The Sunday night matchup between the Rams and the Cowboys may have been entertaining throughout, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it moved the needle for fans.
This is the first season where players have really made their views about social injustice and police brutality clear, and it’s turned some fans off. We live in a world of “cancel culture,” so if people don’t like what they see at any point, they may choose not to tune in again in the future.
And that’s why there’s been a shift from a large group of fans that would casually tune in. Instead, this season, they’ve elected not to watch some or all NFL games, and the ratings have proven that theory true.
The Week 1 opener between the Chiefs and Texans saw ratings decline from where they were last season, and “Sunday Night Football” featured more of the same.
Sunday night’s Rams-Cowboys game was played in brand-new SoFi Stadium, yet only 14.81 million total viewers tuned in to watch, according to Deadline. For the sake of comparison, the Steelers-Patriots Sunday night game from Week 1 of last season drew 22.2 million viewers, and that matchup was a 33-3 blowout.
It will be interesting to see if this ratings decline trend continues throughout this season.
