Despite far better circumstances than a year ago, NBA All-Star weekend failed to bounce back in the ratings.
Last Sunday’s NBA All-Star Game averaged a 3.1 rating and 6.28 million viewers across TNT and TBS, tying last year as the lowest rated edition of the game. Keep in mind last year’s All-Star Game was scheduled at the last minute (against many players’ wishes), played in front of a limited capacity crowd, featured none of the usual lead-up events, and aired opposite a ballyhooed celebrity interview on CBS.
While this year’s game faced the Winter Olympics Closing Ceremony (3.6, 6.57M), the lack of improvement indicates that last year’s numbers were not an anomaly.
Viewership — which peaked at 6.7 million during the NBA’s halftime celebration of its top 75 players — did outpace last year (5.94M), though that year-ago figure excludes some out-of-home viewing. (While it is highly likely that this year’s viewership increased even without the aid of last year’s undercount, that cannot be said with complete certainty until a corrected figure for last year’s game is available.)
Compared to the previous traditional NBA All-Star Game two years ago, ratings fell 24% (from 4.1) and viewership 14% (from 7.28M). Keep in mind that game featured greater-than-usual viewing at the outset due to a pregame tribute to Kobe Bryant, who died weeks earlier.
Notably, the TBS alternate presentation featuring Ernie Johnson, Kenny Smith, Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal and Draymond Green averaged just a 0.45 rating and 852,000 viewers — down a sharp 36% in ratings and at least a third in viewership from last year (0.7, 1.28M pending revision). In the seven years TBS has simulcast the All-Star Game, this year’s “Inside the All-Star Game” simulcast was the least-watched.
By contrast, the main TNT broadcast was up 8% in ratings (from 2.4 to 2.6) and as much as 16% in viewership (from 4.67M pending revision to 5.43M).
All three All-Star games this year have tied or set new multi-year lows. Two weeks earlier, the NFL Pro Bowl and NHL All-Star Game posted their smallest audiences since 2006 and 2009, respectively.
As for the other events in All-Star weekend, NBA All-Star Saturday Night averaged a 2.0 and 4.24 million — marking the lowest rating and viewership for the event in at least 20 years. Ratings fell 27% and viewership 16% from the previous edition two years ago (2.8, 5.05M).
Last Friday’s NBA Rising Stars Challenge drew a 0.7 and 1.23 million, down 19% and 16% respectively from the last time it was played two years ago (0.9, 1.48M) and the least-watched edition of the game since 2017 (1.13M).
Finally, the NBA All-Star Celebrity Game pulled a 0.7 (-26%) and 1.29 million (-11%) on ESPN, the least-watched edition of that game since at least 2007.
[Nielsen estimates from ShowBuzz Daily 2.23]
