The Burn Notice finale was outstanding (and no, I don’t get paid to go on about my love for Burn Notice, but if anybody at NBC Universal wants to send a check, let me know), and the numbers were great too, with 6.09 million. But that was not enough to best iCarly for the top spot. iCarly took the win with an impressive 6.299 million. WWE RAW took the third and fourth place slots on the chart, with an NCIS rerun rounding out the top 5.
True Jackson VP and Hannah Montana also made the top 10 with over 4.2 million viewers. More NCIS, iCarly and of course Sponge Bob were rounded out by a dash of Sonny with a Chance and The O’Reilly Factor.
The biggest surprises of the week to me were that anyone was actually watching the World Baseball Classic on ESPN. More people watched the USA vs. Venezuela game on Sunday night than watched LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers take on the Boston Celtics on Friday. I know more people are watching TV on Sunday night than Friday night, but, it still surprises me.
Woe is Detective Hanadarko! The return of Saving Grace also surprised me. 2.497 million last Monday (3/2) It’s lead in, a repeat of The Closer had more viewers with 2.964 million. If that keeps up, indeed, it will take an angel from Heaven to save Grace.
Ashes to Ashes, the British sequel to the British (and original) version of Life on Mars bowed on BBC America on Saturday night with 241,000 viewers. That network is on a different scale than most of the shows we wind up writing about, its best performer of the week, Top Gear averaged 489,000. Ashes was the 3rd most-watched show on BBCA for the week, coming in behind a season 1 episode of the British version of Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares.
We also have weekly rankings of the top advertising supported cable networks.
Top 20 cable shows for the week ending March 8, 2009:
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE COMMENTING, THANK YOU!
Please note, all shows outside of the top twenty are sorted by viewers but not ranked. If you don’t see a show listed here, the only thing you can conclude for sure is that it wasn’t in the top twenty. The top twenty would include premium cable, if any of those shows ever made the top twenty. But the additional show list is for advertising supported basic cable networks only. We do not see data directly for premium cable channels.
There are over 14,000 shows. I’m not taking requests. If you make a request in the comments anyway, I might delete it, ignore it or mock you. Or turn the comments off altogether 
| Rank | Shows | NET | DAY | Time | Viewers Live+SD (000) |
| 1 | ICARLY | NICK | Sat | 08:00P-08:30P | 6,299 |
| 2 | BURN NOTICE | USA | Thu | 10:00P-11:02P | 6,090 |
| 3 | WWE ENTERTAINMENT | USA | Mon | 10:00P-11:10P | 5,765 |
| 4 | WWE ENTERTAINMENT | USA | Mon | 09:00P-10:00P | 5,257 |
| 5 | NCIS | USA | Mon | 07:00P-08:00P | 4,677 |
| 6 | NCIS | USA | Mon | 08:00P-09:00P | 4,502 |
| 7 | TRUE JACKSON, VP | NICK | Sat | 08:30P-09:00P | 4,405 |
| 8 | NCIS | USA | Tue | 07:00P-08:00P | 4,276 |
| 9 | HANNAH MONTANA | DSNY | Sun | 07:30P-08:00P | 4,249 |
