The second-anniversary edition of AEW Dynamite was hurt going against the National League Wild Card game with the show falling to fourth among cable programs.
The October 6th edition of Philadelphia featuring the Casino Ladder Match and a big eight-man tag averaged 1,053,000 viewers and 489,000 (0.37) in the 18-49 demographic, courtesy of Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics and Showbuzz Daily.
Viewership dropped by 8.5 percent and the 18-49 audience declined by 18 percent from last week’s episode. It was Dynamite’s lowest viewership since the September 1st go-home edition before the All Out pay-per-view and the lowest 18-49 audience since the August 18th episode.
The key competition was the St. Louis Cardinals vs. L.A. Dodgers Wild Card game on TBS that averaged 6,673,000 that topped cable on Wednesday with 1.73 in the 18-49 demo. Dynamite finished fourth behind the MLB game, Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (0.39), and Inside the MLB (0.39). Dynamite did top MTV’s The Challenge (0.33).
Dynamite was impacted most with its male audience that saw the 18-49 audience fall by 21 percent and males 12-34 declining 16 percent from the prior week. Adults 25-54 represented a decrease of 18 percent for the week, although women 12-34 grew by 17 percent from last week’s show in Rochester.
In Canada, Dynamite averaged 113,800 viewers and 67,300 in the 25-54 demographic on TSN 5. It’s in line with what the show has been doing on Wednesday nights and it doesn’t appear that the switch from TSN 2 to TSN 5 this week made any difference.
Rhodes to the Top was split into two 30-minute shows on TNT immediately following Dynamite and had mixed results.
The 10 – 10:30 p.m. ET program was up from last week’s premiere, however, last week’s show saw the entire hour grouped together and we don’t know have an apples-to-apples comparison of the first half-hour. The first half-hour this week averaged 443,000 viewers and 0.19 in 18-49 and finished 15th for the night on cable, although, the second half-hour from 10:30 – 11 p.m. only did 295,000 viewers and 0.13 as the show dropped by 33.4 percent in viewers and 31.6 percent in 18-49 over the entire hour.
If we use the average for the entire hour, Rhodes to the Top did 369,000 viewers and 0.16 in 18-49 and would have finished 22nd for the night on cable. Last week’s premiere did 422,000 and 0.17 respectively, so they dropped 12.5 and 6 percent respectively.
We are not aware of Rhodes to the Top airing in Canada this week, so we don’t have a number for it. Last week it aired in a 30-minute slot on E! Canada Wednesday night at 10:30 p.m. ET but was not promoted well and only averaged 1,000 viewers in that slot.
Here is a breakdown of the demos for both Dynamite and Rhodes to the Top (which we have averaged out to reflect the entire hour) and the comparison to last week in brackets:
ADULTS 18-49
Dynamite: 0.37 (-17 percent)
Rhodes to the Top: 0.16 (-6 percent)
FEMALES 18-49
Dynamite: 0.22 (-9 percent)
Rhodes to the Top: 0.10 (-17 percent)
MALES 18-49
Dynamite: 0.53 (-21 percent)
Rhodes to the Top: 0.22 (-4 percent)
ADULTS 18-34
Dynamite: 0.24 (Even)
Rhodes to the Top: 0.09 (-10 percent)
FEMALES 12-34
Dynamite: 0.14 (+17 percent)
Rhodes to the Top: 0.06 (+20 percent)
MALES 12-34
Dynamite: 0.26 (-16 percent)
Rhodes to the Top: 0.08 (-33 percent)
ADULTS 25-54
Dynamite: 0.41 (-18 percent)
Rhodes to the Top: 0.18 (-10 percent)
ADULTS 50+
Dynamite: 0.45 (+2 percent)
Rhodes to the Top: 0.14 (-7 percent)
