Fox Sports Detroit ratings for Pistons season opener nearly doubled from last year

Via The Detroit News, the opening rating for the Detroit Pistons on Fox Sports Detroit Wednesday was pretty pretty pretty good:

"The Pistons’ season-opener against the Rockets drew a 4.6 household rating Wednesday on Fox Sports Detroit, which was nearly double last season’s 2.88 opening-game rating. The figure was also the highest recorded since the 2009-10 season, said Courtney Welch, Fox Sports Detroit manager of social media and communications."

As Brian Packey of Detroit Bad Boys points out, the fact that the season started at the normal time played a role in that improved rating, as did more national interest in the game because of the debut of Houston’s James Harden and Jeremy Lin. The fact that the Detroit Tigers season just ended, the NHL is locked out and college basketball hasn’t started quite yet probably helped as well. But I followed the comments both on PistonPowered and on Twitter during the game last night and it definitely felt like a lot more fans were paying attention last night than at any point last season.