As the NBA and MLB return from their coronavirus-imposed break, it appears TV viewers are not as interested in what the increasingly woke leagues have to offer.
With both baseball and basketball draped in all sorts of Black Lives Matter and social justice symbolism for their opening games, a substantially smaller number of fans tuned-in to the rest of the week’s games.
According to Outkick.com, neither league did well.
As for the opening games, Outkick reported that the return of the NBA on TNT saw the following numbers:
Lakers-Clippers: 3.4 million
Pelicans-Jazz: 2.1 million
ESPN’s MLB return numbers were also unsatisifying:
Yankees-Nationals: 4.0 million
Dodgers-Giants: 2.8 million
Outkick’s Ryan Glasspiegel added more ratings numbers on Twitter
“To be fair since I compared MLB vs NBA return night 1, here is night 2,” (July 24) he wrote, adding:
MLB (last Friday, ESPN)
Mets-Braves (4p) – 922K
Brewers-Cubs(7p) – 1.0M
Angels-As (10p) – 797K
NBA (last night ESPN) (July 31)
Celtics-Bucks (6:30p) – 1.3M
Mavs-Rockets (9p)- 1.7M
The Athletic’s Ethan Strauss also noted that the numbers continued to fall off for MLB:
For good measure, Strauss also pointed out that baseball can’t blame COVID-19. The virus didn’t stop people from watching Tom Brady golf with Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson back in May.
In fact, the charity golf match earned record TV ratings in May.
Dubbed “The Match II,” the game featuring Tom Brady, Phil Mickelson, Peyton Manning, and Tiger Woods peaked at an astonishing 6.3 million viewers and raised more than $20 million for charity.
