The NBA All-Star Game in New Orleans brought back viewers to the event this year. This year’s game averaged 7.8 million viewers on both TBS and TNT. That’s the most for the NBA All-Star Game since 2013. And it’s up 3% since last year which averaged 6.5 million.
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The night before, All-Star Saturday Night on TNT averaged 5.63 million which is a rise of 1% from 2016’s event.
In addition, both the All-Star Game and All-Star Saturday Night gave Turner networks the most-watched sports telecasts on cable for the week. And Turner says All-Star Saturday was the highest-rated program of the night across broadcast and cable.
The top-rated local markets for the All-Star Game are as follows:
1. Oklahoma City — 10.9
2. San Francisco and Cleveland — 10.3
4. New Orleans — 9.2
5. Memphis — 8.5
For All-Star Saturday Night, the top local markets look like this:
1. Cleveland — 7.5
2. New York — 5.4
3. San Francisco — 5.3
4. Las Vegas — 5.0
5. Washington — 4.9
As for online streaming, Turner notes that viewers on its TV Everywhere platforms (apps, desktop and laptop computers) increased by 46% with total video consumption increased by 37%.
One note is that this year’s All-Star festivities were in New Orleans while last year’s were in Toronto which probably depressed numbers a bit in 2016. And even with 2016 being Kobe Bryant’s last All-Star Game, the U.S. ratings could not count Toronto.
Turner is happy about its viewership numbers and will take it to the bank for this year.