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In some positive ratings news for WWE and USA Network, the Aug. 16 edition of SmackDown Live held steady against stiff competition from the Summer Olympics - even gaining a small number of viewers over last week’s broadcast.
The main Olympics broadcast over on NBC was down considerably from last week (23.1 million from 33.4 million), but it’s still a juggernaught to go against, and the fact that SmackDown is keeping most of Raw’s audience and is still way up from its Thursday night numbers is encouraging.
Here’s the viewership trend since the Draft:
July 27 - 2,743,000
Aug. 2 - 2,681,000
Aug. 9 - 2,455,000
Aug. 16 - 2,471,000
While it was fourth overall in cable viewers, SmackDown kept the crown in the coveted 18-49 demographic, where it captured a 0.82 rating.
For complete results and the live blog for SmackDown this week click here. To read a complete recap of all the night’s events click here. For a full playlist of the show click here.