| Scoreboard |  |
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-49 | 3.9/11 | 2.4/7 | 1.7/5 | 1.6/5 | 1.5/4 | 0.4/1 |
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-34 | 4.1/13 | 2.2/7 | 1.0/3 | 1.1/3 | 1.6/5 | 0.5/2 |
| Total Viewers (million) | 9.406 | 7.174 | 7.248 | 5.255 | 3.709 | 1.307 |
Surprising no one, ABC and the first game of the NBA Finals dominated Thursday night, as Kobe and the Lakers crushed the Magic, and the prime-time portion of the game did 12% better than last’s years game 1 in the fast affiliates 18-49 demo ratings.
While these fast affiliate ratings do not include the 11pm+ portion of the game, ABC has to be happy with the prime time portion which did better than last season’s opener. Although last season’s game 1 was a close one and got a boost from the end, this year the game was a blow out late and the numbers likely suffered. We will post the final numbers as soon as we see them.
It’s not clear what NBC might have been expecting from the premiere of The Listener, it didn’t do well (we’re told it was NBC’s lowest summer series debut rating ever), but the real test will be its first outing without NBA competition.
Fox’s So You Think You Can Dance was down 16% in the demo from last Thursday. Still, a 3.1 demo vs. the NBA Finals is good news for the show.
NBC’s I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here was up 9% in the demo from Wednesday (bad number reading on my part!) plunged 42% in the demo from Wednesday night, but and in many parts of the country it faced the NBA Finals, so I don’t read too much into that number.
Full details:
| Time | Net | Show | 18-49 Rating | 18-49 Share | 18-34 Rating | 18-34 Share | Viewers Live+SD (Millons) |
| 8:00 | ABC | Jimmy Kimmel Live | 2.7 | 10 | 2.8 | 11 | 7.529 |
| NBC | I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here! | 1.9 | 6 | 1.5 | 5 | 5.175 | |
| FOX | Bones (repeat) | 1.6 | 5 | 1.3 | 5 | 6.145 | |
| CBS | Big Bang Theory (repeat) | 1.6 | 6 | 1.0 | 4 | 5.822 | |
| CW | Smallville (repeat) | 0.4 | 1 | 0.4 | 2 | 1.384 | |
| 8:30 | ABC | NBA Countdown | 2.8 | 9 | 2.9 | 10 | 7.030 |
| CBS | New Adventures of Old Christine (repeat) | 1.4 | 4 | 0.8 | 3 | 5.220 | |
| 9:00 | ABC | NBA Finals: Game 1 | 4.4 | 12 | 4.6 | 14 | 10.479 |
| FOX | So You Think You Can Dance | 3.1 | 9 | 3.1 | 9 | 8.203 | |
| NBC | The Listener (premiere) | 1.5 | 4 | 0.9 | 3 | 5.249 | |
| CBS | CSI (repeat) | 1.5 | 4 | 0.8 | 2 | 7.666 | |
| CW | Supernatural (repeat) | 0.5 | 1 | 0.5 | 1 | 1.231 | |
| 10:00 | ABC | NBA Finals: Game 1 | 4.5 | 12 | 4.7 | 14 | 10.460 |
| CBS | The Mentalist (repeat) | 1.9 | 5 | 1.4 | 4 | 8.556 | |
| NBC | The Listener (premiere) | 1.4 | 4 | 0.8 | 2 | 5.343 |
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Because of the live NBA Finals telecast, all results for ABC are approximate and subject to more than typical adjustment. See below for more information.
For comparison, here is our Overnight report for last year’s first game in the NBA Finals.
You can see TV ratings from past Thursday overnight reports here.
Table
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Shows are sorted from highest 18-49 rating to lowest in each time slot.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
Definitions:
Fast Affiliate Ratings: These first national ratings, including demographics, are available at approximately 11 AM (ET) the day after telecast, and are released to subscribing customers daily. These data, from the National People Meter sample, are strictly time-period information, based on the normal broadcast network feed, and include all programming on the affiliated stations, sometimes including network programming, sometimes not. The figures may include stations that did not air the entire network feed, as well as local news breaks or cutaways for local coverage or other programming. Fast Affiliate ratings are not as useful for live programs and are likely to differ significantly from the final results, because the data reflect normal broadcast feed patterns. For example, with a World Series game, Fast Affiliate Ratings would include whatever aired from 8-11PM on affiliates in the Pacific Time Zone, following the live football game, but not game coverage that begins at 5PM PT. The same would be true of Presidential debates as well as live award shows and breaking news reports.
Rating: Estimated percentage of the universe of TV households (or other specified group) tuned to a program in the average minute. Ratings are expressed as a percent.
Share (of Audience): The percent of households (or persons) using television who are tuned to a specific program, station or network in a specific area at a specific time. (See also, Rating, which represents tuning or viewing as a percent of the entire population being measured.)
Time Shifted Viewing – Program ratings for national sources are produced in three streams of data – Live, Live+Same Day (Live+SD) and Live+7 Day. Time shifted figures account for incremental viewing that takes place with DVRs which are currently in approximately 24.4% of all U.S. TV households. Live+Same Day (Live+SD) include viewing during the same broadcast day as the original telecast, with a cut-off of 3:00AM local time when meters transmit daily viewing to Nielsen for processing. Live+7 Day ratings include incremental viewing that takes place during the 7 days following a telecast.
For more information see Numbers 101 and Numbers 102.
Incredible (first comment i hope)
This is completely off-topic, but I was just thinking how ironic it is that NBC launched the first series based on the movie “Parenthood” back in the fall of 1990, the same time “Law and order” started….and now they’re launching the second series based on the movie “Parenthood” in what will likely be L&O’s LAST season. The Parenthood shows are like bookends for L&O’s run.
