Sunday’s battle between Peyton Manning and Michael Vick produced the second-largest NFL audience of the season.
The Week 9 NFL national window, featuring Colts/Eagles in 76% of TV markets, drew a 16.3 final rating and 27.789 million viewers on CBS Sunday afternoon — up 38% in ratings and 44% in viewership from Week 9 last year (SD/NYG*: 11.8, 19.285 mil, CBS), and up 14% and 19%, respectively, from Week 9 in 2008 (NYG/DAL*: 14.3, 23.270 mil, FOX).
This marks the second-most viewed NFL telecast of the season on any network, behind only the Week 1 national window on FOX (GB/PHI*: 28.023 mil), and the third-highest rated.
Additionally, Sunday’s national window ranks as the sixth-most viewed NFL telecast on CBS since the network resumed airing games in 1998.
So far this season, eight NFL telecasts have drawn at least 25 million viewers. To put that in perspective, nine telecasts all of last season topped 25 million, and only three telecasts hit that mark in 2008.
The telecast trounced Sunday Night Football on NBC (11.6, 19.368 mil), marking the eighth time in nine weeks this season — and the 17th time in the past 18 NFL weeks — that the national window has topped SNF.
