Ratings predictions: NBA Finals, NFL, ALCS and more

Typically, record-low ratings correspond with poor play. In 2003, Spurs-Nets was a dreadful slog that included a 33-30 halftime score, full-screen graphics devoted to offensive futility, and Mike Tirico and Joel Siegel bumping Incredible Hulk fists. In 2007, Spurs-Cavs was a forgettable mismatch overshadowed by Tony Soprano.

After an uncompetitive first two games, Lakers-Heat has been one of the more compelling NBA Finals in recent years. Games 3, 4 and 5 went down to the wire and Friday’s duel between Jimmy Butler and LeBron James seems likely to live on in Finals lore. Yet through four games, the 2020 NBA Finals has delivered easily the four lowest ratings on record for the event.

The ‘whys’ are no mystery in this anomalous year. The Finals is taking place four months later than scheduled, trading in its cushy early summer spot on the calendar for rough-and-tumble football season. With nearly all of the year’s marquee sporting events compressed into a short time frame, ratings have declined virtually across the board — even as total viewing of sports is either up, or comparable to last year. Plus, sports is competing with an engorged cable news leviathan that is swallowing up a greater and greater portion of television’s diminishing audience.

Given the numbers for other sports this year, one might wonder why the NBA’s ratings — still among the highest in an albeit-diminished industry — should generate so much scrutiny. Just like the NBA Finals, Kentucky Derby ratings plunged from the 8.0-9.0 range to below a 5.0 — but with nary a tut.

Part the scrutiny is due to the league’s media presence. Sports pundits do not endlessly debate American Pharoah’s ranking in the “GOAT” conversation, for example. Given the NBA’s ubiquity in the sporting conversation, one would expect far better ratings for the championship series than 3.1, 3.6, 4.1 and 4.4 — the kind of numbers one would expect for an Indy 500 (pre-COVID, that is; this year’s 500 fell to a 2.3).

It is also the case that, for whatever reason, the NBA has always had detractors in greater measure than the other leagues — and whenever its ratings go down, blame is inevitably placed at the feet of its’ players and their perceived pathologies. One wonders what the Venn diagram looks like between the NBA’s current critics and those who were lambasting players as thugs and criminals 15-20 years ago. One also wonders what the odds are that someone who swore off the NBA in 2004 became a loyal viewer again before swearing it off once more in 2020.

Ultimately, record-low ratings are hard to square with a high-quality series involving the league’s biggest superstar and most popular team, no matter the litany of legitimate excuses. While it is true that the NBA is doing no worse than any other league under these adverse conditions (with the noted exception of the NFL, whose ten percent decline should be the envy of the industry), the expectations are higher when you have a $2.7 billion/year media rights deal and your players are influential, world-famous celebrities. Much of the NBA ratings conversation is littered with cheap shots, but it is fair to expect the ratings to hold up better than this, even with all of the obvious caveats.

Typically, NBA Finals ratings jump the later one gets into a series. That will obviously not be the case this year thanks to Sunday’s NFL competition. Game 6 ratings will in all probability drop from Game 5. Still, expect the numbers to fare far better than last Sunday’s Game 3, which averaged an all-time Finals low 3.1. Prediction: 4.0.

Outside of Los Angeles, nobody was more upset with the Lakers’ loss Friday night than NBC executives. Sunday Night Football has routed the NBA for four straight weeks but has not emerged from those confrontations unscathed. Opposite the Finals last week, it posted its lowest rating in nearly two years. While its declines are but a flesh wound compared to those of the NBA, there is little doubt that NBC would prefer not to share its Sunday night stage week after week. As it is, expect Vikings-Seahawks to give SNF its sixth ratings drop in as many weeks. Last year’s Colts-Chiefs game drew a 10.6. Prediction: 8.9.

The Giants-Cowboys rivalry returns to CBS for the first time since the network last held NFC rights in the early 1990s. Giants-Cowboys has lost a lot of juice thanks to New York’s slide out of relevance, one of the reasons why the NFL may have felt comfortable giving CBS a game that has traditionally been a staple of the FOX lineup (FOX does have the Week 17 rematch). The teams enter Sunday a combined 1-7, making this one of those games where the announcers may implore you to ‘throw out the records.’ No matter how good the game is, ratings will have a tough time matching last year’s 13.8 for Packers-Cowboys. Prediction: 11.2.

It would make sense to suggest that Major League Baseball was rooting for the Yankees to advance to the ALCS, but in a year like this one, would a New York win have really mattered? Ratings will surely be worse trading the Yankees for the Rays, but they were already down considerably. At a certain point, the difference between bad and worse is cosmetic.

Expect a steep drop for Sunday’s Game 1 of the ALCS, which faces both the NFL and Game 6 of the NBA Finals. Last year’s Game 1 averaged a 3.6 on the FOX broadcast network. Last year’s LCS Game 1 on TBS — Nationals-Cardinals — averaged a 2.8. Prediction: 1.5.

What relevance does a top ten matchup have in a year when two of the “Power 5” conferences have yet to play, a year when there has been no relevant non-conference play, a year when some teams are much further along in their seasons than others? So far this season, no college football game has cracked a 3.0 rating — a stat that would be eye-opening in week six of a normal season. Do not expect Miami-Clemson to be the first. Last year’s comparable Michigan State-Ohio State game had a 3.9. Prediction: 2.4.

With NBC airing hardly any French Open coverage prior to this weekend’s finals, ratings have been hard to come by. NBC’s opening day of coverage plunged 57 percent from last year, squarely in line with the trend for events postponed from spring to late summer and fall. It seems reasonable to expect similar numbers for Sunday’s men’s final, despite the marquee matchup of Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic. Last year, coverage featuring the men’s final averaged a 1.2 rating. Prediction: 0.7.