By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
Tuesday’s NXT television show averaged 528,000 viewers for The CW network, according to ProgrammingInsider.com. The viewership count was up a tick from last week’s 527,000 viewership average.
Powell’s POV: NXT finished with a 0.08 rating in the 18-49 demo, up compared to last week’s 0.07 rating. NXT didn’t get much of a boost without the World Series as competition, but it did run against election night coverage and an NBA game. One year earlier, the November 6, 2024, edition of NXT delivered 619,000 viewers and a 0.17 rating for a Wednesday edition that aired on The CW against AEW Dynamite.
Modern wrestling fans are not sports fans, especially at the NXT, TNA, AEW level of fan who watches everything.
So why did Smackdown fall below the one million viewer mark against the World Series last Friday? Why has lowly Collision typically done better numbers after college football season? Why did the NXT number collapse against the first NBA game on NBC?
Because it’s been on a steady, consistent decline for months and nothing changed.
That was the 9th time in 12 weeks the ratings have dropped for Smackdown, and it wasn’t even the biggest single week drop. MLB had nothing to do with it.
You know I don’t jump in very often, probably because like many and apparently in increasing numbers I barely follow wrestling closely at this point. Back in the late nineties WWf and WCW were not overly concerned with what else was on. All of these big sporting events were the same level of competition back then as they are now. Between WWF and WCW the viewership was huge and both hardcore and casual consumers made it an appointment to catch the programming. Face the reality; the product is stale, the writing is lame, the performers are not especially compelling characters, the asking price for participation is unreasonable. You are watching with no control as your primary interest is dissolving. Convincing yourselves that it is instead because of this alternative or that one is living in denial. At this point it is more entertaining watching a quick video of Vince Russo analyzing the product than actually watching the product itself.
I have always pointed out the numbers for strong competition in ratings reports for every company, and I always will. Sometimes, strong competition takes a bite out of a wrestling show’s numbers. Other times, it’s interesting to see how well a wrestling show held up against strong competition. The numbers are there. You can interpret them however you want, even if you think that listing those numbers somehow means I’m living in denial. Strong competition from a big game or a major news night is obviously not to blame for declining numbers across the board, but there are clearly nights when they are a factor for wrestling shows and non-wrestling shows.