SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)…
Last night’s episode of WWE Smackdown Live on USA Network drew a 1.60 rating, the same the week before WrestleMania and below the prior two weeks (1.69, 1.65). That means Smackdown got zero post-WrestleMania ratings bump.
To put that in perspective, last year Smackdown drew a 2.10 on the post-WrestleMania edition, which was u from the 1.74 of the prior week. Two years ago, Smackdown drew a 2.14 rating, up from the 2.02 the week before.
This could be a result of a backlash against the end of Raw the night before when The Bar interrupted the Kofi Kingston vs. Seth Rollins “title vs. title” main event. It also could be a result of both Kofi and Becky Lynch already appearing on Raw, taking away the novelty of seeing their first post-WM title victory appearances.
In any case, a deeply disappointing rating… which was still good enough to top cable ratings for the night in the key 18-49 demographic. Smackdown drew a 0.8 rating in the key demo, ahead of “Curse of Oak Island” on History Network which drew a 0.7 rating and “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” on Bravo which drew a 0.6 rating.
The second episode of “Miz & Mrs” this season finished no. 5 in the demo rating with a 0.4, tied with three other shows with 997,000 viewers, a drop of just over half of Smackdown’s total 2.199 million viewers.
Two shows on cable drew more than 3 million total viewers (“Curse of Oak Island” on History and “Hannity” on Fox News), and another drew more than 2.5 million (“The Rachel Maddow Show” on MSNBC)
RECOMMENDED: Raw Rating: Post-WrestleMania episode tops 3 million viewers in hour one, but off 25 percent from last year’s post-WM edition, key metrics and perspective