The return of Monday Night Football and the absence of the NBA playoffs led to WWE Raw holding up for two hours before a decline in hour three.
Monday’s edition of WWE Raw averaged 1,689,000 viewers or a decline of 2.1 percent from last week. It was the show’s lowest viewership average since August 17th, however, it’s 0.50 rating in the 18-49 demo was up from last week’s 0.48.
The return of the NFL dominated the Monday night cable ratings with the earlier 7 pm Eastern game involving the Pittsburgh Steelers and NY Giants topping the list with 10.8 million viewers and a 3.62 in the 18-49 demo. The later game between Tennessee and Denver that began just after 10 pm averaged 7.7 million viewers and did a 2.92 demo number.
The NFL games were down 17.7 and 27.5 percent respectively from the 2019 Monday Night Football premieres. Year-to-year against MNF, viewership fell 25.7 percent and dropped 27.5 percent in the 18-49 rating.
In Canada, WWE Raw averaged 223,400 viewers (129,000 in the 25-54 demo) on Sportsnet 360 and was the fifth-most watched sports broadcast on Monday trailing the Dallas Stars vs. Las Vegas Golden Knights game, the two NFL games, and an episode of Hockey Central.
Monday’s episode of Raw began with 1,812,000 viewers and dropped 4 percent in the second hour to 1,734,000 and dropped another 12 percent in the third hour to 1,521,000. It was a decline of 16 percent from the start to the end of the show.
Raw performed consistently through the first two hours with minimal declines in hour two with the only notable one being adults over 50 that fell 7 percent.
The larger drop was felt in the third hour where males 18-49 and adults over 50 fell by 16 percent, males 12-34 and adults 25-54 dropped 15 percent, and the 18-49 figure fell 13.5 percent from the first hour.
Coming off a poor number last week, Raw had a bounce-back with adults 18-34 increasing by 26 percent this week, females 12-34 improved by 17 percent, and males 18-49 were up by 10 percent.
The trend of the show seems to bear out that there was interest in seeing the Steel Cage Match between Seth Rollins and Dominik Mysterio before the drop off in the third hour that featured the Drew McIntyre vs. Keith Lee main event.
It’s notable that the first two hours held up considering the 8-10 pm hours faced the larger NFL game.
Next week, Raw is set to go against both Monday Night Football and the Miami Heat vs. Boston Celtics game.
Here is a breakdown of the key demos:
Source: Showbuzz Daily
ADULTS 18-49
This week: 0.50 (+4 percent)
Hour 1-3: -13.5 percent
FEMALES 18-49
This week: 0.33 (-6 percent)
Hour 1-3: -9 percent
MALES 18-49
This week: 0.55 (+10 percent)
Hour 1-3: -16 percent
ADULTS 18-34
This week: 0.29 (+26 percent)
Hour 1-3: -13 percent
FEMALES 12-34
This week: 0.21 (+17 percent)
Hour 1-3: -5 percent
MALES 12-34
This week: 0.33 (+3 percent)
Hour 1-3: -15 percent
ADULTS 25-54
This week: 0.61 (+3 percent)
Hour 1-3: -15 percent
ADULTS 50+
This week: 0.82 (-2 percent)
Hour 1-3: -16 percent
