How the NFL keeps fans transfixed even when there are no games
The show must go on

Nothing draws an audience quite like the National Football League. The season opener in September 2023 attracted nearly 25m viewers, and in February almost 124m Americans tuned in for Super Bowl LVIII. Yet the NFL is not satisfied with dominating the media for only five months a year. It has developed an uncanny ability to turn ordinary off-season events into spectacles.
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This article appeared in the United States section of the print edition under the headline “Off-season offence”
United States May 25th 2024
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