Last I checked only one game of sixteen have been played this week, right? The initial ratings as compared to the FOX broadcast of the first Thursday night game is down at this time, but it is comparing apples to oranges. Kansas City and the Texans are both among the lower end of rating drawers to begin with. On top of that it was up against two playoff games AND the semi-finals of the US Open primetime broadcast. By the way, it still drew far more viewership than all three of those combined. Let's see what Sunday night's NBC numbers look like compared to last year's NBC Sunday night numbers. If they are down you might be onto something. Less viewers. But, not less revenues. Revenues are not tied to viewership numbers. They are tied to advertising.

You see, advertisers have fixed budgets for their advertising dollars. The pandemic has brought a halt to the production of new programming. The advertisers are not wanting to put their money behind repeats. That is why revenues were up in last night's game by over 10% over last year's. Even if for some reason NFL viewership was to be down by a small margin it is still going to be the highest rated shows on TV every week by a colossal margin. That you cannot deny. The NFL, especially in today's television market, gives advertisers by far their greatest bang for the buck.

After all is said and done, I expect, as do the experts, that viewership will be up on the whole and without a doubt advertising revenues are going to be up regardless of the final level of ratings. This, of course, can change if NOBODY watches, but it is already apparent that is not to be the case.

Oh, and once again, thanks for your service and there is no need for you trying to shed any light upon my father's service ... I was right there for all thirty years and knew him and learned from him for my first 58 years of life. I have had a few thousand more conversations with him than have you about everything including politics and human rights.