During the offseason, the NFL couldn’t get out of its own way, as the Deflategate fiasco dominated the headlines and angered millions of fans. But once football starts, those fans can’t get enough.
In fact, the NFL says that with 19.9 million viewers for the average game, it was the most-watched Week One ever, topping the 19.6 million mark in Week One of 2013.
Football remains by far the most popular programming on American television: Of the 30 media markets that have NFL teams, an NFL game was the most-watched television program of the week in 29 of them. (The only exception was Cleveland, where the Ohio State-Virginia Tech game was the most-watched TV show last week.)
The most-watched game of the weekend was the Thursday night kickoff game between the Steelers and Patriots, which got 27.4 million viewers on NBC. Next was the Giants-Cowboys game on Sunday night, which drew 26.8 million viewers to NBC. CBS and FOX also topped 20 million viewers, with CBS getting 23.3 million viewers in the late afternoon window thanks mostly to Ravens-Broncos, and FOX getting 20.1 million viewers in the early afternoon window thanks mostly to Packers-Bears.
For all the off-field issues that seem to dominate NFL discussions in America, there may be nothing that can change the fact that Americans simply love the game on the field.