ABC is reporting 17.3 million watched last night’s game 5 of the NBA Finals. The Los Angeles Lakes won game five over the Boston Celtics forcing a game six tomorrow in Boston. The series, already averaging 14.5 million seems a lock for averaging 15 million after game 6.
ABC is reporting good performance in key demographics. I found ABC’s recent DVR boilerplate update interesting:
A note about increasing DVR penetration and year-to-year rating comparisons: Year-to-year rating trends based on the Live + Same Day data stream may be somewhat distorted by the level of DVR penetration in the Nielsen sample, which has jumped from 17% at the same point in 2006-07, up to 25% currently. More viewers are watching shows on their own timetables, which may not be reflected in the overnight next day numbers. The only truly valid year-to-year comparison would be one based on the Live + 7 Day metric, once those stats are released by Nielsen.
Very interesting boilerplate indeed. I think the networks are going to be frustrated by this. Most media will not be interested in waiting the extra 2 weeks to get the data to do the Live+7 comparison and will simply go with what's available immediately, which is Live+SD.
I think ABC does have a point, but I think the expediency of the media will render it moot.
And I clearly underestimated the jump that would happen after game 4. Now that I think about it, it makes sense that viewership would jump up for any game that could be the final one.
That 15 million turned out to be a great over-under. I don't think it's in the bag yet. If the Celtics win tonight ABC's got to do 17.5 million to get there. Tonight's competition will be a little tougher than the Tonys, the game may not be close, it's a work day which impacts the west coast audience. It's gonna be pretty darn close.
If ABC actually believed that the only truly valid comparison is Live + Seven Day, then that's all they'd release. Simply by issuing Live + SD comparisons they indicate that they don't believe their own argument.
For sports programs, the difference in audience between Live + SD and Live + 7 is frequently less than 1%. It's certainly not a difference that would cause anyone to say that the Live + SD comparison is an invalid measure of success or failure.
When the Live + 7 figures become available for Game 1 I'll post them. I'll predict with confidence that the difference will be trivial.
You can save the live plus seven posting for sporting events, besides we'll see it anyway.. The problem with boilerplate is it gets stuck everywhere, but I predict even FOX will put such boilerplate in its ratings press releases come the fall.