ESPN Kicks Off Televised Coverage of 2013 World Series of Poker

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Tuesday, July 23rd, 2013 | Written by Charles Washington

There’s been a definite dearth of televised poker in the United States since Black Friday.

But even as once-popular shows like High Stakes Poker have faded into history, the highest-profile poker program of all – ESPN’s coverage of the World Series of Poker – continues full steam ahead.

The network kicks off their coverage of the 2013 World Series of Poker tonight (Tuesday, July 23, at 9 p.m. ET).

Episodes run from now until November Nine

The WSOP on ESPN is basically the equivalent of a standard season run for a sitcom or similar network show, albeit one compressed into a shorter span of time.

This year’s coverage will span 28 individual episodes, paired in back-to-back weekly installments, running from now until the actual conclusion of the WSOP Main Event on November 4th and 5th.

ESPN returns familiar team for WSOP coverage

Viewers tuning into the 2013 World Series of Poker broadcasts on ESPN will find familiar faces awaiting them, as Lon McEachern and Norman Chad will man the booth and provide the bulk of the commentary.

Rounding out the core team is well-known poker personality Kara Scott, who will reprise her 2012 role as something of a “sideline reporter” bringing insights and interviews from the field.

Asia-Pacific Main Event final table new twist for 2013

While the broadcast team for the 2013 World Series of Poker on ESPN is familiar, there’s one big part of the schedule that is completely new for 2013: Final table coverage from the Asia-Pacific WSOP Main Event.

That event was won, of course, by PokerStars pro Daniel Negreanu. Negreanu’s win, coupled with the lack of a top-tier name at or near the final table of the primary Main Event, were probably part of the motivation for adding the APWSOP to the lineup.

But even if someone lesser-known had won, it’s still likely that the WSOP would have wanted to shine as much light as possible on their latest attempt to expand the WSOP brand across international borders into countries like Australia, much as the WSOPE was an attempt to gain a foothold in the European poker market.

Main Event dominates the ESPN broadcast schedule

Past years have seen the ESPN tinker with the coverage formula. Some years saw an attempt to capture at least highlights from many – if not nearly all – events. And others have seen the network narrow their focus almost exclusively on the Main Event.

This year looks like a case of the latter, not the former. Of the 28 episodes that make up the schedule for ESPN’s presentation of the 2013 World Series of Poker, only four step outside the boundaries of Main Event coverage.

Specifically, the first two episodes focus on the APWSOP Main Event, as detailed above. And then episodes 3 and 4 are devoted to the WSOP National Championship Final Table. But once those first two weeks of coverage are in the rearview, it’s all Main Event as far as the eye can see.

Viewership trends from 2012 set standards for this year’s broadcast

Last year’s World Series of Poker broadcasts were by and large considered a success, with ratings shares increasing in nearly every year-over-year comparison with 2011.

That was an especially impressive accomplishment given the proximity of the WSOP Main Event final table to the 2012 presidential election. In fact, the traditional schedule for the final table was actually shifted around in 2012 to accommodate the election, with the event concluding nearly a week earlier than it normally would have.

The number to watch in 2013 will continue to be the ratings share for the Main Event episodes, which are the bread and butter of ESPN’s World Series of Poker coverage. Anything above a 0.7 will represent growth for the broadcast, which has struggled historically to maintain audiences year to year.