pro, college, or HS. If I had to rank my favorite sports to watch in order of preference, then the list would probably look like this: 1. Football (American, Canadian, Aussie Rules) 2. Soccer 3. Basketball 4. Rugby (Union Rules) 5. Ice Hockey 6. Water Polo 7. Racquetball/Squash 8. Wrestling 9. Volleyball 10. Polo Fortunately, ESPN Family of Networks (including ESPN+) is willing to broadcast a lot of these Olympic sports at the collegiate or pro level. Surprisingly some of the collegiate broadcasts are at the club level because the sport is currently not sponsored by the NCAA. However, you are correct that most people only care about watching football, basketball, maybe baseball, and maybe softball on TV. Any interest in watching ice hockey or lacrosse on TV is probably regional given how few the number of schools that sponsor the sport at the NCAA level. Even though soccer isn't as regional as ice hockey and lacrosse, the interest in watching the sport on TV is probably at that level. Something that could help explain the TV ratings is the bulk of events are typically scheduled at times when most people are at work or school. Just imagine if ESPN decided to broadcast the Alabama vs. WVU football at 2pm on a Tuesday (non-holiday). I suspect the rating for that game would be significantly down than if the game took place in one of the more traditional college football time slots. I'm not suggesting that the ratings would be up for the Olympic sports if they scheduled the games in better time slots because this generation of adults are from the old school where football and men's basketball dominate. However, there may be more of today's youth participating in these other sports than when I was their age. I'm in my mid-40s and as a youth I played football (Fall), basketball/wrestling (Winter), soccer (Spring/Summer), and baseball (Summer). When today's youth become adults, what will be their TV interests? Will they want to watch the sports they used to play or will they want to watch the sports (i.e. football, basketball, baseball, golf, etc.) that are currently popular today?