WWE Raw ratings start stronger than last week, end up down slightly

Raw started higher and fell more last night than in previous weeks, ending up at 3.22 million viewers, which was a one percent drop from last week’s number. Last week’s rating was the best for the show since April 17th.

Raw remained the most-watched show on cable, with Rachel Maddow on MSNBC second at 2.86 million viewers. Raw’s 10 p.m. to 11 p.m. hour was the second most watched show during that period on television, trailing only Midnight Texas, on NBC, which did 3.19 million viewers vs. 2.99 million for Raw. When you factor in the coverage area for NBC and USA, the reality is Raw would have been the actual highest rated show by a significant margin in hour three.

The first two hours were fourth in the time slot behind ABC, CBS, and NBC programming.

There were significant drops in every demo, even the male demo that usually stays strong.

My feeling on this is the huge first hour was curiosity regarding what would be said about Ric Flair, which was covered early and it was clear it wouldn’t be talked about again. Even in males 18-49, which usually has its best hour in number three, it dropped 11 percent from one to three.

In addition, during the summer, it’s hour number two that is usually the highest rated hour and every demo except males 12-17, which was closer to usual patterns, saw the audience decline in hour two and three.

The three hours were:

8 p.m. 3.42 million viewers
9 p.m. 3.29 million viewers
10 p.m. 2.99 million viewers

Here’s a chart from Paul Fontaine that looks at Raw ratings in 2017 and how they compare to last year: