Raw this week (a 3.2 in case you missed it), was suspected to be low because of the NFL’s Monday Night Football return. The RAW rating was down a whopping 16% from last week’s Raw.
For the record, when Raw went up against last year’s Hall of Fame game, their rating dropped 5%, from a 4.2 the week before to a 4.0 the day of the game… but the drop still wasn’t as big as it is now.
In 2002, RAW did a 3.7 the week before and the week of the Hall of Fame game, for no change at all.
Dave Scherer blames it on the quality of Monday’s show. He points to the quarter hour ratings for evidence.
He says:
The show started with a 3.0 quarter and rose to a 3.2 by the second segment. It stayed there for the third one, and then dropped to a 3.1 for the final segment of hour one. It clearly shows that not only did the show fail to gain viewers as it went along, which is the usual pattern that Raw shows, in fact it lost them. The second hour was just as sporadic, doing a 3.3 for each of the first two quarters before dropping to a 3.0 at 10:30. They did a 3.1 at 10:45 and finished with a 3.6 for the overrun. It’s pretty clear to me by the viewership pattern that a poor quality episode had a lot more to do with people tuning out than any other factor.
A 16% drop on the final RAW before Summerslam surely has to concern the upper brass at World Wrestling Entertainment.
Credit: Dave Scherer, PWInsider.com
