Chiefs Still Unbeaten But ‘Sunday Night Football’ Ratings Down Again On Politically Charged Day
On a day that saw Vice President Mike Pence walk out of the Indianapolis Colts-San Francisco 49ers game because of players taking a knee during the national anthem, the Kansas City Chiefs had a very good night on Sunday Night Football. With a 42-34 victory over the Houston Texans in the Lone Star State, the Chiefs won their fifth in a row to start the season.
The @Chiefs remain the lone undefeated team in the @NFL at 5-0. #ChiefsKingdom pic.twitter.com/nlnvkMDgPW
— SNF on NBC (@SNFonNBC) October 9, 2017
However, with a 10.6/18 in metered market results, last night was not so stellar for NBC and the NFL. In a seemingly ever-escalating political atmosphere for the ratings-battered league, that marks a 3% dip from last week’s SNF, when the Seattle Seahawks beat the Indianapolis Colts 46-18. That is also a season low for SNF in a season that has been mired in controversy and ratings decline.
To add further context, last night’s injury-filled SNF was up just 4% in MM numbers from the comparable game of last year, when the New York Giants battled the Green Bay Packers. The sting in that is that season low SNF of October 9, 2016 was up against the Donald Trump-Hillary Clinton town hall debate that came the weekend of revelations of inappropriate and damning remarks about women that Trump made to Access Hollywood‘s Billy Bush in 2005. That led to candidate Trump’s “locker room talk” defense at that town hall.
Last week’s 8:30-11:45 PM ET SNF went on to snag a 5.8/21 among adults 18-49 and 16.73 million viewers, which was down from the week before. The Giants-Packers game last year eventually drew a 5.9/16 in the key demo and an audience of 16.62 million.
We’ll update with more SNF numbers and the rest of what was on the Big 4 last night later on. As something to tide you over until then, last night’s game, which had a 16-point spread at halftime, peaked from 9-9:30 PM ET with a 11.5/9 MM rating.
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