WWE SmackDown viewership and TV ratings decline on season premiere

The viewership figures and TV ratings of WWE SmackDown were slightly down on last week's season premiere episode on FOX. As per Showbuzz Daily, the October 16th episode drew an average of 2.124 million viewers. The figure is down from October 9th's viewership of 2.178 million viewers for Night One of the 2020 WWE Draft.

"If you did not get emotional watching The New Day's farewell, then you do not have a heart." - @RyanSatin on @AustinCreedWins, @WWEBigE, & @TrueKofi's farewell on the season premiere of #SmackDown pic.twitter.com/2mkP8gHpuM

— WWE on FOX (@WWEonFOX) October 17, 2020

The TV ratings of SmackDown for the key demographic area of 18-49 was 0.6, which is the same as the previous week's. It scored a 0.7 rating in the 25-54 demographic, which is down from the previous week's rating of 0.8. 0.3 was the score in the 18-34 demographic, also down from the previous week's score of 0.4.

Although the recent episode of SmackDown on Friday was strong with a good main-event match, the slump in viewership may be due to Major League Baseball's NLCS game on TBS.

The clash between Braves and Dodgers dominated the 18-49 key demographic with a 1.05 rating and averaged 3.605 million viewers. Despite facing such stiff competition, it can be said that WWE SmackDown still managed to score respectable numbers in their key demo.

What happened on last week's SmackDown?

SmackDown completed a full year of being on the FOX network last week and began their second season. The night began with Triple H and Stephanie McMahon creating hype for the show.

A CHAOTIC scene closed out a wild season premiere of Friday Night #SmackDown!#UniversalTitle @WWERomanReigns @WWEUsos @HeymanHustle pic.twitter.com/4xuji8hixK

— WWE (@WWE) October 17, 2020

Last week's episode was eventful, as it featured The New Day's final match as a trio, Lars Sullivan's in-ring return and a returning Daniel Bryan being confronted by Seth Rollins. The main-event of the night saw Roman Reigns defending the WWE Universal Championship against Braun Strowman in a back and forth match.

Reigns won the match by making Strowman pass out with a guillotine choke, which he debuted for the first time. After the match, Reigns and Jey Uso had a confrontation ahead of their clash at Hell in a Cell, with the former coming off the strongest.