Viewers tuning into Fox for the Michigan-Purdue college football game at 4 PM ET instead found a Cubs-Brewers baseball game still going on.
Cubs-Brewers began at 1:05 PM, and given that baseball games frequently go on for three+ hours (especially when involving expanded September rosters and pitching changes in playoff races), it’s hardly surprising that a baseball game would go past the 4 PM time slot.
And, while most of the people tuning in for Purdue-Michigan probably didn’t care about the baseball game, it was a very important game for the NL Central and NL Wild Card races. So, it does makes sense that Fox stuck with the baseball game for its conclusion.
What doesn’t make much sense is that there wasn’t a bigger separation in start times for the games (though this can of course be difficult to work out, and Cubs-Brewers was already a very early time to accommodate Fox).
And what makes even less sense is that the start of the Michigan-Purdue game was moved to… Fox Business Network?
Oh, and Fox waited four minutes to go to Michigan-Purdue after the baseball game ended, to get their commercials in.
But it’s odd that Fox would choose to throw Michigan-Purdue on Fox Business, a channel that most people don’t even know exists. It’s hidden in the DirecTV listings on channel 359 (local channels are 1-100, sports channels are in the early 200s and 600s). Few sports bars are going to take the time to figure that out.
And the same thing happened for the beginning of the Maryland-UCF game, which was slated for a 3 PM ET start on FS1. NASCAR trucks racing was on FS1 into the 3 PM ET time slot, and the Maryland-UCF start was moved to Fox Business.
NASCAR trucks running long… UCF-Maryland shifted to Fox Business. Fox Business!
Naturally, viewers looking for these football games were quite angry with Fox.
Stupid. Why? I have 12-14 games a year. And, I don't have Fox Business. What the hell. Give me my football game damnit!
The worst part of this whole situation? Michigan-Purdue was the first in-conference game for Fox under their new Big Ten deal. Not exactly a great start to that partnership.