It’s a practice that’s been going on for decades in sports broadcasting. But promoting misleading kickoff times is no less annoying to fans, and MLS and FOX are two of the worst offenders.

For some fans, seeing an ad on TV or the web for game coverage is how they find out about events. And the time listed is often earlier than when a game will actually start. The reason? To get viewers to unknowingly tune in early for pre-game coverage. And the reason for that? To squeeze in a few extra commercial breaks. That’s especially useful for soccer, where you don’t have in-game breaks for commercials.

When it’s an ad-supporter network like FOX controlling the messaging, you can see the reason why they would do it. However, Major League Soccer, in particular, has no excuse. As of 2023, the vast majority of MLS games are shown exclusively via MLS Season Pass. This is a subscription service. Users pay as much as $15/month to watch the games. And heavy promotion went into the fact that “almost every game is now a 7:30 PM local start time”.

Except that, well, that actually isn’t the case. MLS games are listed at 7:30 PM local time, but actually don’t kick off until 8 minutes after that time.

That might seem like a minor gripe, sure, but it’s still misleading your customers.

Worse though are FOX Sports. Specifically when it comes to the upcoming FIFA Women’s World Cup.

The network are promoting times a full two hours earlier than the actual kickoff times for United States group matches.

These three games actually start at 9PM ET and 3AM ET respectively. For big events, like a World Cup, fans often plan their day around the game time. Such a huge difference between the promoted coverage time and actual kickoff can dramatically effect those plans. Especially for games like these – in primetime or very early (or late, depending on the person) in the day.

Even a simple disclaimer, listing the actual game times but adding “Studio coverage starting at 1AM ET” would be more respectful to viewers.

What do you think about the FOX and MLS promotion of kickoff times? Fair play to draw in viewers and please advertisers? Or a sneaky ruse?