National Football League TV ratings are up for the first time since 2015, an improvement league and television executives attribute to new stars, a fading national-anthem controversy and a much-needed distraction from the political divisiveness shaking the country, The Wall Street Journal reports.
Five weeks into the season, the average TV audience for a game is 15.6 million, up 3% compared with the same period a year ago, according to Nielsen. Ratings remain 16% lower than in the first five weeks of the 2015 season.
The top 15 shows for all of September were NFL games, Nielsen data show, a sign that despite ratings erosion in past seasons, football still is the most popular programming on television.
In prime time, the strength of NFL programming remained evident. Fox and NBC, which carry Thursday night and Sunday night games, respectively, were the only networks to post an uptick in prime-time viewers this broadcast-TV season, which started Sept. 24.