Oh my gosh is I’m A Celeb on EVERY SINGLE STUPID NIGHT…??????
A-N-N-O-Y–I-N-G……..I’d rather someone force me to watch Dancing With the Stars then see this crap of what NBC is airing—!!!
Aw, the SYTYCD demos are usually a bit higher than that. I guess the NBA finals were the reason why the numbers were low?
On a side note, I love the top 20 the judges picked this year.
Good to hear. Go Lakers!
So The Mentalist repeat grew out of the CSI repeat. That is interesting. Did the basketball game get less interesting as the Lakers were obvioulsy going to win or was that stregnth on The Mentalist part?
gmyers, the game was a blowout by the end of the 3rd quarter and likely lost viewers after 11pm Eastern, but it was remarkably stable through the 10:30-11 half hour which is the last time period we currently have data for.
Bad news for ABC, unless the Magic do something drastic this looks like it will be a very short series.
Interesting how The Listener didn’t do so great. I read somewhere that it did so well in Europe and other places that Fox International was asking CTV for a second season after the fifth episode…
bad numbers for the nba finals. it really does not take a genius to figure out why the numbers were low. i expect them to rise if the magic gain some self-respect and compete with the lakers.
jon, the primetime ratings for the game are certainly not “bad” compared to last year’s first game, although last year’s game ratings were up post 11pm, and last night’s game ratings are almost certainly down post 11pm.
I don’t think the Listener did that bad considering it wasn’t advertised too much and had some stiff competition. I’m sure it met NBC’s liking considering the cost would be much lower. It’s not very often that an imported show does very well in the States (compared to how well US shows do abroad).
I turned to the Listener thinking i was going to get something bad like Reaper, but instead it was a great show.
i hope it last a long time, its a really good show
When will the ratings for Burn Notice get released? This broadcast stuff is a yawn! Shows like “I’m a Celebrity…” is why people don’t bother to watch network TV in summertime…
ok, maybe not bad, b/c the series has potential. but the rating overall was lower than last years but it was a blowout. the game finished lower than any world series game except game 3 which was rain delayed.
From the online buzz, I gathered that people were far more interested in watching Royal Pains than The Listener, which is probably what happened, especially since Royal Pains’s lead-in was the immensely popular Burn Notice.
Speaking of, how soon till we get numbers for Royal Pains?
NBC is fourth again! shame especially they premiere a new show but its an import!
ABC rocks Summer!
^but ABC is and will be fourth in the summer. The Finals is not 4 months long.
“Oh my gosh is I’m A Celeb on EVERY SINGLE STUPID NIGHT…??????”
Seriously! What I find even more aggravating than the fact anybody would even make a show about a bunch of has-been sub d-list celebrities whose fifteen minutes of fame was up a long time ago is that there are people who actually watch this crap!
NBC is beyonde dumb. Not only did The Listener was up against the NBA finals, it was also up against (and will be for the rest of the summer) Burn Notice.
The time has come to stop ignoring cable when schedualing a show. Mondays are the best example of it, you have Secret Life of the American Teenager, WWE and if I remember corectly The Closer and Saving grace were also on Mondays.
Does anyone know how Conan did last night?
@Michael, I didn’t see any numbers for Conan for Thursday yet and I looked several times.
From TFC:
In late-night metered market ratings, NBC’s “Conan” (3.8/9) took the the top spot, defeating ABC’s “Nightline” (2.8/8) and CBS’s “Letterman” (3.2/8). Rounding out the night then were “Kimmel” (1.5/5) on ABC “Ferguson” (1.5/5) on CBS and “Fallon” (1.9/6) and “Daly” (1.2/5) on NBC.
doh! thanks, Julia.
The Listener wasnt that bad, I liked it. The acting was okay…what do you expect, its Canadian, but other than that i would watch it again.
Thanks,Julia.
Ryan, equating poor acting to something’s origin in Canada is ridiculous. There are currently many major American shows on the air that have a full time Canadian member, probably the majority; and there are quite a few legendary Canadian actors and have been since Mary Pickford arrived in Hollywood.
I wonder if it really is NBC. Perhaps they just can’t land a good show because no one is watching when they are showing promos? Generally (but not always of course) if a series does well ratings-wise in the US, it will in many other parts of the world too.
Hopefully, NBC airs all 13 episodes of The Listener. It helps that it’s a cheap show like Fox’s Mental, another 13-episode summer series import. Both shows have done similarly in the ratings with around a 5.2, not bad when you consider they’re cost-effective nature and low expectations. If The Listener aired behind Ghost Whisperer on CBS it would likely get 7.5 or higher as it seems compatible.
If I recall rightly, the game didn’t become a blowout until near the end of the third quarter – so the viewership for ten to eleven didn’t slip. So that’s why they delay the start of these games … I was surprised to see Kimmel was on, and a little surprised he busted out the competition. Could we be seeing once or twice weekly Kimmel shows on ABC competing with Leno’s time slot in the future? Along with, say, once or twice weekly SNL specials? With the continued popularity of Barbara Walters specials, 20/20 etc, why not give her an extra night a week also? I could definitely see, if the ABC fall schedule crashes and burns as badly as their summer shows have, ten to eleven taken up with filler, and CBS being the last one standing with scripted shows during that time.
Why was Jimmy Kimmel doing at 8pm??
The Listener is a great show. I ran across it back in March decided to check it out and was pleasantly surprised. I was sad to see NBC pick it up as NBC frankly has no clue what to do with good shows.