Everyone wants to watch the KC Chiefs play football

Two thoughts come to mind when I see the viewership numbers on the K.C. Chiefs season-opening game in Week 1 against the Cleveland Browns: 1.) Good football makes a difference, and 2.) Silly boycotts do not.

On Sunday afternoon, the folks at CBS were fortunate enough to have the rights to broadcast the game from Arrowhead Stadium between the visiting Browns and the Chiefs at home. The matchup itself was set up to be a must-watch game given the fact that both rosters are loaded with top talent and have championship aspirations. What people might not have realized is that resulting viewership would break records.

Browns beat reporter Nate Ulrich of the Akron Beacon-Journal has the numbers from a recent press release from the league.

It turns out that being good at something means other people will want to watch you do that something. In this case, the Chiefs are very, very good at what they do and people want to watch them do it. It didn’t hurt the Browns were involved, too, given just how young and deep and talented their roster is front to back.

However, it seems that trying to measure exactly how popular Patrick Mahomes is would be a hard thing to do. We just know he’s incredibly popular and yet we’re often surprised by the moments in which his popularity is made manifest.

As for the boycotting, last year the numbers for the NFL were down in the midst of COVID and a vocal minority of fans swore online that they were done with the league given certain social stances or player statements or team decisions. The idea was that there is power in numbers, so a number of fans (or former fans) were set to come together and give their message to the NFL.

If the league was supposed to feel any sort of repercussions, this is a funny way to do it. The Chiefs and Browns instead broke a six-year mark in terms of viewership for the broadcast, and the league’s broadcasting partners have to be thrilled with the results.