| 10 | ICARLY | NICK | Sun | 11:00A-11:30A | 4,061 |
| 11 | SPONGEBOB | NICK | Sun | 10:30A-11:00A | 4,017 |
| 12 | SPONGEBOB | NICK | Mon | 05:30P-06:00P | 3,991 |
| 13 | NCIS | USA | Wed | 07:00P-08:00P | 3,962 |
| 14 | THE OREILLY FACTOR | FOXN | Thu | 08:00P-09:00P | 3,953 |
| 15 | SPONGEBOB | NICK | Sat | 12:30P-01:00P | 3,884 |
| 16 | SONNY WITH A CHANCE | DSNY | Sun | 08:00P-08:30P | 3,872 |
| 17 | SPONGEBOB | NICK | Sat | 09:30A-10:00A | 3,855 |
| 18 | ICARLY | NICK | Sat | 07:30P-08:00P | 3,841 |
| 19 | ICARLY | NICK | Mon | 06:00P-06:30P | 3,816 |
| 20 | SPONGEBOB | NICK | Sat | 09:00A-09:30A | 3,732 |
| Other Shows (sorted in order but NOT ranked) | |||||
| AMERICAS BEST DANCE CREW | MTV | Thu | 10:00P-11:06P | 3,446 | |
| HOUSE | USA | Thu | 08:00P-09:00P | 3,352 | |
| SECRET LIFE/AMERICAN TEEN | FAM | Mon | 08:00P-09:00P | 3,329 | |
| S SUITE LIFE ON DECK | DSNY | Sun | 07:00P-07:30P | 3,241 | |
| HOUSE OF PAYNE | TBSC | Wed | 10:30P-11:00P | 3,114 | |
| FAMILY GUY | ADSM | Sun | 11:00P-11:30P | 3,106 | |
| JON & KATE PLUS 8 | TLC | Mon | 09:00P-09:31P | 3,103 | |
| WIZARDS OF WAVERLY PLACE | DSNY | Sun | 08:30P-09:00P | 3,099 | |
| BACK AT THE BARNYARD | NICK | Sat | 10:00A-10:30A | 3,026 | |
| H2O | NICK | Sat | 09:00P-09:30P | 2,747 | |
| USA/VENEZUELA | ESPN | Sun | 08:00P-11:48P | 2,645 | |
| CAVALIERS/CELTICS | ESPN | Fri | 08:01P-10:40P | 2,515 | |
| STAR WARS:CLONE WARS | TOON | Fri | 09:00P-09:30P | 2,499 | |
| SAVING GRACE | TNT | Mon | 10:00P-11:00P | 2,497 | |
| FOR THE LOVE OF RAY J | VH1 | Mon | 10:00P-11:00P | 2,434 | |
| NIP TUCK | FX | Tue | 10:00P-11:02P | 2,385 | |
| ROBOT CHICKEN | ADSM | Sun | 11:30P-11:45P | 2,356 | |
| LITTLE PEOPLE, BIG WORLD | TLC | Mon | 08:30P-09:00P | 2,349 | |
| THE FIRST 48 | A&E | Thu | 09:00P-10:00P | 2,194 | |
| GHOST HUNTERS INTERNATL | SCIF | Wed | 09:00P-10:01P | 2,154 | |
| DAILY SHOW | CMDY | Wed | 10:59P-11:30P | 2,110 | |
| BATMAN:BRAVE & THE BOLD | TOON | Fri | 08:30P-09:00P | 2,073 | |
| DOG THE BOUNTY HUNTER | A&E | Wed | 10:00P-10:30P | 2,060 | |
| INTERVENTION | A&E | Mon | 09:00P-10:00P | 2,043 | |
| IMPORTANT THINGS | CMDY | Wed | 10:30P-10:59P | 1,964 | |
| THATS SO RAVEN – LN | DSNY | Fri | 12:00A-12:30A | 1,964 | |
| I LOVE MONEY 2 | VH1 | Mon | 09:00P-10:00P | 1,940 | |
| REAL WORLD XXI | MTV | Wed | 10:00P-11:00P | 1,927 | |
| TOP CHEF | BRAV | Wed | 09:00P-10:00P | 1,904 | |
| USA/CANADA | ESPN | Sat | 02:07P-05:07P | 1,850 | |
| ECW | SCIF | Tue | 09:00P-10:00P | 1,842 | |
| LOUISVILLE/WEST VIRGINIA | ESPN | Sat | 09:00P-11:10P | 1,780 | |
| SEINFELD | TBSC | Thu | 07:30P-08:00P | 1,774 | |
| NORTH CAROLINA/VIRGINIA T | ESPN | Wed | 07:00P-09:01P | 1,732 | |
| BREAKING BAD | AMC | Sun | 10:00P-11:00P | 1,662 | |
| KEEPING UP KARDASHIANS | EN | Sun | 10:00P-10:30P | 1,656 | |
| BATTLSTR GALACTICA (ORIG) | SCIF | Fri | 10:00P-11:00P | 1,568 | |
| CH DISNEY CELEBRATE CAKES | FOOD | Sun | 08:00P-09:00P | 1,500 | |
| DINERS, DRIVE INS & DIVES | FOOD | Fri | 09:30P-10:00P | 1,416 | |
| PARDON THE INTERRUPTION | ESPN | Mon | 05:30P-06:00P | 1,306 | |
