Spotted Ratings, Labor Day Weekend Roundup 8/31-9/2/12

WHAT MATTERS:

• Meaningful football's back in broadcast primetime with the premieres of regular games on ABC and Fox. While I predicted ABC would easily outrate Fox for the season, even I was surprised by the extent of the opening night shellacking, as ABC's Alabama/Michigan game had five times the demo numbers of Fox's USC/Hawaii offering. ABC reported it was tied as the biggest Saturday Night Football premiere since they picked it up, though several other games last year did as well or better. Both games were blowouts and dropped considerably over the course of the telecast (ABC had a 3.7 in the game's first full half hour at 8:30, while Fox had a 0.8 at 8:00). Fox was also beaten handily by the Clemson/Auburn primetime matchup on ESPN (1.4).

• As I always note, the biggest viewing drops surrounding many holidays come on the eve of the holiday, not on the day itself. (Night-centric holidays like Valentine's Day and the 4th of July are more the exception.) The viewing drop wasn't really felt on Saturday (the football arrival probably helped) or on Labor Day Monday, but Sunday (also the last Sunday of the year without the NFL) was in the vicinity of 15% less viewed by 18-49ers than the previous Sunday (33%ish vs. 39%ish). That was certainly felt on broadcast, where Big Brother took a huge drop and ABC's specials totally bombed. Several cable shows sat out the evening, but the Breaking Bad finale (1.3) posted merely average numbers that I have to feel would've been better on a normal evening.

FRIDAY 8/31/12 FULL TABLE:

	Viewers	A18-49	Last	LeLa	Avg	Rank
Shark Tank (SR)	3.93	0.9
20/20 (SR)	4.58	1.1
20/20 (SR)	3.98	0.9
Undercover Boss (SR)	3.70	0.9
CSI: NY (SR)	3.50	0.5
Blue Bloods (SR)	4.67	0.6
America's Got Talent (R)	3.06	0.6
Grimm (R)	2.01	0.5
Dateline Fri (SR)	3.76	0.8
Bones (SR)	3.02	0.7
Bones (SR)	2.86	0.6
America's Next Top Model Fall	1.07	0.4	+0%	n/a	+0%	1/2
Nikita (SR)	0.63	0.2

SATURDAY 9/1/12 FULL TABLE:

	Viewers	A18-49	Last	LeLa	Avg	Rank
Saturday Night Football Pregame	5.8	1.9	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1
Saturday Night Football	7.9	3.0	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1
CSI: NY (SR)	3.0	0.4
48 Hours Mystery (SR)	3.5	0.7
48 Hours Mystery (SR)	4.0	0.8
America's Got Talent (R)	2.0	0.4
Law and Order: SVU (SR)	3.1	0.6
Law and Order: SVU (SR)	3.8	0.7
CFB on Fox	1.8	0.6	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1

SUNDAY 9/2/12 FULL TABLE:

	Viewers	A18-49	Last	LeLa	Avg	Rank
The Chew/ABC Primetime Preview	2.33	0.4	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
Once Upon a Time (SR)	1.81	0.3
TV's Most Dynamic Duos	2.53	0.5	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
60 Minutes (SR)	6.96	0.8
Big Brother Sun	5.65	1.9	-27%	-33%	-13%	7/8
The Good Wife (SR)	2.93	0.4
The Mentalist (SR)	4.08	0.7
Dateline Sun (SR)	3.28	0.8
America's Got Talent (R)	3.04	0.8
America's Got Talent (R)	2.79	0.8
American Dad! (SR)	1.40	0.6
The Cleveland Show (SR)	1.59	0.7
The Simpsons (SR)	2.41	1.0
The Simpsons (SR)	2.63	1.1
Family Guy (SR)	3.00	1.4
Family Guy (SR)	3.26	1.5

KEY (click to expand)

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.
Last - A18-49 percent difference from previous episode.
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.

(R) - Repeat.
(SR) - Summer repeat. (for shows not currently in season)

Much more detail on these numbers at the New Daily Spotted Ratings page.

More Spotted Ratings in the Index.