Shedeur Sanders drama fuels 40-percent spike in Friday night draft viewership

By falling to round five of the draft, Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders lost a lot of money. The league and its broadcast partners made it all back, and then some.

Via Jon Lewis of SportsMediaWatch.com, the second night of the draft attracted an average audience of 7.3 million viewers across all platforms. It's a 40-percent increase over last year's Day 2 coverage.

The record was set in 2020, with 8.2 million. That draft happened a little more than a month into the pandemic. After weeks of no sporting events, the draft became something/anything for people stuck at home to watch.

On Friday night, ESPN exiled the draft coverage to ESPN2, to make room for an NBA playoff game. That probably was a win for ESPN2. There's a good chance more watched the draft on ESPN 2 than the basketball action on ESPN.