Sunday night football ratings? Pretty much on top.
For the fifth straight week NBC's "Sunday Night Football" game was the highest-rated show on television. And Sunday's game between the Philadelphia Eagles and winless San Francisco 49ers wasn't innately compelling, especially since Eagles quarterback sensation Michael Vick was sidelined by injury.
Over the last five weeks, the Sunday game is averaging almost 22 million viewers, the highest average for a prime-time NFL program in 14 years, this according to the national data from The Nielsen Co.
At least viewers are a little discriminating though. Even though it won the night, the Eagles-49ers drew well under the year's average -- 16.9 million viewers.
Later Tuesday there should be some ratings information on how the "Monday Night Football" game on ESPN between Minnesota (Brett Favre) and the New York Jets competed against the most highly rated prime-time entertainment show, ABC's "Dancing With The Stars." Former Super Bowl winning quarterback Kurt Warner danced and was criticized for inelegant arm movements while another Super Bowl-winning quarterback, Favre, despite almost engineering a stunning comeback with long touchdown passes, was criticized for some inelegant text messaging.
-- Diane Pucin
