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[Hollywood]

WWE SmackDown! finished with a 2.9 broadcast rating for this week, with a 4.6 share.

We reported yesterday the major conflicts that WWE SmackDown! will encounter with the airing of MLB baseball, causing preemptions in the New York market. This does not appear to be the only problem as in addition to the Yankees, The Boston Red Sox, The Washington Nationals, The Philadelphia Phillies, The Los Angeles Dodgers, The Minnesota Twins, The Seattle Mariners, and The Colorado Rockies all have television deals with their local UPN channel to carry their games on Friday evenings.

More importantly, UPN 9 in the New York market is in its first year of a three year deal with the Yankees to broadcast 20-25 games per year, although Friday is not a stipulation in the contract meaning that it could be changed.

Apparently UPN and the Yankees agreed on Friday so that the games did not interfere with SmackDown, which means that UPN possibly put SmackDown in a position where it can be preempted.

SmackDown does not appear to be as top of a priority as it used to be to UPN executives given Viacom’s Leslie Moonves comments that the program would be cancelled, later clarified that it “could be cancelled.” WWE’s deal with UPN to air SmackDown expires in September 2006. It should also be noted that WWE was not given advance notice by UPN of plans to change the show's timeslot before Thursday's upfront presentation by the network. -nodq.com

:lol

WWE's now in the TWO's ... 1.0's here we come. Can't wait for when it comes on Friday and it's down below 2.

 

[G4life98]

the fucked up part is that is that smackdown has been the the highest rated show on upn since it started and the network still gives it no respect and are basically trying to kill it by putting it on fridays.

 

[Liu Kang Baking A Pie]

the fucked up part is that is that smackdown has been the the highest rated show on upn since it started and the network still gives it no respect and are basically trying to kill it by putting it on fridays.

Ratings don't mean shit to the network itself. Ratings are only used as leverage to get more advertisers and to get more money out of those advertisements, but no one wants to put commercials on during wrestling. That's why you see the same Skittles, Castrol, and video game ads every single commercial break. Smackdown could be getting 8.0's, but if it doesn't bring in more ad money, the networks don't care.

 

[Almighty_Chocobo]

Wrestling is really not what it used to be. It just doesn't have the charasmatic characters anymore that draw in crowds like they used to(Austin, Hogan, ect..) Sure they still have talent like Angle, but they seem to have lost their touch in how to use them correctly. Their first step to fixing it needs to be the elimination of all of this seperate Smackdown and Raw BS....

 

[Liu Kang Baking A Pie]

Wrestling is really not what it used to be. It just doesn't have the charasmatic characters anymore that draw in crowds like they used to(Austin, Hogan, ect..) Sure they still have talent like Angle, but they seem to have lost their touch in how to use them correctly. Their first step to fixing it needs to be the elimination of all of this seperate Smackdown and Raw BS....

So we can have Triple H on both shows?

A few very vocal people want to just have one big roster, but these people don't seem to remember how watered down and boring everything was when it was the same shit on both shows all the time. We don't need Triple H on about 8 shows in 25 segments to promote his next PPV match. And Angle/Michaels at Wrestlemania wouldn't have been nearly as anticipated if they had already been involved in angles with each other for the last year as a result of being on the same shows and storylines all the time.

 

[Megat0n]

When it switches to Friday, the ratings will be deceptive because there will be less people watching tv then on Thursday so share will actually be higher.

 

[Prine]

good, i hope the whole WWE brand bomb. Teach Vince a lesson that his shows suck! Throw out the yes men

 

[Baconäger]

Wrestling has been dead for awhile now. Get over it.

 

[DMczaf]

Stop the retarded brand split!