Spotted Ratings, Sunday 9/25/11

WHAT MATTERS:

• This premiere Sunday saw big year-to-year declines from Desperate Housewives, whose final season opened up down by a whooping 26% year-to-year. It was a tick ahead of last year's finale. But ABC got good news at 10/9c as the debut of Pan Am actually had full retention out of Desperate in the prelims and, after finals, still had the best post-DH retention since Grey's Anatomy left Sunday. It also built on DH in total viewers and did better than any episode of Brothers & Sisters in the timeslot last year.

• Earlier in the evening, the two-hour premiere of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition was down a couple ticks from last year.

• It was a nice opening week for Fox's Animation Domination, with The Simpsons slightly up from last year, The Cleveland Show flat and Family Guy down less than 10%. They also had the American Dad! premiere, which was even with last year's October 3 premiere. It's worth noting that Fox had the NFL overrun this year and didn't have it on last year's opening Sunday, so those performances may not bode quite as well as they seem to.

• The Good Wife turned in yet another low-2's performance in its Sunday debut, down a bit from last year but in line with its 2010-11 average. CSI: Miami was down huge from last year's premiere (which had a much bigger lead-in in Undercover Boss). Also down 20%+ from last year was, The Amazing Race, though it was still easily CBS' strongest show and it benefited more directly from the national NFL overrun last year.

• NBC of course dominated with Sunday Night Football, though it posted its weakest performance of the season thus far.

FULL TABLE:

	Viewers	A18-49	Share	Skew	Last	Lead	LeLa	Avg	Rank	TRUE
Extreme Makeover: Home Edition	5.37	1.3	4	31%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	1.16
Extreme Makeover: Home Edition	8.76	2.3	6	34%	+77%	+77%	+0%	+77%	1/2	1.96
Desperate Housewives	9.93	3.2	7	41%	n/a	+39%	n/a	n/a	1/1	2.52
Pan Am	11.06	3.1	8	36%	n/a	-3%	n/a	n/a	1/1	2.88
60 Minutes	12.27	2.3	6	24%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	2.28
The Amazing Race	10.18	3.0	7	38%	n/a	+30%	n/a	n/a	1/1	2.41
The Good Wife	10.66	2.2	5	26%	n/a	-27%	n/a	n/a	1/1	1.47
CSI: Miami	9.89	2.3	6	30%	n/a	+5%	n/a	n/a	1/1	2.12
Sports: Football Night in America p1	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
Sports: Football Night in America p2	5.75	2.3	7	51%	-32%	n/a	-100%	-23%	3/3	2.45
Sports: Football Night in America p3	12.04	4.6	12	49%	-18%	+100%	-32%	-21%	3/3	4.17
Sports: Sunday Night Football	20.36	8.3	21	52%	-17%	+80%	-18%	-21%	4/4	6.92
Sports: NFL Overrun	23.99	9.4	29	50%	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	11.38
Sports: The OT	12.22	5.3	15	56%	n/a	-44%	n/a	n/a	1/1	3.72
The Simpsons	8.08	3.9	10	62%	n/a	-26%	n/a	n/a	1/1	2.86
The Cleveland Show	6.13	3.1	7	65%	n/a	-21%	n/a	n/a	1/1	2.31
Family Guy	7.69	4.1	9	68%	n/a	+32%	n/a	n/a	1/1	3.23
American Dad!	5.83	3.0	7	66%	n/a	-27%	n/a	n/a	1/1	2.02

KEY (with much more detail at the New Daily Spotted Ratings page):

Viewers - The total number of viewers (age 2+, in millions) that watched the program.
A18-49 - Adults 18-49 rating. Percentage of US TV-owning adults 18-49 watching the program.
Share - Adults 18-49 share. Percentage of US TV-watching adults 18-49 watching the program.
Skew - Percentage of the total audience that falls in the 18-49 demo.
Last - A18-49 percent difference from previous episode.
Lead - A18-49 percent difference from lead-in program.
LeLa - A18-49 percent difference between the show's lead-in and its lead-in for the previous episode.
Avg - A18-49 percent difference from the show's average demo for previous original episodes this season.
Rank - The A18-49 rating's rank among the show's episodes that have aired so far this season.
TRUE - True Strength, a metric developed last summer that adjusts the A18-49 rating for overall viewing levels, competition and lead-in.

(R) - Repeat.

More Spotted Ratings in the Index.