After a regular season and playoffs marked by declines, the NBA Finals opened with its worst-ever performance in the ratings.
Wednesday’s Game 1 of the NBA Finals (Heat-Lakers) averaged a 4.1 rating and 7.41 million viewers on ABC, comfortably the lowest rated and least-watched NBA Finals game on record (dates back to 1988). The previous lows were a 5.2 and 8.06 million for Nets-Spurs Game 2 in 2003. [Related: NBA Finals ratings history.]
As goes without saying, it was also the least-watched Finals opener on record. The previous low was 9.21 million for Cavaliers-Spurs in 2007.
The Lakers’ easy win, in which they led by as many as 32, sank 48% in ratings and 45% in viewership from Warriors-Raptors last year (7.9, 13.38M) and 59% and 58% respectively from Cavaliers-Warriors in 2018 (10.0, 17.67M), which aired as scheduled in late May.
The Game 1 audience was on the level of a typical conference final rather than the NBA Finals. Last year’s Blazers-Warriors West Finals Game 1 drew a higher rating (4.5) and slightly fewer viewers (7.32M) on ESPN. Notably, Game 1 did not generate the top audience of the protracted season, trailing Clippers-Lakers on ABC and ESPN Christmas Day (8.76M).
The steep decline and record-low is in keeping with the trend for sporting events rescheduled from their traditional times of year. Stanley Cup Final viewership sank 61% to a 13-year low; the Kentucky Derby 43% to a record-low; the final round of golf’s U.S. Open 56% to a record-low; the Indy 500 a comparably modest 32% to a record-low. All of those events, like the NBA Finals, are staples of May and June that were relocated to August and September.
While NBA ratings have been down all season, even before the league’s four-month hiatus, the Lakers’ presence had been a bright spot earlier in the playoffs. Six of L.A.’s first eight playoff games increased over the comparable windows of last year’s postseason. That changed starting with Game 4 of their second round series against Houston on the opening night of the NFL season. From that point on, every Laker game that can be compared to last season has declined at least a third.
Game 1 was still the night’s most-watched show overall and in the key young adult demographics, though that should go without saying for an NBA Finals game. Compared to last year’s opener, ratings fell 40% in adults 18-49 (from 4.8 to 2.9), 38% in 18-34 (from 4.2 to 2.6) and 42% in 25-54 (from 5.2 to 3.0).
Outside of the NFL, no television program has done better in 18-34 or 18-49 since the Academy Awards in February.
Game 1 did face unusual competition from MLB Wild Card games on ESPN (Yankees-Indians: 2.54M) and ESPN2 (Brewers-Dodgers: 1.09M). It also had to contend with a diminished audience pool as 9.1 million fewer viewers were watching television than on the opening night of last year’s finals.
Locally, Game 1 averaged a 13.2 rating in Los Angeles and a 12.9 in Miami-Ft. Lauderdale. L.A.’s rating declined 48% from the Lakers’ previous NBA Finals opener against the Celtics in 2010 (25.2) and Miami’s 58% from the Heat’s previous Finals opener against the Spurs in 2014 (30.5).
Baseball competition was a factor in Los Angeles, where Game 1 aired opposite a Dodgers playoff game on ESPN2 that averaged a 4.6. Baseball also affected ratings in the top market New York, where Game 1 (4.9) trailed the Yankees’ competing playoff games against Cleveland on ESPN (5.4).
[Nielsen estimates from Programming Insider 10.1, ShowBuzz Daily 10.1]
