The National Football League (NFL) received the best news at the beginning of the New Year by confirming that the television audience of the regular season of 2018 that ended last month increased by five percent in relation to that of 2017.
The increase came after two years of losing the NFL audience, which corresponded to the protests of some players during the intonation of the national anthem, something that this season has almost completely disappeared.
The news of the increase has even greater value for the NFL to occur at a time when there is a widespread trend of loss of television audience at all levels of programming both sports broadcasts and normal programs.
During the 2018 season, the average audience per game was 15.8 million viewers, compared to 14.9 in 2017.
In addition to the 50 major sports broadcasts during 2018, 46 were from NFL games.
Meanwhile, the average streaming audience increased 86 percent. A total of 13 games on Thursday night were aired on Amazon Prime.
Analysts have offered a number of explanations for the rally of television audiences this season, including the success of the teams in some of the biggest markets in the NFL such as Dallas, Chicago and Los Angeles (both the Rams and the Chargers), which now have headquarters in the Californian city.
The prominence of the offensive game that marked the rhythm of the unprecedented competition, made the transmissions a more attractive product for the fans.
The NFL in its report on television audiences did not disclose those related to the Red Zone channel.
