By TIM REYNOLDS AP Basketball Writer
National NBA games being shown on NBC/Peacock, Amazon Prime Video or ESPN have drawn more than 60 million viewers through the first month of the regular season, the league announced Thursday, noting that is the highest opening total in 15 years.
That doesn’t include the 2011-12 season, which opened on Christmas Day — traditionally one of the biggest viewership days on the NBA calendar. Still, it’s a very positive sign for the league through the season’s first four weeks and with this being the first of an 11-year, $76 billion deal with its broadcast partners.
NBA content has commanded more than 30 billion views across social media platforms operated by the league and third parties, which is a record for this point in a season. Sales of merchandise on NBAStore.com is up more than 20%, the league added, with those numbers driven in part by who the league calls “next generation stars” — like Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Anthony Edwards, Victor Wembanyama, Tyrese Maxey, Cooper Flagg, Jalen Brunson and Luka Doncic.
NBA League Pass has seen subscriptions go up 10%, with time spent viewing games on the platform up 8%, the league said.
And it’s not just screens seeing good numbers.
In-arena attendance so far is on pace with last season, which was the second-best for attendance in league history with about 97% capacity leaguewide to this point. There are 10 teams that entered Thursday having sold out every home game so far this season — the Boston Celtics, Cleveland Cavaliers, Golden State Warriors, Houston Rockets, Miami Heat, New York Knicks, Oklahoma City Thunder, Phoenix Suns, San Antonio Spurs and Utah Jazz. Other teams, like Atlanta and Charlotte, are up nearly 10% over last year’s attendance numbers.
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