WWE SmackDown ratings grow two percent against tough competition

[Big Red Machine]

Source: www.F4WOnline.com

By Paul Fontaine | @PaulAceFontaine | May 10, 2017 5:58 pm

Photo: WWE.com

Despite the near-record low WWE Raw ratings from the night before and strong competition from network fare and the NBA playoffs, SmackDown's ratings for their taped show on Tuesday, May 9th were up two percent from last week.

However, the 2.348 million viewers marks the eighth lowest number for the show since moving to a live format last July.

The show was taped earlier in the day from the UK and was heavily wrestling-oriented with a main event six-man tag match featuring WWE World Champion Randy Orton, Jinder Mahal, and more.

SmackDown finished 11th for the night in total viewers on cable but third in the 18-49 demo with a 0.74 rating, trailing only NBA playoff action and its post-game show.

Game two of the Western Conference semifinals between the San Antonio Spurs and Houston Rockets aired directly opposite SmackDown and did over double the viewership at 4.713 million. Strong network programming such as NCIS (13.4 million), Bull (11 million), and The Voice (8.7 million) also aired opposite SmackDown.

With the network shows coming up on their season finales in the next couple of weeks, it will be interesting to see if SmackDown (and even Raw) see a slight uptick in the ratings as a result.