Schedules Plus Update, CBS (2001-02 & 2002-03)

Schedules Plus looks at the evolution of network schedules and timeslots using numbers adjusted for historical decline. These update posts, looking back on the newly added 2001-02 and 2002-03 seasons, will link back to the now updated full posts for each day, and the update posts have exclusive year-to-year trends and ranks among the 13 iterations of each hour.

Many more disclaimers can be seen on the individual pages, but the most basic one is that the listed schedules are fall lineups, even when midseason replacements may have done much better. (I try to mention those midseason replacements that did better.) Please also note that the 2003-04 thru 2005-06 numbers still contain the "old" A18-49+ scores from before I filled in the missing data from those seasons. So those numbers will change (slightly) when the 2014-15 numbers are entered this summer.

More 2001-03 Schedules Plus updates: ABC | CBS | NBC | Fox | CW

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Monday

	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2001-02	King of Queens	Yes, Dear	Everybody Loves Raymond	Becker	Family Law		118
	120	123	179	125	81
	122		152
Rank	6/13		4/13		12/13		10/13
2002-03	King of Queens	Yes, Dear	Everybody Loves Raymond	Still Standing	CSI: Miami		132 (+12%)
	101 (-16%)	109 (-12%)	156 (-13%)	122 (-3%)	154 (+89%)
	105 (-14%)		139 (-9%)
Rank	8/13		8/13		4/13		7/13
2003-04	Yes, Dear	Still Standing	Everybody Loves Raymond	Two and a Half Men	CSI: Miami		136 (+3%)
	87 (-14%)	100 (-8%)	148 (-5%)	137 (+12%)	173 (+13%)
	94 (-11%)		142 (+2%)
Rank	10/13		7/13		2/13		3/13
Avg	115		143		131		130

With the introduction of CSI: Miami, CBS' full Monday average grew over this period despite the deterioration of the Raymond/King of Queens/Yes, Dear-led comedy generation. The comedy block would continue to decline from here, bottoming out in the first couple years after Raymond exited, then finally rebounded when new tentpoles How I Met Your Mother and Two and a Half Men started picking up steam in 2007-08.

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Tuesday

	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2001-02	JAG		The Guardian		Judging Amy		90
	91		78		100
Rank	10/13		11/13		2/13		9/13
2002-03	JAG		The Guardian		Judging Amy		75 (-16%)
	70 (-23%)		67 (-15%)		89 (-11%)
Rank	12/13		12/13		6/13		12/13
2003-04	NCIS		The Guardian		Judging Amy		68 (-10%)
	67 (-5%)		63 (-5%)		73 (-18%)
Rank	13/13		13/13		11/13		13/13
Avg	115		107		86		103

Even the 2001-02 lineup was significantly weaker than what CBS has gotten out of this night for the last half decade-plus with NCIS twins. And it got even uglier in the subsequent years as JAG and Judging Amy fell farther. CBS brought The Amazing Race over to the night in 2004-05, which helped turn things around initially, but the rise of NCIS was the real game-changer.

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Wednesday

	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2001-02	60 Minutes II		The Amazing Race		Wolf Lake		71
	59		91		62
Rank	10/13		10/13		11/13		11/13
2002-03	60 Minutes II		The Amazing Race		Presidio Med		68 (-3%)
	62 (+4%)		83 (-9%)		61 (-2%)
Rank	9/13		13/13		12/13		12/13
2003-04	60 Minutes II		King of Queens	Becker	Brotherhood of Poland, N.H.		65 (-6%)
	53 (-14%)		99	77	53 (-13%)
			88 (+6%)
Rank	12/13		12/13		13/13		13/13
Avg	86		113		100		100

Wednesday, like Tuesday, was as weak as ever in these opening three years of the era, even though newbie The Amazing Race generated some interest. The lineup immediately got much better in 2004-05 because the string of failed 10/9c dramas gave way to CSI: NY. The introduction of Criminal Minds the following season made less of an immediate impact but more of a long-term one. The network would remain low at 8:00 all the way up to Survivor's move in 2010, but most of the scripted/reality options at least did somewhat better than 60 Minutes II (which ended in 2004-05).

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Thursday

	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2001-02	Survivor		CSI		The Agency		162
	197		204		86
Rank	4/13		5/13		13/13		5/13
2002-03	Survivor		CSI		Without a Trace		179 (+10%)
	187 (-5%)		228 (+12%)		121 (+41%)
Rank	5/13		3/13		5/13		4/13
2003-04	Survivor		CSI		Without a Trace		190 (+7%)
	199 (+7%)		233 (+2%)		139 (+15%)
Rank	3/13		2/13		3/13		2/13
Avg	171		174		117		154

Early in season one, Without a Trace struggled to post even half of CSI's ratings, but it was looked on more favorably because of its vast improvement on The Agency. It paid off, as WaT strengthened significantly in seasons two and three. The rise of the crime dramas helped to offset Survivor coming back to earth somewhat, leading to a stellar four-year run with a 175+ average for this night.

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Friday

	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2001-02	The Ellen Show	Danny	That's Life		48 Hours		49
	48	44	50		50
	46
Rank	13/13		12/13		11/13		13/13
2002-03	48 Hours		Hack		Robbery Homicide Division		52 (+6%)
	56 (+22%)		52 (+5%)		47 (-7%)
Rank	9/13		11/13		13/13		11/13
2003-04	Joan of Arcadia		JAG		The Handler		59 (+14%)
	65 (+15%)		59 (+13%)		53 (+14%)
Rank	8/13		9/13		10/13		10/13
Avg	67		62		66		65

CBS has done well on Friday for nearly a decade now, and for much of the Ghost Whisperer/Numb3rs heydays they were basically the only network that could get any kind of audience at all on the night. So it's pretty striking to see just how much of a mess they were for the first four years of the era on Friday. They seemed to be getting their act together with the introduction of Joan of Arcadia and the move of JAG in 2003-04, but both those shows fell apart in the second year of the combo. That put them right back at about the 2001-02 level until Numb3rs came along at midseason.

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Sunday

	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2001-02	The Education of Max Bickford		(movies)				79
	54		91		91
Rank	13/13		3/13		3/13		10/13
2002-03	Becker	Bram and Alice	(movies)				63 (-20%)
	55	54	67 (-26%)		67 (-26%)
	55 (+1%)
Rank	12/13		11/13		12/13		13/13
2003-04	Cold Case		(movies)				83 (+32%)
	86 (+57%)		81 (+21%)		81 (+21%)
Rank	11/13		7/13		6/13		9/13
Avg	99		83		81		88

Like the ABC Sunday movie night, the CBS version was thriving in 2001-02, and that was in spite of pretty terrible lead-ins at 8/7c. (But it is worth noting that the enormous made-for-TV documentary 9/11 (16.2 rating!) inflates that 2001-02 average by a full ten points.) Also like the ABC movie night, the CBS version dropped to a large degree in 2002-03. Unlike the ABC night, CBS stuck this one out into 2003-04. They saw a pretty impressive rebound, perhaps owing in part to Cold Case cleaning up the 8/7c hour, and that kept the movie night alive for another couple years. But by 2005-06 it had returned to 2002-03 levels, and that was it.