WWE SmackDown posts lowest non-holiday ratings in nearly a year

[Big Red Machine]

Source: www.F4WOnline.com

By Paul Fontaine | @PaulAceFontaine | May 23, 2018 1:58 pm

Against heavy competition from the NBA playoffs and network TV season finales, Tuesday night's SmackDown averaged just 2.195 million viewers, the lowest number of 2018.

Aside from Halloween night, it was the smallest audience for the show since June 13th of last year.

The NBA playoff game between the Golden State Warriors and Houston Rockets did a very strong 8.296 million viewers, topping cable viewership for the night. Season finales of "Roseanne" on ABC and "NCIS" on CBS both topped 10 million viewers airing opposite SmackDown.

The show finished seventh in terms of total viewership on cable and third in the 18-49 demo with a 0.68 rating.

SmackDown retained 82 percent of the Raw audience from the previous night, right in the normal range during non-football season. Raw ratings were also down on Monday night.

For the second time in the last three weeks, SmackDown was down year-over-year. So far in 2018, the show is down an average of one percent as compared to the same time period last year.