There’s still half of the 2024 NFL regular season to go. But attention is quickly rising around the notion of the two-time defending champion Chiefs running the table with an undefeated season, potentially putting an emphatic exclamation point on Kansas City’s bid to have the league’s first three-peat of the Super Bowl era. 

The 8–0 Chiefs have not lost since Christmas Day last year, are the NFL’s last team this season without a loss, and are currently favored in all but one of their remaining nine games—a Nov. 17 road contest at the 7–2 Bills. But the bid to become the NFL’s first undefeated team since the 1972 Dolphins is already drawing notice from the likes of The New York Times, USA Today, and ProFootballTalk, and is becoming a dominant storyline of this season. 

Only two of the Chiefs’ eight wins to date, however, have been by more than one touchdown, and numerous injuries have beset the team. The average margin of victory of seven points is also an NFL-record low for a team that has won its first eight games. But the victories for Kansas City keep coming.

“You can only give them so many chances,” Buccaneers quarterback Baker Mayfield said after a 30–24 overtime loss to the Chiefs on Monday Night Football.

On one level, the Chiefs’ ongoing dominance is a result of their aggressive offseason spending, which included giving position-specific salary records to players such as kicker Harrison Butker and center Creed Humphrey. Team management, led by owner Clark Hunt, has prioritized using nearly all available salary-cap room in pursuit of continued winning, and the team’s remaining space of $2.9 million is the third-smallest figure in the league. 

The team’s success, with 14 consecutive wins and counting extending to last season, is also a likely boost to ongoing stadium deliberations involving potential sites in both Missouri and Kansas. 

Riding the Wave

The Chiefs’ quest for perfection is also likely to be a sizable aid to the NFL’s broadcast partners. The team was already a prime factor in the 2024 league schedule, and it will be a featured part of Netflix’s highly anticipated entry into NFL game broadcasts.

After overtaking the Cowboys as the league’s top viewership draw, the Chiefs on Sunday will play their first 1 p.m. ET game of the season after starting with four prime-time games and four more in the 4 p.m. window.

Amazon will look to continue the record viewership pace that the streamer’s NFL package is on as Thursday Night Football begins the second half of its 2024 schedule on Prime Video with an intriguing AFC North matchup.

Through eight games of Amazon’s 16-week schedule, Thursday night games are averaging 13 million viewers. That’s 4% higher than the average audience for Prime Video’s first eight games of the 2023 season. Last year, TNF’s full-season average was 11.86 million in Amazon’s second season exclusively airing NFL games. The 2022 season average was 9.58 million.

On Thursday, the Bengals (4–5) visit the Ravens (6–3) to kick off Week 10, with Joe Burrow and Cincinnati looking to get back to .500 after an 0–3 start. Baltimore won an overtime thriller between the two division rivals 41–38 earlier this fall.

Later this season, Amazon will also air strong divisional matchups between the Commanders and Eagles (Week 11) and Packers and Lions (Week 14), as well as a Chiefs game against the Raiders on Black Friday.

It should be noted Amazon’s own record pace is still down from the 16.2 million viewers that TNF games averaged on linear TV channels during the 2021 season on Fox and the NFL Network.

Fox, ESPN Are Booming, Too

On Sundays this season, NFL games on Fox are averaging 18.65 million viewers—the network’s highest through nine weeks since 2016. This past weekend, 24.21 million people tuned in to Detroit’s 24–14 victory over Green Bay, which was the largest audience of Week 9.

The Chiefs’ 30–24 overtime victory against the Buccaneers was the most-watched Monday Night Football game of the season, drawing 20.6 million viewers on ESPN. That narrowly beat out the 20.5 million people who watched the season-opening Jets-49ers game.

The NBA agreed to a historic $77 billion media-rights deal over the summer, and it may be fortunate to have secured the deal before this season given low viewership numbers to start the year.

Last week’s prime-time NBA games—Tuesday on TNT and Wednesday on ESPN—saw significant viewership declines compared to comparable games last season, according to Sports Media Watch. 

The Western Conference finals rematch between the Mavericks and Timberwolves averaged 1.07 million viewers Tuesday, down 17% versus last year’s game between the Knicks and Cavaliers. Numbers for TNT’s second game between the Pelicans and Warriors were not made available.

Wednesday’s games on ESPN—an Eastern Conference finals rematch between the Celtics and Pacers and a rivalry game between Victor Wembanyama and the Spurs and Chet Holmgren and the Thunder—drew 1.01 million and 730,000 viewers, respectively. The first game was down just 2% versus Pelicans-Thunder last year, but the nightcap dipped 51% versus Lakers-Clippers.

The NBA was up against the last two games of the World Series between the Dodgers and Yankees, which—driven by star power and major markets—was the most-watched Fall Classic since 2017. 

However, viewership for most of the NBA’s opening-week slate was also down double-digit percentages, with the exception of the historic father-son debut of LeBron James and Bronny James Jr.

New Faces Needed

It was easy to point at viewership decline for the NBA’s opening week as each game of the Wednesday doubleheader featured two teams with injuries to star players. (The Sixers were missing Joel Embiid and Paul George, while the Clippers played without Kawhi Leonard.)

However, while the Week 2 slate was up against the World Series, none of the featured teams were missing star players.

One of the NBA’s issues may be the diminishing star power of the league’s aging mainstays. The NBA’s biggest draws for the last decade have been LeBron James, Stephen Curry, and Kevin Durant, and while all three of their teams have started the season strong, none were expected to be in championship contention entering the season. 

The three stars showed their viewership pull when they teamed up with Team USA in the summer during the Paris Olympics. The gold medal game was the most-watched Olympic men’s basketball game since 1996. 

This week may be the best example of where the NBA’s viewership stands as all three veteran stars will be on ESPN. Wednesday night’s slate included Curry’s Warriors facing the Celtics in a rematch of the 2022 NBA Finals. On Friday, Durant’s Suns play the Mavericks, and James’s Lakers face the Sixers—who will still be without Embiid, this time due to a suspension.

Young stars like Anthony Edwards and Devin Booker have yet to attract the same audience as the aforementioned trio, in part because of their lack of titles. They’ve fallen behind international players like Nikola Jokić and Giannis Antetokounmpo, who, despite their success, haven’t been able to compel U.S. viewers quite like James, Curry, and Durant.

There has also been an ongoing debate about the devaluation of the league’s regular season, which the NBA is attempting to resolve with the second year of an in-season tournament, now called the Emirates NBA Cup, which starts Nov. 12.