Why Is No One Watching The Stanley Cup Finals?

It's not news that Stanley Cup Finals ratings are utterly abysmal, but here we are talking about them again because it's another year and the NHL has decided to hold another annual round of playoffs. Hooray for us, because the hockey has been really great! But not so good for NBC, which saw Games 1 and 2, broadcast on the mothership and not the impossible-to-find-on-your-dial Versus NBC Sports Network, suffer hilariously low ratings. Some 66 TV shows scored higher ratings last week than either game. (If anyone has actually seen Dogs in the City, Swamp People, and/or Mountain Men, and there are millions of you, now I'm curious what I'm missing.)

And as Sports Illustrated's Grant Wahl pointed out today, even the Brazil-Mexico friendly on Sunday drew some 3.3 million viewers on Univision, 800,000 more than Game 2 of the Devils and Kings the day before on NBC. And though it may seem like this narrative turns up every year, the 2011 Finals were actually pretty popular. A closely contested series, between teams representing the LA and New York media markets, that can't muster up better numbers than Pawn Stars or Cartoon Network airings of Family Guy should scare the fuck out of the NHL and NBC. Maybe we'll find out if it actually does.

[h/t @GrantWahl]