conversation on the soccer journalist Grant Wahl with three of his longtime friends and colleagues — Jon Wertheim, senior writer for Sports Illustrated, a senior correspondent for 60 Minutes and a senior analyst for The Tennis Channel; Mark Mravic, a longtime editor for Sports Illustrated who was the editor for GrantWahl.com; and Jeff Pearlman, the author of “The Last Folk Hero: The Life and Myth of Bo Jackson” and a longtime former Sports Illustrated writer. In this podcast, we talk about Wahl’s impact on people professionally and personally; the outpouring of love for him on social media and elsewhere; our earliest memories of him; how he approached his work; his relationship with his wife, Dr. Celine Gounder; his work as an independent journalist and growing his own business; his support and work for U.S. women’s soccer; his enduring legacy and much more.
You can subscribe to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, and more.
2. The Athletic’s Pablo Maurer examined Major League Soccer’s four-year linear broadcast agreements with Fox Sports and TelevisaUnivision in the United States and TSN and RDS in Canada.
2a. Pat McAfee is The Athletic’s Sports Media Person of the Year.
2b. Episode 262 of the Sports Media Podcast features T.J. Quinn, an investigative reporter for ESPN who has reported on the Brittney Griner case for ESPN since her imprisonment. In this podcast, Quinn discussed how he learned of the prisoner swap for Griner; his game plan for reporting the story; dealing with government sources; reporting on Griner getting a chance to do a light basketball workout; Griner’s life in Russia as best as Quinn could report; how Griner is doing psychologically and what is next for her; on Roger Carstens, the U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs; the social media vitriol and Russian disinformation floating through Twitter and Quinn’s accounts; media outlets requesting Griner; and more.
3. Courtesy of Sports Business Journal assistant managing editor Austin Karp: Here are the most-watched regular-season games during the 2022 college football season. As always, you’ll find Ohio State, Alabama and Michigan in that mix.
3a. Here are the details of ESPN’s College Football Playoff MegaCast presentation.
3b. Sports reporter Bonnie Bernstein got some news out of NBA commissioner Adam Silver when interviewing him for the NCAA’s Title IX College Sports Conversations podcast. Said Silver: “I would be hugely disappointed if, certainly, in five years, we haven’t seen our first female head coach in the NBA.”
4. Sports pieces of note:
• The Brittney Griner prisoner swap is the AP Sports Story of the Year.
• How Grant Wahl Changed The Place of Soccer in the United States. By Louisa Thomas of The New Yorker.
• Via NPR: Grant Wahl’s wife, Dr. Céline Gounder, remembers the late soccer journalist.
• This thread, from Grant’s brother Eric Wahl.
• A note from Grant’s wife, Céline Gounder.
• Vikings earn largest comeback in NFL history — and savor every moment. By Alec Lewis of The Athletic.
• Many French vowed to boycott the World Cup. Then their team did too well. By Rick Noack of The Washington Post.
• How Lionel Messi’s body and brain help make him the world’s best footballer. By Sarah Shephard of The Athletic.
• Court filing reveals new details about alleged Hockey Canada group sexual assault. By Robyn Doolittle of The Globe and Mail.
• Sports Business Journal media reporter John Ourand’s annual predictions column is always worth reading.
• ESPN’s Wright Thompson on Ukrainian soccer’s fight to carry on.
• The trading card collector’s gift guide: Box breaks, shower curtains, custom cards and more. By David Gonos of The Athletic.
• The night Messi won the World Cup — told with some help from the man himself. By Oliver Kay of The Athletic.
Non-sports pieces of note:
• The Chechen Warlord Who Does Putin’s Dirty Work in Ukraine. By Thomas Grove and Evan Gershkovich of The Wall Street Journal.
• I Was Caught in the Capitol Riot, and I Still Feel the Pain of That Day. By Caroline Edwards for The New York Times.
• The Safest Place. By Noelle Crombie of The Oregonian.
• How a hard-working, middle-class family spiraled into homelessness. By Alexa Gagosz of The Boston Globe.
• Bob Iger vs. Bob Chapek: Inside the Disney Coup. By Joe Flint, Robbie Whelan, Erich Schwartzel, Emily Glazer and Jessica Toonkel of The Wall Street Journal.
• Fifteen notable lives lost in 2022. Via The Economist.
• Incredible reporting here: Putin’s War: A New York Times investigation based on interviews, intercepts, documents and secret battle plans shows how a “walk in the park” became a catastrophe for Russia.
(Photo of Lionel Messi: Julian Finney / Getty Images)