| KYLE XY | FAM | Mon | 09:00P-10:00P | 1,297 | |
| THE SOUP | EN | Fri | 10:00P-10:30P | 1,202 | |
| DAMAGES | FX | Wed | 10:00P-11:01P | 974 | |
| MOONLIGHT | SCIF | Fri | 09:00P-10:00P | 928 | |
| AROUND THE HORN | ESPN | Tue | 05:00P-05:30P | 900 |
Nielsen Ratings Data: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved
I know requests are not allowed but I do wonder how the “Kingdom of the Blue Whale” special on National Geographic Channel did sunday night. It was an interesting show and has been advertised like crazy on the internet.
Ummm…can I put in a request for next week?
Good for Burn Notice & RAW. I love both shows. I see that Around the Horn is listed too, love watching that show also
what is up with icarly? did it really gain 1m viewers since the last new episode?
ICarly rules all!!! Last week it didn’t even make the top 20.
It just show how lazy the broadcast nets are for writing off Saturdays.
Good to see Burn Notice and Raw dominate like that. Raw had a really good show last night and ending where HHH took a sledgehammer to Orton’s whorehouse in St. Louis and chased him down. Raw should grow next week to #1 again.
USA/CANADA was amazing on Saturday. I went to that game and man was it loud at Rogers Centre. Good to see it reach 2 million viewers on ESPN.
iCarly was heavily promoted on Nickelodeon more than usual. iCarly deserves to be the number one show b/c its really the funniest sitcom on air right now. Its for all ages too don’t let it being on Nick fool you. iCarly is way funnier than anything NBC has on Thursday Nights right now.
Robert, I know requests are out of question, but do you by any chance have the viewers average for Nip/Tuck I know the second part of the fifth season averages 2.54mil, but I was hoping you could give me the fith season average
im glad Saving Grace has already been clenched for a 3rd season. People need to start watching this again!
Yeah WWE RAW had a really good show last night. I actaully thought it was one of the best shows in years, almost every match and every scene was well thought out and brought us closer to Wrestlemania. I think the next 3 weeks ratings are going to top 6 million they could possibly keep growing after Wrestlemania.
Burn Notice, not my cup of tea, but thought the finale was good and the numbers showed.
ICARLY??! The show always goes weeks with out a top 5 appereance in the ratings and then out of no where a new show comes on and 5.5 to 6.5 million viewers tune in, and they are all under 12 years old. I always woundered what ICARLYS 18-49 demo is lol. Prolley about 2% of the audience ha
Matt I agree I didn’t see it last week but I saw it last night and with Christina Ricci on there is definitely become watchable again.
The Closer is so overrated for me, I think TNT has way better shows than The Closer on there that should be getting higher numbers.
wow Saving Grace is an amazing show i hope they put it after The Closer again it worked for them
@tooltip, unfortunately we don’t see any season-to-date average information for cable shows, I’d have to go back and do it manually. Sorry.
