Stop us if you’ve heard this one before — people really love watching live sports, especially the NFL.
On Friday, the Sports Business Journal released its findings of the top 100 telecasts of 2022 and found that 94 were sports-related, and 82 of those were NFL games. Obviously, the top broadcasts were all NFL games and all had major stakes: No. 1 was Super Bowl LVI between the Los Angeles Rams and Cincinnati Bengals, followed by the NFC and AFC Championship games.
The only non-NFL broadcast to crack the top 20 was President Biden’s State of the Union Address on March 1. Given that 2022 was an election year, it might not be surprising that there were four political programs in the top 100 last year, but obviously, nothing tops the NFL.
You can check out the full top 20 below (figures courtesy of Sports Business Journal):
| Rank | Network(s) | Date | Telecast | Viewers |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | NBC | 2/13 | Super Bowl LVI: Rams-Bengals | 110,400,000 |
| 2 | Fox | 1/30 | NFC Championship: Rams-49ers | 50,225,000 |
| 3 | CBS | 1/30 | AFC Championship: Chiefs-Bengals | 47,851,000 |
| 4 | CBS | 1/23 | AFC Divisional Playoff: Chiefs-Bills | 42,736,000 |
| 5 | Fox | 11/24 | NFL: Giants-Cowboys (Thanksgiving) | 42,058,000 |
| 6 | CBS / Nickelodeon | 1/16 | NFC Wild Card: 49ers-Cowboys | 41,496,000 |
| 7 | NBC | 1/23 | NFC Divisional Playoff: Buccaneers-Rams | 39,880,000 |
| 8 | Fox | 1/22 | NFC Divisional Playoff: Packers-49ers | 36,923,000 |
| 9 | multiple | 3/1 | State of the Union (President Biden address) | 34,646,000 |
| 10 | CBS | 11/24 | NFL: Bills-Lions (Thanksgiving) | 31,782,000 |
| 11 | CBS | 1/22 | AFC Divisional Playoff: Titans-Bengals | 30,752,000 |
| 12 | Fox | 1/16 | NFC Wild Card: Buccaneers-Eagles | 30,373,000 |
| 13 | NBC | 1/16 | AFC Wild Card: Chiefs-Steelers | 30,185,000 |
| 14 | Fox | 11/13 | NFL: Cowboys-Packers | 29,171,000 |
| 15 | NBC | 1/15 | AFC Wild Card: Bengals-Raiders | 28,910,000 |
| 16 | Fox | 12/24 | NFL: Eagles-Cowboys | 27,832,000 |
| 17 | CBS | 11/20 | NFL: Cowboys-Vikings | 27,546,000 |
| 18 | CBS | 9/18 | NFL: Bengals-Cowboys | 27,389,000 |
| 19 | Fox | 1/2 | NFL: Cardinals-Cowboys | 26,786,000 |
| 20 | Fox | 9/25 | NFL: Packers-Buccaneers | 26,399,000 |
Even without NFL football, sports still reign supreme, thanks in part to the 2022 Beijing Olympics. According to SBJ, if you removed all of the NFL games from the ratings, the Winter Games and college football would have eight top-50 telecasts apiece, the MLB and the NBA would have six, college basketball would appear five times, and FIFA World Cup matches would account for four. The Kentucky Derby would be the only other sporting event to crack the top 50 on a non-pro football list. No hockey or women’s sports managed to crack the top 100 in any capacity.
Shockingly, the number of sporting events accounting for the top 100 broadcasts actually fell compared to 2021 — but only by one — though the ratio of NFL games in the top 100 grew, even with the NFL’s move to Prime Video for “Thursday Night Football.” In 2021, 75 of the top 100 broadcasts were NFL games.
Unfortunately for the streaming faithful, none of the admittedly mediocre “Thursday Night Football” games cracked the top 100, but a stronger slate next year could change that. Regardless, there’s a reason broadcast companies paid over $100 billion for the NFL’s rights and why they’ll shell out big bucks for any live sports content.
What were the non-sports events that cracked the top 100? That would be the aforementioned State of the Union address, two televised congressional hearings from the January 6 committee, a televised speech to Congress from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and the “Slapgate” Academy Awards.
You can check out the entire top 100 below:
82 NFL games in the top 100 most-watched TV shows of 2022
— Lev Akabas (@LevAkabas) January 6, 2023
That football emoji at #35 is the 4-10 Broncos losing to the 4-10 Rams by 37 points on xmas… which got more viewers than any NBA game, any MLB game, any World Cup Game, the Oscars, or any scripted TV show pic.twitter.com/goJraIxjvr