The Ratings Thread - a lot of people watched wrestling on Super Tuesday, sort of

[Jussi]

I think it also speaks to Seth/Wyatt. Wyatt was never a draw historically and Seth has had poor quarter numbers since Dave started getting them. They advertised the FFH, they told us Seth was gonna go after him... and it still fell below 2.

Was there some handegg or basebalzzzzz game going on?

 

[Fro]

Both

 

[M.C.G. 31]

Was there some handegg or basebalzzzzz game going on?

Both, but how many times can you use this as an excuse? WWE has to look in the mirror and realize they’ve made no stars, the product sucks, and their ratings drop 15-25% year-on-year. That is not normal, no matter what the competition is.

 

[Jussi]

Both, but how many times can you use this as an excuse? WWE has to look in the mirror and realize they’ve made no stars, the product sucks, and their ratings drop 15-25% year-on-year. That is not normal, no matter what the competition is.

I would think when the seasons are closing for either sport?

 

[Blitzkrug]

The ratings fiasco can easily be summed up with how the WWE promoted the first FOX Smackdown

They came for the old people, left when they realized it was the same ****y personalities being pushed because this company hasn't been able to build a legitimate star in like 15 years

 

[KaseMeOutside]

The ratings fiasco can easily be summed up with how the WWE promoted the first FOX Smackdown

They came for the old people, left when they realized it was the same ****y personalities being pushed because this company hasn't been able to build a legitimate star in like 15 years

they also advertised Austin, Undertaker, and Sting...none of them were on the show.

If you tuned in to see one of them you were probably like "WTF" but they've been advertising shit for a long time only to pull the plug

 

[Emperoreddy]

What saddens me is NxT being in dead last of all four shows when it’s such a good product.

 

[TheBeastCoast]

What saddens me is NxT being in dead last of all four shows when it’s such a good product.

If it wasn't on at the same time as AEW I would find a way to watch it....but I'm not going out of my way after the fact. Raw and Smackdown haven't been a thing for me in a few years. Still watch all of the Takeover's though....been able to enjoy all of them without watching weekly can't see it being any different.

 

[WIP CALLER]

What saddens me is NxT being in dead last of all four shows when it’s such a good product.

What has hurt nxt for me is that these guys just end up just going nowhere on the main roster. You invest yourself in characters in nxt only to see them do nothing on the main roster. Several guys I loved on nxt were called up only to look like geeks on the main show. Hard to invest in a product where your top talent ends up just being roster fodder at the next level. Look at allister black. Dude was red hot in nxt, had serious taker vibes, and has now been reduced to hiding in closets on the main show.

 

[M.C.G. 31]

AEW - 1,014,000
NXT - 712,000

AEW more than doubled the 18-49 people (.44) and 18-49m (.65) demo again

doubled 18-34 people demo

NXT only won in the 50+ demo again by .02 points


AEW was 5th on the night, NXT 30th

 

[TheBeastCoast]

So both shows dropped around 10% this week. Going to be interesting to see where these shows level off at. Would be nice to see AEW stay over a million but seems doubtful.

 

[M.C.G. 31]

So both shows dropped around 10% this week. Going to be interesting to see where these shows level off at. Would be nice to see AEW stay over a million but seems doubtful.

Yeah at this rate it’s looking like AEW drops below 1m next week, maybe in two weeks, while NXT is close to dropping below 700k.

 

[sabremike]

Yeah at this rate it’s looking like AEW drops below 1m next week, maybe in two weeks, while NXT is close to dropping below 700k.

Wait, the recap on the Observer site says AEW went from 1,018,000 to 1,014,000 this week, which would be a drop of 4,000. Am I reading this wrong?

 

[M.C.G. 31]

Wait, the recap on the Observer site says AEW went from 1,018,000 to 1,014,000 this week, which would be a drop of 4,000. Am I reading this wrong?

It was 1.14m after the TruTV revision.

 

[boredmale]

So both shows dropped around 10% this week. Going to be interesting to see where these shows level off at. Would be nice to see AEW stay over a million but seems doubtful.

Was their baseball last night? That could eats into rating a bit.

I would be curious to see AEW PVR viewership for a week after the fact.

On a side note I personally think instead of trying to get a big rating on Wednesday nights AEW should have pushed for that 6:05 timeslot on Saturday and see if they could have gotten a few replays during the week.

 

[M.C.G. 31]

Was their baseball last night? That could eats into rating a bit.

I would be curious to see AEW PVR viewership for a week after the fact.

On a side note I personally think instead of trying to get a big rating on Wednesday nights AEW should have pushed for that 6:05 timeslot on Saturday and see if they could have gotten a few replays during the week.

No baseball.


Why in the world would they want 6:05 on Saturday and replays during the week? That would be really dumb.

 

[boredmale]

No baseball.


Why in the world would they want 6:05 on Saturday and replays during the week? That would be really dumb.

AEW would be better served getting 2M viewers over 3-4 airings then 1M viewers over 1 airing. I pick 6:05 on Saturday night because that is when NWA/WCW used to air on TBS before Nitro. That slot actually had decent ratings

 

[M.C.G. 31]

AEW would be better served getting 2M viewers over 3-4 airings then 1M viewers over 1 airing. I pick 6:05 on Saturday night because that is when NWA/WCW used to air on TBS before Nitro. That slot actually had decent ratings

There is nothing indicating that they aren’t getting 2m.