Dylan, I agree on Raw I think last night’s was its best in a long time and the writing has really stepped up as of late heading into Wrestlemania. I wouldn’t be surprised if Raw reaches over 6 million viewers going into WM but I also agree with you that WWE won’t stop there as I sense another golden age for them coming after Wrestlemania since their younger talent is going to start getting established like Orton to carry the show but not as big as the Attitude Era.
iCarly is actually not your average under 13 show. Its ratings are high b/c they get a good portion of their audience from people over 18 that’s why their ratings are higher than other tween shows. A research report I read a month ago stated that iCarly is very popular among some people in their 20s. I was surprised by that since I thought I was the only person watching at my age until I discovered some of my friends were watching it too. WEIRD ISNT IT!
“The biggest surprises of the week to me were that anyone was actually watching the World Baseball Classic on ESPN.”
I’m amazed that anybody watches the soccer World Cup. Or a soccer game of any description. Or an NBA game at any time.
Different strokes for…different sports fans. Not to mention that the U.S. kicked butt 15-6.
Anyway, thanks for the great site. Nothin’ like numbers to tell the real story.
as i watched kyle xy last night, i saw promos for the new shows that will be taking its spot… I can’t wait to see the lousy numbers those shows start bringing in!!
Kyle XY is dead and gone but I do think ABC family will kick themselves when less than 1 million turn into those new shitty looking sitcoms taking this brilliant show’s place.
not too shabby for Important Things with Demetri Martin.
Eastbound and Down must be doing pretty bad. Too bad since the past two episodes have been an improvement.
Oh thanks for the info Hot Pocket i would of never guessed one person over 18 watched ICARLY! haha well that was my mistake
Also that is very true, RAW has a lot of younger stars like Randy Ortan, Ted Deibsei, Cena and even Edge that will wrestle for years to come. LAst year the ratings sunk for WWE but now they are beginning to get better ratings and that is becuase of the realistic storylines.
Im readt for another Golden Age of wrestling because im not the biggest fan in the world but i love to watch it when it is hot and has a lot of good storylines. its gonna be interseting
I’ve never heard of iCarly, so I can’t take it to task in such a public forum. But seriously … do parents have nothing better to do with their kids on the weekend than drop them in front of the television? (Says the girl with the 3-year-old nephew who has the entire Noggin schedule memorized, not to mention entire transcripts of Wow Wow Wubbzy stored in his little brain). It really blows my mind exactly how many of the cable shows in the top 20 are geared to children…
Stephanie: It’s because children show are very consisted. Shows like Heroes or Greys for example are inconsisted in their quality and because of that they’re bleeding viewers.
Kids are not dumb. If a show starts to get bad they’ll leave it faster than grown-ups.
Robert, are those Adult Swim numbers above average? 3.1 million for an 11:00 airing of Family Guy is pretty impressive.
DAMN at iCarly. 6.2 million viewers is a great number!
The show is very consistent in ratings. With every new episode of this past year charting in the top 5 with more than 5 million viewers. The only weeks it hasn’t been in the top 5 is when reruns have aired & even those have managed top 20 every week with the exception of two or three episodes.
How did the new episode of The N’s Degrassi do?
stop asking him how shows did! he told you not to!
Can anyone else see Burn Notice breaking the double digit barrier?
Why does the Monday 8pm rerun of NCIS consistently make the top 20? I can see the 7pm airings, or the Saturday night airings, but with everything that’s on broadcast tv at 8pm Monday. Plus none of the other weeknight 8pm reruns make the top 20.
I love ICARLY and never thought it did that well!
I hope you just forgot or overlooked Trust Me this week and that it didn’t completely fall below everything on the list.
@rebkell, see:
http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/03/10/tnts-trust-me-struggles-like-charles-barkleys-swing/14258
Not requesting data for a show that isn’t mentioned here but of one that is: any 18-49 demo data for “Saving Grace”?
we don’t see the 18-49 data (or any demo data) for individual cable shows usually unless they’re issued in a press release or the network is otherwise promoting the numbers. Given Saving Grace’s numbers, I’m not expecting any releases.
thanks for the icarly info, Hot Pocket. now i kind of want to watch an episode since i’m in their unintended demo (+20).
