NFL fans in stands & watching on television

The NFL’s kickoff weekend ended up having the secondhighest TV ratings for Week 1 over the past five seasons.

The 16 games averaged 17.4 million viewers on television and digital properties. That is a 7% increase over last season (16.3 million average) and nearly equal to 2019, which averaged 17.6 million and remains the highest since 2017.

The most-watched game of the week was last Thursday night’s 31-29 victory by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers over the Dallas Cowboys. It averaged 26.4 million on NBC and digital, making it the most-watched first game of the season since 2015.

NBC averaged 22.8 million for the Thursday and Sunday games, which is an 11% increase over last year.

ESPN and Nielsen reported that the Monday night overtime thriller between the Las Vegas Raiders and Baltimore Ravens averaged 15.3 million on ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC. It is the most watched “Monday Night Football” Week 1 game since 2013, when Philadelphia at Washington averaged 16.5 million. That included 800,000 for the Mannings Megacast on ESPN2.