The New Orleans Saints' TV ratings dominated the rest of the league in Week 1 of the preseason, as the broadcast of the Saints-Vikings game last Friday, Aug. 9 delivered a 40.0 rating, nearly 15 points ahead of the No. 2 team.
The Saints regularly deliver huge ratings but the Gray Communications broadcast (shown on Fox-8 locally) was up 26 percent from Week 1 in 2018 and 31 percent from the comparable 2017 broadcast. The Kansas City Chiefs were the second-highest broadcast with a 25.3 rating.
In the NFC South, the Carolina Panthers were 14th at 12.4, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers were 22nd with a 7.6 rating and the Atlanta Falcons had the 26th-rated broadcast with a 6.0 rating,
The Saints' Week 1 preseason broadcast also was No. 1 in another metric, household share, with a 57, up 23 percent from 2018. The Chiefs has the league's second-highest share with a 48.
