It was a bad night on the networks to be anything but sports. Note: the football and baseball numbers below are adjusted to estimate where the final numbers will be after western time zones are taken into account tomorrow.
ABC: ONCE UPON A TIME proved once and for all that Disney doesn’t interfere with its content, with a memorable (and unhyped) character development toward the end of the episode, but the show fell 0.3 to 2.3. REVENGE dropped 0.2 to 1.7. The promos at the end of BETRAYAL promised dramatic fireworks over the next 3 episodes, but with an awful 0.8 rating (down 0.3 from last week), it’s not clear the show will last that long.
CBS: With the late NFL game on FOX, everything tumbled. 60 MINUTES was a powerful demonstration of the power of football overruns, down a remarkable 2.3 from last week’s game-delayed episode to 1.5. The rest was a parade of series lows: THE AMAZING RACE down 0.6 to 1.8, a vintage THE GOOD WIFE down 0.4 to 1.2, and THE MENTALIST down 0.2 to 1.3.
NBC: We estimate the adjusted NFL SUNDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL number will be 8.6, up a hefty 1.6 from last week, and testimony to the power of the Cowboys/Redskin brand names.
FOX: After what we estimate as a giant 10.6 NFL late-afternoon game overrun (the insane ending of the Patriots/Saints game, the closest you’ll ever see to a real game ending like a movie), we expect the MLB AMERICAN LEAGUE PLAYOFFS to have a 2.7. That’s nowhere near football, but still a better number than FOX has managed with its animation line-up this season.
CBS debuts its revised Monday tonight, with 2 BROKE GIRLS moving back to 8:30PM in place of the canceled We Are Men, and a BIG BANG THEORY rerun at 9PM. (MIKE & MOLLY arrives next month.)
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