Patriots Lose But ‘Monday Night Football’ Ratings Rise, ‘Better Late Than Never’ Off In Return But Improves On ‘The Brave’
All things must come to an end, and last night’s Monday Night Football saw the Miami Dolphins shut down the New England Patriots’ eight-game winning streak. In a season that has been full of ratings tackles for the league and its broadcasters, it also saw an uptick for ESPN and the NFL: With a 8.5 in metered market ratings, last night’s MNF was up 9% over last week.
On the broadcast networks, NBC’s globe-trotting reality series Better Late Than Never returned for a second season after a 15-month break with a 1.1 in adults 18-49 and 5.6 million viewers. That was down from the show’s Season 1 average in summer 2016 (1.6, 7.3 million) when it aired behind America’s Got Talent, which was higher rated than last night’s The Voice (1.9 in 18-49, even with last Monday’s fast national, 10.4 million) and benefited from a preview during the network’s Olympics coverage. BLTN‘s Season 2 opener’s lead-in retention of The Voice was a so-so 58%, down from 67% for the series premiere last year. But BLTN improved the 10 PM time slot for NBC, which has been airing military drama The Brave in the hour, with the largest audience and biggest adults 18-49 Live+Same Day delivery since premiere week.
Elsewhere, CBS’ Kevin Can Wait (1.1, 6.3 million), Man With a Plan (1.1, 5.7 million) and 9JKL (0.7, 4.3 million) all dipped a tenth in the demo from last week. For 9JKL, these were new L+SD series lows in both viewers and demo. Superior Donuts (0.9, 5.2 million) and Scorpion (0.9, 5.9 million) held steady.
Fox’s Lucifer (0.8, 3.4 million) ticked down a tenth in 18-49, while The Gifted (0.8, 2.8 million) was flat. Following a a Penn & Teller rerun, Valor‘s fall finale (0.2, 770,000) slipped to a viewership low and was even with last week’s demo low despite a lead-in that was less than a half of last week’s.
ABC’s fast nationals were likely inflated by NFL preemptions. For now, a Bachelor preview special did a 0.8 and 3.4 million. Christmas Light Fight (1.2, 5.2 million) is up 0.2 from last Monday, so it will likely finish on par.
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