Tell Me Again How Traditional Media Is “Dead”: The NFL Continues To Dominate

by Freddy Tran Nager, Founder of Atomic Tango + Confessed Football Addict; image by Dall-E…

If you want to understand American culture, better understand the power of professional football.

Last night, 28.9 million people in the US (including me) watched the NFL season kickoff game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Baltimore Ravens. Those aren’t numbers generated by bots or purchased from click farms, or reported by some opaque platform from its cryptic data vault; those are numbers reported by third-party data aggregator and auditor Nielsen.

We’re also not talking mere “impressions” here — that dubious metric that counts bare glimpses of content, as if a split second on a screen is enough to impress anyone. An NFL game runs about three hours, and much of that consists of commercials that most viewers do watch.

Nielsen also reports that the game drew a 37 share. That means 37% of all televisions in use at that time were tuned into the game. Few other attractions generate that kind of shared interest in the United States.

To think, this millionaire professional athlete used to have his own identity.

Speaking of shared interest, I can’t mention the Kansas City Chiefs without also mentioning Taylor Swift. In case you haven’t heard, some guy she’s dating plays for the Chiefs, and as a true influencer, Ms. Swift has inspired millions of young women to take up an interest in football. Or, at least, interest in catching one of the dozens of shots of her during the game.

A few years back, social media zealots were predicting the demise of traditional media attractions like the NFL. The powers that be took note and evolved. You don’t have to watch, but you can’t look away.