NBC is dominating early-season baseball viewership after taking over Opening Day and Sunday Night Baseball rights from ESPN, averaging 2.25 million viewers per game through 11 broadcasts according to Nielsen.
Including Peacock streaming measured by Adobe Analytics, NBC’s average rises to 2.51 million viewers — a 51% increase from ESPN’s 1.66 million average through the same period last year.
The New York Yankees–Boston Red Sox game on Sunday, June 28, is the season’s most-watched so far, drawing 3.27 million viewers on NBC (4 million with streaming). The game went to extra innings after coverage joined in progress in the fourth inning due to a golf overrun.Several factors are boosting NBC’s numbers compared with last season on cable:
- Broadcast television on NBC reaches a larger potential audience than ESPN.
- NBC has aired fewer games so far than ESPN did at this point last year.
- Nielsen’s updated Big Data methodology has generally lifted measured sports audiences.
ESPN’s numbers have dropped sharply, with its games (including two on ABC) averaging just 1.12 million viewers this season. On ABC, the Yankees–Red Sox game on June 27 led with 1.99 million. ESPN’s top regular-season game so far is Yankees–Royals on Memorial Day afternoon, which averaged 1.63 million.
The decline for ESPN is largely explained by scheduling: the network has shifted most games to weeknights this season, whereas last year’s stronger 1.66 million average included more weekend matchups. ESPN’s three weekday games last year averaged only 1.23 million, similar to this season’s overall performance.