Ratings Roundup: NFL Starts with a Bang; PGA Championship Reaches Historic Low

This week’s edition of Sunday Night Football, featuring the Chargers and Cowboys, pulled in 10.7 million viewers, the largest audience for an NFL preseason game this season and the most-watched primetime program of the week. It was also No. 1 in Household Rating (6.4/11) and rankes as the third most-watched preseason game since NBC acquired the SNF rights in 2006. Despite the strong showing, the was actually down slightly in rating from last year’s Vikings-49ers game featuring Brett Favre’s return, which notched a 6.7/12…

…The final numbers from CBS’s disappointing PGA Championship coverage are in and they are historically low. CBS’s final round coverage of the PGA Championship drew a 4.1 final rating and 6.107 million viewers on Aug. 14, the lowest since 2008, when the was up against the Olympic Games. That is only down 5% in ratings and 6% in viewership from last year (4.3, 6.511M), but marks the lowest rated, least-viewed final round of the PGA Championship since 2008 (2.8, 4.020 million opposite the Olympics). Of the last 30 editions of the PGA Championship (dating back to 1982), Sunday’s final round ranks as the fifth-lowest rated — ahead of only 1992 (4.0), 1996 (3.7), 1986 (3.5) and 2008 (2.8). This year’s final round drew an even lower rating and fewer viewers than third round coverage two years ago…

…ESPN’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race from Michigan averaged a 3.2/8 with 5.0 million viewers for the network on Sunday, up 3% over last year’s numbers. Through three races, NASCAR Sprint Cup racing on ESPN is averaging a 3.5/8 holding even with last year’s 3.5/9 in rating.  ESPN’s live telecast of the NASCAR Nationwide Series race in Montreal on Saturday, Aug. 20, earned a 1.5 final national household coverage rating, averaging 1,872,000 viewers. Last year’s race aired on ESPN2 and earned a 1.7 rating…

…Last Friday the Washington Redskins and Baltimore Ravens went head-to-head in the local ratings game, the Redskins facing the Colts and the Ravens against the Chiefs. The Redskins broadcast in Washington earned a combined 13.4 rating, good for about 320,000 households (according to overnights). The Ravens broadcast in Washington earned a 1.4 rating, good for about 34,000 households. In Baltimore, meanwhile, the Ravens broadcast earned a 17.7 rating, good for about 196,000 households, while the Redskins broadcast earned a 1.3 rating, for about 15,000 households. There was also a national Fox broadcast that night that earned a 1.0 in Washington, meaning about 378,000 Washington-area households were watching preseason NFL football on Friday night. Nearly one-third of TVs in use in this market were tuned to the NFL.