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WWE thought it had a relatively soft line-up to compete with on Tues., Jan. 8. SmackDown was all set to rollout its first live show of the new year, with two matches with Royal Rumble title implications announced in advance. The President Donald Trump announced he’d be making a live speech carried on all the major networks at 9PM eastern. And...
Honestly it wasn’t as bad as some thought it might be. But it wasn’t good, either.
We’ll never know how they might have done without the gvovernment shutdown battle as an alternative for viewers, but WWE got an audience of 2,032,000 to tune in. That’s down 52K from last week’s pre-taped New Year’s Day show, but above December’s live, pre-McMahon “new era” shows.
The blue brand was the 16th most watched show among cable originals on the night, behind a whole mess of Trump/Pelosi/Schumer coverage on the news networks and the premiere of History Channel’s Project Blue Book & their reliable juggernaught Curse of Oak Island.
Among the 18 - 49 demographic, SmackDown ratings was up from the week prior. Their .72 share was good for fourth place, behind Fox News & CNN’s coverage of the speeches, and Oak Island.
While you wonder how they’ll do next Tuesday when they really shouldn’t have any major live competiton, here’s a list of SmackDown’s numbers from the past six months:
Jan. 1 - 2.09 million / .68
Dec. 25 - 1.9 million / .61
Dec. 18 - 2.21 million / .74
Dec. 11 - 1.98 million / .68
Dec. 4 - 1.95 million / .66
Nov. 27 - 2.26 million / .81
Nov. 20 - 2.15 million / .69
Nov. 13 - 2.31 million / .90
Nov. 6 - 2.1 million / .68
Oct. 30 - 2.11 million / .73
Oct. 23 - 2.09 million / .69
Oct. 16 - 2.55 million / .92
Oct. 9 - 2.1 million / .67
Oct. 2 - 2.1 million / .68
Sept. 25 - 2.19 million / .72
Sept. 18 - 2.28 million / .78
Sept. 11 - 2.23 million / .72
Sept. 4 - 2.32 million / .77
Aug. 28 - 2.35 million / .75
Aug. 21 - 2.44 million / .77
Aug. 14 - 2.19 million / .7
Aug. 7 - 2.2 million / .73
July 31 - 2.4 million / .75
July 24 - 2.34 million / .75
July 17 - 2.29 million / .74
July 10 - 2.18 million / .68
July 3 - 2.01 million / .54
For complete results and the live blog for SmackDown this week click here. To read a complete recap & review of all the night’s events click here. For a full playlist of the show click here.
Source: Showbuzz Daily