The Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, Va., Bob Molinaro column: Believing TV ratings might not make good horse sense [The Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, Va.]

May 7--In the wake of the news that Saturday's Kentucky Derby was the most-viewed horse race in 21 years, I hereby promise to refrain for all time from any attempt to explain why people watch what they watch.

Going in, this Derby was as sexy as a washing machine. It featured a cavalry charge of long shots, not a marquee name in the bunch. Pre-race, there just wasn't much buzz.

And yet, somehow more TV viewers tuned in for this horse race than for any other in a generation.

Should we believe the Nielsens? I think I'd feel more comfortable with a gallop poll.

Let's just say that I'm suspicious.

We've all been programmed, I have at least, to react to TV ratings as if they mean more than they do. Or as if they can be explained scientifically or used to clinch an argument.

I'm trying to break that habit. So, when Fed-Ex drops its sponsorship of the Orange Bowl after 21 years and dropping ratings, I hesitate to read too much into it. Or affix blame.

It's true the Orange Bowl has had one wheel in a ratings ditch since hitching its wagon to the ACC. And that this makes the conference a tempting target for people who question its importance to the BCS.

The ACC was thrown on the defensive again when the Iowa-Georgia Tech Orange Bowl on Jan. 5 drew the smallest audience of the four BCS games. This followed the 2009 Orange Bowl between Virginia Tech and Cincinnati that suffered the lowest ratings of any BCS game ever.

These numbers have not been kind to the ACC.

But while I don't want to be in a position to have to defend the conference, don't the ACC's opponents in these relatively humdrum Orange Bowls share half the blame?

Iowa? Cincinnati? C'mon, they're Nielsen poison.

True, Cincinnati made some noise last season, but it takes years for football's social climbers to appear on the casual fan's radar.

The Orange Bowl is not the premier event it used to be -- pre-BCS -- when charismatic Nebraska and Oklahoma teams rolled in to take on other powerhouses. The contract with the ACC doesn't help. Despite all the ACC has done to unravel its great tradition, people still think of it as a basketball conference.

This is not a bad thing, by the way.

But the Orange Bowl also has been caught up in the backwash of changing attitudes. Better match-ups would help restore a little luster and create greater parity with other BCS bowls. But the reality is that it's just one more old-school event -- playoffs, anybody? -- that is shrinking with the times.

The Derby is another. The alleged boomlet in the race's viewership is a surprise because everybody knows it's another once-great occasion that is diminished in importance.

As for FedEx, it didn't drop the Orange Bowl because ratings tanked. At least not for that reason alone. It had more to do with ESPN -- the new BCS bowl network -- reserving big-game sponsorships for companies willing to invest in season-long advertising packages.

FedEx said no thanks, apparently believing it wouldn't receive a healthy return on its investment. There's a recession going on, after all.

Long before now, though, haven't we all wondered what sort of bang for their buck big companies got from sponsorships of bowls and other sporting events?

At least Tostitos seems like a natural tie-in with the Fiesta. People eat chips during games. They're likely to buy more Tostitos for the bowl and their bowls of dip.

But that's not the same, is it, as the less obvious relationship between viewers and, say, Allstate (Sugar Bowl) and Citi (Rose), both of which are in negotiations with ESPN to renew contracts.

But now I'm venturing into territory as unfamiliar to me as TV ratings.

I watched the Kentucky Derby, but couldn't tell you who its major sponsors were.

By any chance, was one of them a company that sells big, silly women's hats?

Bob Molinaro, (757) 446-2373, [email protected]

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