More People Watched Major League Gaming Online Than the NFL Draft

John Funk

U.N. Owen Was Him?
Dec 20, 2005
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More People Watched Major League Gaming Online Than the NFL Draft

22.5 million people watched MLG's Columbus Pro Circuit online, more than the 2011 NFL draft.

Professional gaming may have had a hard time really getting traction in the West as opposed to, say, places like South Korea [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EuF9gpW8hSA], but its inroads have been steady if slow.

Major League Gaming announced [http://www.majorleaguegaming.com/news/mlg-delivers-record-breaking-22-5-million-online-video-streams-from-mlg-columbus/] that it had recorded a record-breaking 22.5 million online streams of its recent Columbus, Ohio event, with viewers from 164 countries watching four streams over the three-day competition. That, by the way, is almost double the amount of people who watched the 2011 NFL draft - or rather, the amount of people who watched it online, anyway.

[mlg=977857427001]

MLG compared its 22.5 million viewers with the 11.4 million viewers who watched the NFL draft online. But the NFL draft was also televised, wasn't it? The numbers I found suggested that about six million people watched the draft, putting it at a combined total of 17.4 million for NFL vs. 22.5 million for MLB.

It's a lot closer this way, but honestly, that still ain't too shabby at all. For comparison, the NBA finals reportedly clocked in at an average 17.2 million viewers [http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2011/06/13/2011-nba-finals-on-abc-second-most-viewed-since-2004/95475/] per game. MLG still comes out ahead here, and even though you could argue that these numbers are fudged thanks to multiple streams broadcasting at once, it has every right to be proud of its numbers.

Of course, comparing MLG's streams to a traditional, major media event like the NBA finals is a bit off-kilter - the NFL draft, as a streaming event, is a much more equatable comparison. So fun with numbers aside, it's certainly nothing to sneer at here.

According to MLG, 16,000 fans attended the event in person, and 1,300 competitors tried their luck. If you're confident in your trigger fingers, feel free to give it a try in the Pro Circuit's next events in Anaheim, CA (July 29-31), Raleigh, NC (August 26-28) and Orlando, FL (October 14-16) - whichever is closest to you.

MLG's grand finale is in Providence, Rhode Island in November, which is probably the most interesting thing to happen in Providence in years.

Edit: Corrected an error regarding the NBA numbers.

Edit #2: According to Team Liquid [http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=233102], the 22.5m streams were only from 450k viewers. Still impressive, but not quite as impressive as some would like them to sound.

(MLG [http://www.majorleaguegaming.com/news/mlg-delivers-record-breaking-22-5-million-online-video-streams-from-mlg-columbus/])

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Popido

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Oct 21, 2010
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Thats quite lot considering that I thought professional gaming died with PC gaming.

...

Go Korea!
 

Bad Neighbour

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Jan 14, 2009
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<- One of those viewers!

MLG put on a hell of a show this time with the Starcraft tournament. Can't speak for the other games (I think Halo is pretty good to watch actually, much as I hate it) but definately tune in for the next one if you're into competitive gaming whatsoever.
 

sunburst

Media Snob
Mar 19, 2010
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MLG Columbus was pretty amazing, but it's too bad there's still a large gap of skill in StarCraft between the Korean pros and the foreign scene. IdrA is the only guy who can consistently keep up but he needs to work on his GG timing if he wants to be a contender again.
 

Woodsey

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Aug 9, 2009
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Popido said:
Thats quite lot considering that I thought professional gaming died with PC gaming.


OT: I can't think of anything more boring than watching other people play games, if I'm honest.
 

Micalas

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Mar 5, 2011
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I watched as well. When the SC2 stream was down between games I tried watching the Black Ops stream and two things stuck out in my mind.

1. Why the fuck are you doing competitive FPS play on a PS3 rather than a PC?
2. They're not doing anything but running in and dying. This looks no different than any of the matches me and my friends have played.

Don't get me wrong, I love the big FPS titles, but that shit was boring and they didn't look much more skilled than the slightly above average guy that people sometimes is falsely claimed to be hacking.
 

emeraldrafael

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Jul 17, 2010
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Probably cuase those things are international and no one really cares about the NFL outside America, and the NBA isnt much better. I wouldnt be surprised if American veiwer ship was low (which is probably why they put it on public cable just to make sure someone saw it. Like how two of the games for the Stanley Cup Finals were on Vs and both those games were the American team's home.

EDIT: also, didnt G4 have something like this called Arena, and it tanked?
 

Twilight_guy

Sight, Sound, and Mind
Nov 24, 2008
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I think we need official rules on what qualifies as a sport. I considering gaming in the same category as chess. Is chess a sport? (Honestly, I'm not sure on this one). Gaming a chess are both primarily mental with little physical exertion. This falls into the same challenge as art in a way though since both are nebulous bullshit terms with no hard definition. Of course I don't know about MLG since being art gives game legitimacy as a side-effect but being a sport gets them... sponsors? I dunno.
 

0p3rati0n

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Apr 14, 2009
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This is all the more reason for MLG shows to get prime time on T.V. Hell is that happens I'll turn my t.v. on to actually watch T.V. and not video games. E3 was the first time in a while that I actually spent a few hours sitting on the couch watching t.v.
 

NinjaTigerXIII

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Apr 21, 2010
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Its only a matter of time before MLG will be on ESPN and the big name TV networks because lets face it, eSports are just something that can't be ignored anymore. Its a Juggernaut that has no signs of slowing down, ever.
 

maddawg IAJI

I prefer the term "Zomguard"
Feb 12, 2009
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"...from 164 countries watching four streams over the three-day competition."

I hate to be that guy, but being an international thing and streaming an event tend to net you more folks then a sport that is only widely followed in the west. Plus, your counting all the viewers from a 3-day event and comparing it to one game, which went late into Sunday night and wasn't all that exciting. Most people in the east coast we're probably turning off their televisions by the time the game went into the 3rd quarter. If Miami had won that game, I can guarantee you this, the MLG would not have come close to the amount of viewers who would watch game 7.

In short, no, the MLG did not have more viewers then the NBA Finals, their entire event had more viewers then game 6, but that's it. The MLG did have more viewers then the NFL draft and I will give them credit for that one.
 

Flig

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Nov 24, 2009
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Considering MLG is international and both the NBA and NFL are primarily American events I don't find this very surprising at all...
 

maddawg IAJI

I prefer the term "Zomguard"
Feb 12, 2009
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NinjaTigerXIII said:
Its only a matter of time before MLG will be on ESPN and the big name TV networks because lets face it, eSports are just something that can't be ignored anymore. Its a Juggernaut that has no signs of slowing down, ever.
Its been on ESPN for quite a while now actually, or at least the website.
 

Radeonx

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Apr 26, 2009
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These statistics are terribly skewed, but it is nice to see that gaming is getting more popular, I guess.
 

NightlyNews

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Mar 25, 2011
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Twilight_guy said:
I think we need official rules on what qualifies as a sport. I considering gaming in the same category as chess. Is chess a sport? (Honestly, I'm not sure on this one). Gaming a chess are both primarily mental with little physical exertion. This falls into the same challenge as art in a way though since both are nebulous bullshit terms with no hard definition. Of course I don't know about MLG since being art gives game legitimacy as a side-effect but being a sport gets them... sponsors? I dunno.
I watch professional go players (go is like if checkers and chess had a lovechild, although it is without a doubt more strategy based than checkers and many believe it is deeper than chess).

I imagine watching strategy games like starcraft are similar to me watching pro go players. Not sure if it's a sport, but other countries take go very seriously -second most played board game.

According to wikipedia go can be a sport, not really sure if that means anything to you though :]