Date: 13th February 2001

NBA Ratings Reduced To A Dribble


The retirement of Michael Jordan appears to affect NBA ratings more intensely with each passing year.

According to Nielsen overnights, the primetime segment of Sunday's All-Star game (7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.) posted a 4.6 rating and 7 share for NBC, which put the network in fourth place during those hours. The ratings are some 30 percent below those for last year's game (6.9/12) and nearly 60 percent below those for 1998 (10.6/17), the last year that Jordan played in the contest. Compounding NBC's problems Sunday night, the Jim Carrey movie The Truman Show also failed to draw, earning only a 7.2/11, putting it behind its Big 4 network rivals between 9:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. as well.

Source: Studio Briefing