SPORTS ILLUSTRATED IS LOWERING SUPER BOWL EXPECTATIONS: Why Super Bowl TV Ratings Will Be Down This Year.

Last year’s Super Bowl between the Eagles and Chiefs drew 127.7 million viewers for Fox. It set a new record for the most watched telecast in television history.

My guess is that NBC won’t come close to topping this on Sunday, despite Nielsen using a new viewership measurement system that has seen big increases across the board for most sporting events in recent months.

For one reason, last year’s Super Bowl aired on Fox’s free streaming service, Tubi. This year’s Super Bowl will air on Peacock, which is a paid service. Tubi has 97 million active users. Peacock has 44 million subscribers.

Another big reason why this Super Bowl won’t be watched by as many people as last year’s is because of who is here and who isn’t here.

Travis Kelce’s fiancée is not part of this Super Bowl. That eliminates a large portion of people who watched last year’s Super Bowl despite not caring even one bit about football. Patrick Mahomes has also reached that level where the non-NFL fan may tune in to see him play. Sam Darnold and Drake Maye will not bring in one of those fans.

Okay, so the Chiefs didn’t even make it to the playoffs this year. But why couldn’t “Travis Kelce’s fiancée” perform at the Super Bowl halftime? As alluded to above, she has a rather substantial fan base, and they might have tuned in just to see her.

Flashback: Why is an anti-American crossdresser being chosen to headline the most American event ever?

That’s why: