The USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships get underway in Oregon next Thursday, though viewers may have trouble finding it. That’s because this year’s event is only being shown on CNBC and USATF.TV, the first time it hasn’t aired on NBC proper in almost 20 years (2006).
Sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson spoke out in strong opposition to that choice, lamenting the network’s decision to bump track for re-runs of Magnum P.I. and The Blacklist, which haven’t aired new episodes in months due to the ongoing writer’s strike.
“These companies continue to make it HARDER for track and field to have exposure!!!” wrote Richardson (via Essentially Sports) in a since-deleted Instagram story. “All they want is to continue to exploit sports!!!”
Track and field obviously isn’t as popular or profitable as football, basketball or even golf, though it probably deserves a larger audience than NBC’s business channel, especially during a relatively quiet period on the sports calendar with few alternatives.
NBC has faced similar criticism in the past for making its content less accessible to casual viewers, having them jump through hoops to watch games on obscure properties like USA and MSNBC or behind a paywall on its streaming service, Peacock. That confusion no doubt impacted NBC’s coverage of last year’s Winter Olympics, reporting its lowest ratings ever during the 2022 Beijing Games.
As noted by Richardson, NBC’s deemphasis on track presents a major obstacle to the sport’s growth, reducing the year’s biggest meet to afterthought status, unfairly labeled by corporate America as low-wattage content-filler lucky to have a platform at all.