Ant, I can definitely see Burn Notice climbing toward the double-digit barrier. USA definitely knows it has a hot hand right now, and they were pushing promotional material for season 3 the day they closed the door on season 2. (Which is sort of funny, given that the show got as big as it did through word-of-mouth. But the online marketing and PR in support of Burn Notice is second-to-none and it’s clearly working).
Hopefully someone can help… I don’t remember ever reading any ratings for Toni Collette’s brilliant SHOWTIME series The United States of Tara. I really hope this gets picked up.. is it doing well?
Matt, I’m not positive, but I believe Robert and/or Bill have said before that they don’t see ratings info for shows on premium cable channels. Maybe go out to Showtimes website and see if they have any info available. Or send them an e-mail and ask. The worst they can do is say no.
Matt, from the bolded text above the chart: The top twenty would include premium cable, if any of those shows ever made the top twenty. But the additional show list is for advertising supported basic cable networks only. We do not see data directly for premium cable channels.
Matt, while I’m almost positive there have been ratings posted for Tara at some point or other I don’t recall them at all. But the show has already been renewed for a second season. So fear not. http://www.tvsquad.com/2009/02/11/united-states-of-tara-will-be-back-for-season-two/
Matt, what Holly and LJO say are true, but when I have seen U.S. of Tara results I have added them to the text of the post before the data table. Usually when that happens it’s near the bottom of the text. You can click on individual posts within the “top cable show” archive and hunt some of the numbers down.
http://tvbythenumbers.com/category/nielsen-top-cable-tv-show-ratings
As for whether it’s doing OK, from what I’ve seen of the numbers I’m guessing it’s doing OK enough for Showtime.
Could you post Price is Right numbers next week? I’ve asked for 4 weeks.
Carl, The numbers for The Price is Right are included in the syndicated ratings post
http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/03/04/wheel-of-fortune-tops-syndicated-with-121-million/13951
i don’t think they are. TPIR is a CBS daytime show (not syndicated, I don’t think). It’s definitely not a cable show, and unfortunately we almost never see any info on its ratings, sorry.
Oops, I mixed up “Wheel of Fortune” with “The Price is Right”….I’m not up on my TV game shows…
“Why does the Monday 8pm rerun of NCIS consistently make the top 20? I can see the 7pm airings, or the Saturday night airings, but with everything that’s on broadcast tv at 8pm Monday. Plus none of the other weeknight 8pm reruns make the top 20.”
It is the Monday Night Raw bump. Every show in that spot has always done well in the ratings because many people watch USA as they wait for Monday Night Raw to begin.
Damages clocks its highest rating in over a month!!! Dare I say these last few episodes have a chance at getting back over a million?
And I’m also shocked at the WBC ratings. I love baseball but I don’t understand how anybody could be attracted to this thing. It’s just so incredibly empty and meaningless. Listening to some of these people attempting to attach some sort of significance to this has been beyond laughable.
“It’s [the World Baseball Classic] just so incredibly empty and meaningless. Listening to some of these people attempting to attach some sort of significance to this has been beyond laughable.”
Tell that to the Netherlands team. From the way they were hooping, hollering, jumping around and generally cavorting last night after their incredibly exciting win over the Dominican Republic, they attach more than a little significance to this “beyond laughable” event.
I watched the proceedings on the MLB Network. It was honestly one of the most excting sports events I have ever witnessed. A 2-1 11-inning game where the Netherlands came from behind in the last of the eleventh. If you missed it, you missed something that beyond belief, not beyond laughable.
But here’s the thing. How can anybody take seriously an event like this when the great majority of the top players sit it out, there are pitch counts that must be strictly adhered to, and it is being played in March, a month when so many are not yet in great playing shape? As is, there are too many issues and I can’t put them out of my mind when watching so it’s impossible for me, at least, to care one iota about any of it.
Yeah Monday night raw always brings ratings up for shows before/after. Robert i have a question, not about the ratings haha but about advertsiing. Do you have any clue how much advertisers pay for shows like Monday Night RAW, The CLOSER, BURN NOTICE, and MONK? like do you have any clue cause i dont lol!
