In NFL football telecasts, a 2-minute commerical break follows almost every touchdown. After that break, we see the ensuing kickoff, which is SOMETIMES followed by another 2-minute TV commerical timeout.
How are these “arbitrary” breaks determined? If the network could call a TV timeout after every kickoff return, wouldn’t they do it to maximize commerical revenue? Or is there a formula/quota involved?
LIkewise, we sometimes see commericals during team timeouts, but not always!
(I’m just trying to make my channel-switching technique more efficient!)
Sure there’s a quota involved. It’s the amount of ad time the network and station have allotted and sold.
The “two-minute-break” followed by a kickoff and another “two-minute-break” drives me a little bonkers. But hey, I’m just a veep at ABC and don’t have much say in the matter. We have to sell those refrigerators, after all…
Once all of the sold ad time has been aired you can see the rare but greatly appreciated “This will be a thrity second time-out” call from the referee.
My understanding is that commercial time is sold by quarter.
So you’ll hear things like “our commercial will be in the first break in the 3rd quarter” or “during the first half two minute warning.”
Basically, you’ll see more of these 2 minute commercial breaks at the beginning of each quarter, as they rush to fill the quota for that quarter. If there are a ton of stoppages, you’ll start to see no breaks at all after a touchdown…they’ll go straight to the kickoff and then straight to the next drive.
IF you’re channel-flipping like I do, remember that the “2-minute break” is often 1:45 of commercials, followed by 15 seconds of commentary before play begins.
So this is why we sometimes see no commercials during overtime?