Contender 2 sponsor Everlast is “very pleased with the viewer ratings for this new season,” the company’s president said in a statement.
Although the ratings for the first episode were down among total viewers, Everlast says the show “reached 20 million viewers nationwide across all airings on ESPN and ESPN2 just ten days since the second season of ESPN’s critically acclaimed boxing reality series premiered.”
In other words, the show reached a large number of viewers when all of the repeats on both networks were considered. Everlast notes that, compared to last year, ESPN’s ratings “increased 31% from the corresponding 10-11 p.m. time slot.”
Also in the press release, executive producer Mark Burnett says, “I have always believed there was a solid core audience for this series and am glad to see so many viewers flocking to see this season’s The Contender.”
