Updated with results from the Chase for the Nextel Cup and MLS Cup. Here's my listing of American sports, grouped in a similar manner to college teams, for the month of January 2007. This aims to be mostly a listing by popularity, trying to find where these sports stand in American culture. However, it's effectively a ranking by TV ratings.
Ratings for Game 6: 10.1. Ratings for the National Championship: 11.2. Before you cite Bracket Madness, consider that certain high-profile regular season college games beat the pros.
A down year for the national championship game just barely fell behind the Daytona 500 in the ratings. Tournament is still America's office-pool past-time. Big regular season games actually beat NBA regular-season games.
I scoffed at the 11.3 "record" rating for the Daytona 500 - so weak compared to the NFL and college football! (I only started comparing TV ratings this year.) But it only falls to the football and Olympics. The Chase gets 4's and 5's, lowering its rating by way of "core" fanbase counting more. That still absoultely crushes the Stanley Cup Finals.
Turned out to be better and worse than expected. Better because of the WNBA stinkjob, worse because the US Open numbers looked like they would be over-3 and turned out to be rather mediocre.
The Arena League suddenly looks like it belongs. But can we get some ratings for more minor leagues, like lacrosse or the MISL, in here?
If you have any suggestions for how I can contribute to Wikipedia pages on sports, bring it up on the talk page of either this page or my overall talk page.