WWE: SmackDown Live Nearly Beats Raw In The Ratings This Week

Tuesday’s post-Backlash edition of Smackdown Live nearly beat Monday Night Raw in the ratings this week. Smackdown Live saw an increase in viewership, averaging 2.658 million viewers. This is up about 8.3% from last week’s edition of Smackdown. It’s probably due AJ Styles winning the WWE Title at Backlash on Sunday as well as John Cena’s return to television after taking a month off.

This week’s Raw went up against Dancing with the Stars and the return of Monday Night Football. Due to this, Raw saw a large decrease in viewership, averaging 2.69 million viewers. This is down from last week’s Raw which averaged 3.069 million viewers.

This week’s Raw defeated Smackdown in the ratings by approximately 1%. This is the closest Smackdown’s come to beating Raw in the ratings since the blue brand moved to NBC Universal in 2010.

On September 26, Raw will have to contend with Monday Night Football and the first United States Presidential Election. That week should be a victory for Smackdown.

Thanks to PWTorch for the numbers.