WWE Smackdown Ratings Rise, Tops 3 Million Viewers For Bloodline Angle
It was another big ratings performance for WWE Smackdown on FOX as The Bloodline storyline continues to keep viewers tuning in to see what happens next.
This past Friday’s edition of WWE Smackdown was in the “World’s Most Famous Arena” Madison Square Garden in New York City. It was a sold out crowd that was on hand to find out what would happen next in The Bloodline storyline.
At WWE Money in the Bank six days earlier, The Usos (Jimmy & Jey Uso) beat their cousin Roman Reigns – the Undisputed WWE Universal Champion – and Roman Reigns in a huge Bloodline Civil War tag team match. Jey pinned Reigns, who hadn’t been pinned for over 3.5 prior to that.
On Smackdown, The Bloodline foursome did a promo segment in the 35 minutes of the show with one commercial. This time, Roman & Solo got the upper hand as Reigns teased an apology towards The Usos before hitting a low blow on Jey.
Roman & Solo dominated The Usos with Solo hitting a splash through the commentary table on Jimmy. That led to Jimmy being driven away in an ambulance.
In the main event’s final ten minutes of the show, Jey Uso returned to the building after being at the hospital with his Jimmy (in theory anyway) and got revenge on Roman & Solo. Jey challenged Roman to a match, which is likely for the Undisputed WWE Universal Title at SummerSlam on August 5th, but it hasn’t been made official yet.
The ratings are in for Smackdown, as reported by Andrew Zarian on Twitter, with an audience of 2.56 million on FOX with 986,000 in the 18-49 key demo. It is up 2% from last week and up 21% from last year. The coveted 18-49 key demo rating was a massive number 0.76, which is up 10% from last week. The 18-49 rating is the highest number in over three years. Thanks to Wrestlenomics for that.
It was noted by Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer that the 0.76 key demo number could be the first time in history a wrestling show was No. 1 in the network ratings as we await more details.
Meanwhile, Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics tweeted that the peak of The Bloodline segment on Smackdown drew over 3 million viewers.
The 2nd quarter-hour of last Friday's Smackdown; which was the middle of the Reigns, Sikoa, Usos segment, and had no ads; averaged more than 3 million viewers and a 0.94 P18-49 demo rating (1.23M viewers 18-49).
Higher than any wrestling quarter-hour in recent memory.
— Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) July 10, 2023
Clearly, The Bloodline storyline is working very well for WWE and as the numbers continue to rise, the feuding members of the group may get even more screen time in the weeks ahead.