“How can anybody take seriously an event like this when the great majority of the top players sit it out, there are pitch counts that must be strictly adhered to, and it is being played in March, a month when so many are not yet in great playing shape?”
In fact, the quality of play has been quite high in the series, though the Dominican players obvously felt their collars tighten in the last of the eleventh. Players don’t look out of shape at all, and the pitch counts actually add to the strategy in the games. Some players are sitting out, but there’s plenty of top-level talent in the competition.
Ratings for Degrassi please.
TNT is falling apart. Saving Grace has fewer viewers then most episodes of Leverage. Plus Saving Grace has had The Closer as a lead in many times. Trust Me is a huge loser with only 1 million viewers. Raising the Bar also sucks without the lead in support of The Closer. The Closer seems to be only a summer show, and it skews pretty old. TNT is lucky it has the 2.5-3 million for Leverage without a strong lead in.
That’s So Raven does pretty good for midnight.
Do you take requests?
wow iCarly is doing fantastic! But True Jackson higher than SpongeBob?! that’s just sad. BTW, I’m way out of the demo these three shows aim to (19) but I love them!
Stephany,
Arent most of the Spongebob episodes repeats anyways?
Disney Channel may be looking to increase the ratings for Thats So Raven. They moved it to 11:30pm. That should help increase their 12am and 12:30am.
RJ, uh oh, when That’s So Raven ratings increase, so does the cutoff for cable show ratings reporting!
I wish. But, outside of the top 20, there’s a fairly even distribution. ~25 shows above That’s So Raven and ~20 below.
I have a feeling Trust Me might be renewed because it has sooo much product placement in it. Whole shows revolve around big name products so lots of promotion is at stake… maybe a little bit like Damages, which has already gotten renewed even with poor 2nd season ratings.
GO WWE RAW! DOMINATINNGGGG
matt……….no its done
Poor Damages
I don’t want the FBI on my case but I have watched both iCarly and Hannah Montana. The formula seems to be a girl 12 year old boys like and 12 year old girls will pay to see in a concert or movie. BTW, if a network had 10 of the top 20 shows on the networks, like Nickolodean does … the difference is, ad success for shows tweens watch with their moms and dads and littler siblings has the greatest ( acc to industry figures ) is higher than for anything else on TV. Which is why the Parental TV watchdogs left right and center were formed in the 1960’s.
With over 14,000 shows on the air I wonder which one is 14,000th? They must feel really bad with their numbers.
AniMatsuri, I think it was a couple of weeks ago when Bill or Robert said that there are LOTS of shows that are listed as 0 viewers. So none of them have to feel bad for being the only one at #14,000.
Last week there were over 3,500 airings that had a P2+ rating of 0.0. We only see out to the 10ths and so there are several shows that are 0.0XX rather than 0.000. Those 0.0XX shows registered anywhere from 1K to 127K. I’m not exactly sure what to make of it since there were shows with a 0.1 P2+ average audience rating that had less viewers than some of the shows listed with a 0.0 rating. I’m guessing that all of them are in the realm of “Scratch” territory where Nielsen doesn’t really certify the results.
Last week there were less than 40 shows that didn’t even show up w/1000 viewers, more than 1/3rd of them were infomercials.
Keeping Up With The Kardassians beats out Battlestar Galactica?! Gotta love Sci Fi channel and its policy of keeping low-rated shows around for longer than they deserve.
Anyone knows rating for “The L Word” and “Secret Diary of a Call Girl” finales?
To Nick who said, “It’s [the World Baseball Classic] just so incredibly empty and meaningless. Listening to some of these people attempting to attach some sort of significance to this has been beyond laughable.”
the WBC is about representing your country! and where are you from? i guess you just don’t have pride. i suppose your homeland’s not doing too well… that’s the only laughable matter, really.
aren’t you at least interested to see which country comes out top in baseball?