The facts are they are winning in their 18-49 demo, they have a LIVE prime time spot on a network that it’s nearly 100-million homes in USA. It would be absolutely stupid to go for a Saturday slot at 6pm. Less people would watch live, which means less advertisers.

Their replay that usually airs after the show (immediately, 10pm) still gets around 300k-500k viewers. There are 1.5m people watching in America in a single night. Canada’s numbers are around 100,000-130,000 so far (which, in TV standards tying to America, is 1,000,000-1,300,000 viewers). What they did is perfect.


These numbers also don’t include PVR viewings over 24h later, or SlingTV stuff, which TNT does get the numbers for.

 

[PeterSidorkiewicz]

AEW would be better served getting 2M viewers over 3-4 airings then 1M viewers over 1 airing. I pick 6:05 on Saturday night because that is when NWA/WCW used to air on TBS before Nitro. That slot actually had decent ratings

Your logic doesn’t make sense to me. If given the option between a Nitro style time slot and a wcw Saturday night time slot why would you pick wcw Saturday night? AEW skipped astraight to the prime time better time slot.

 

[Kimi]

I want to know why picking a time slot based on 30 year old information is a good idea.

 

[KaseMeOutside]

Yeah at this rate it’s looking like AEW drops below 1m next week, maybe in two weeks, while NXT is close to dropping below 700k.

There was also no sports competition

 

[Emperoreddy]

Guess we aren’t entering a new boom period afterall

 

[GKJ]

I'm curious what the 10pm replay does on TNT, because it wouldn't shock me, knowing that it was on, if people wait to watch it.

I was never a huge believer that sports besides football has such a major influence over these ratings

 

[GKJ]

Here are quarter-hour splits from the Observer, which are incomplete:

Raw

In the segment-by-segment numbers, Becky Lynch vs. Charlotte Flair gained 265,000 viewers. Andrade vs. Ali and the draft picks lost 259,000 viewers. Viking Raiders vs. Robert Roode & Dolph Ziggler quarter first loss 176,000 viewers but the finish of the match and Aleister Black vs. Eric Young gained 144,000 viewers. Draft picks and the angle with the Street Profits vs. The OC lost 182,000 viewers. Ricochet vs. Shelton Benjamin and the Lana/Bobby Lashley segment gained 69,000 viewers. Asuka & Kairi Sane vs. Natalya & Lacey Evans in the main event segment plus the burning of the Firefly Fun house lost 132,000 viewers. The overall peak quarter was 2,699,000 viewers for Flair vs. Lynch. The low point was the main event and Fun House segment with 1,826,000 viewers.

Smackdown:

Based on the top ten markets, the Seth Rollins vs. Roman Reigns finish and first draft picks gained 9.1 percent from the first quarter. King Corbin vs. Chad Gable lost 7.9 percent. Draft and promotion of both Tyson Fury vs. Braun Strowman, and Cain Velasquez vs. Brock Lesnar videos of the press conference gained 9.1 percent. The Paul Heyman & Lesnar interview plus Velasquez & Mysterio comeback lost 5.1 percent. New Day vs. OC and more drafting lost 5.9 percent. More draft stuff and the intros for Charlotte Flair vs. Bayley gained 5.7 percent. The Flair vs. Bayley title match main event gained 1.5 percent. So the two top segments were Rollins vs. Reigns and the first round of the draft and the video packages from the press conference earlier in the day.

AEW:

For the live show, and this is also based on selected markets, it was a slowly declining audience with the Best Friends vs. Scorpio Sky & Frankie Kazarian the highest rated segment. Ortiz & Santana vs. Alex Reynolds & John Silver and a Cody video package lost 5.0 percent of the audience. Britt Baker vs. Riho lost 9.2 percent of the audience. Pentagon & Fenix vs. Marko Stunt & Jungle Boy gained 1.4 percent. Kenny Omega & Adam Page vs. Jon Moxley & Pac gained 4.3 percent. And Chris Jericho vs. Darby Allin lost 8.2 percent.

Doesn't appear to be available for NXT

 

[M.C.G. 31]

Here are quarter-hour splits from the Observer, which are incomplete:

Raw



Smackdown:



AEW:



Doesn't appear to be available for NXT

He usually gets the NXT and AEW number breakdowns by Friday, no?


Regardless, nice to see Moxley's segment gained on AEW. Not too encouraging seeing the championship match decline 1% less than the women did.

I'm also not totally blaming Seth/Bray for that big viewership loss, but they WERE advertised, they audience KNEW it was happening, so that number isn't encouraging at all and just further proves that Wyatt -- even with his new character (which is already botched) -- can't bring in viewers, and Seth is a weak draw as a champion.

Back in 2012-2013 with Punk as champ people would call him a shit drawing champion because he wasn't gaining stupid numbers of viewers and rather smaller, more consistent numbers. I wonder what those people would say about Seth at this point.

This was also the first segment Ricochet gained viewers in since I've seen the breakdowns and that's probably a fluke to be honest.