Vince & a title match pop a number for SmackDown; Rampage hits a new low

The ratings are in for June 17. Most of the attention for this latest set of Friday night numbers was on WWE. AEW officials won’t be calling attention to theirs.

SmackDown spent a week promoting an Undisputed WWE Universal title clash, and on the morning of the show added an “in character” appearance by embattled CEO & Chairman Vince McMahon. That combined to give WWE’s blue brand its best numbers since April — though not as good as some were forecasting based on the leaked fast overnights that came out over the weekend. The official tally was an audience of 2.29 million, with a .57 rating among 18-49 year olds. It was far and away the highest rated show on television.

Those are big gains from June 10: a 20% increase in viewers and 29.5% in ratings. Some of that can be attributed to lack of competition. Not only was the night free of NBA or NHL playoff action for the first time in a while, many networks were showing things like reruns since it was the start of a three day weekend for many in the United States. But the content of the show definitely helped.

We can say that because the other conditions clearly didn’t help Rampage. Maybe folks with an extra day off ahead of them didn’t want to be home at 10pm on Friday night?

Whatever the reason, AEW’s b-show hit new lows. The .10 in the demo is its worst ever, including nights when its been pre-empted. Rampage only drew 331K viewers. Only May 6’s 5:30pm ET start had a lower number. For the night, the show finished 22nd among cable originals.

WWE won’t have Vince again this week, but maybe they’ll have Roman Reigns and/or Brock Lesnar? AEW will be making the final push to Forbidden Door. It’s possible but not certain the shows will go against a Stanley Cup final game.

We’ll see how they do.

Numbers via Showbuzz Daily