Decade-High MLB Playoff Ratings Prove NBA Is In Decline | Bobby Burack

During the NBA playoffs this spring, several notable media voices rushed to defend the league’s inevitably weak television ratings. Bill Simmons and Ryen Russillo were among them, taking aim at Clay Travis and I over OutKick’s coverage.

"Hey, Clay Travis, how about tweeting about the ratings?" Russillo said after a mid-round Game 7. "Get Bobby Burack on that one," Simmons replied.

A week later, Simmons doubled down. "Should we say something about Bobby Burack again? Do you think Burack will pick that up?"

Per their request, I covered the NBA playoffs ratings. The results: the NBA Finals drew the second-lowest average audience on record and the lowest-rated Game 7 in Finals history.

But rather than addressing the product’s lack of appeal, Russillo blamed – wait for it – those damn right-wingers.

"I think a lot of the ratings-decline stuff is driven by people’s political beliefs," Russillo told Barstool. "If you’re really, really right-wing, you love the idea of the NBA being a dying product because it’s probably the most progressive league. It’s not the NFL. It’s not perfect. You want to compare it to the ’90s? Alright, let’s do it. It looks terrible. You want to do it with any other TV show from the ’90s? I’m telling you right now, it’s probably going to look bad when you start comparing sitcoms to Friends."

It’s true that the NBA isn’t the NFL. However, the argument that "everything on television is down" simply isn’t true. Nor is it true that only football is the only sport thriving in a fractured, cord-cutting media landscape.

Major League Baseball’s postseason is proof. Through the first two rounds, the MLB playoffs averaged 4.33 million viewers per game — up 30% from last year and the highest mark since 2010.

Some NBA defenders claim the league’s dip is tied to small-market matchups. That may play a role. And if so, that's an NBA problem. 

See, other leagues are growing despite similar small market success dynamics. Kansas City and Green Bay are among the most popular markets in the NFL. MLB just posted decade-highs from a series involving Seattle and Detroit. Game 5 between the Tigers and Mariners drew 8.72 million viewers on Fox — the most-watched American League Division Series game in 14 years.

While Championship Series data is still coming in, Game 1 of the ALCS between Seattle and Toronto averaged 10.02 million combined viewers across the U.S. and Canada, including 5.31 million on Fox, Fox Deportes, and streaming. In the U.S. alone, that’s up 32% from last year’s ALCS Game 1 between the Guardians and Yankees on TBS.

Now, Nielsen recently updated its measurement system to include "Panel + Big Data," which may have slightly boosted reported figures. Still, MLB’s growth predates that change. During the regular season, ESPN viewership was up 21% year over year, Fox rose 10%, TBS climbed 29%, and MLB Network gained 13%.

Other sports are also thriving. Golf, tennis, boxing, college football, college basketball, and even horse racing have recently posted near-decade highs.

There’s one major outlier in live sports viewership: the NBA.

Of course, the sensitive media members can't acknowledge that the NBA is not nearly as popular as it is in media and Hollywood circles. The data is clear. The NBA is less popular on television today than at any point since audience tracking became public.

Cord-cutting, Netflix, right-wingers, and OutKick are not the problem. The NBA is. The league is to blame for its own decline.

Anyway, at least the NBA is back in business with the Chinese Communist Party during an ongoing genocide against Muslim Uyghurs. As long as China is watching, the NBA won't have to worry about Americans.