The Breakdown: CBS Sunday in 2017-18 (60 Minutes, NCIS: Los Angeles, Madam Secretary and more!)

It's time for a journey through the CBS Sunday schedule in 2017-18...


fall

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2016-17	60 Minutes	NCIS: Los Angeles		NCIS: Los Angeles	Madam Secretary	Elementary		Elementary	108
	2016-17	213	120		122	81	56			56	108
	2016-17										213	120	122	81	56	56	108
	2016-17	167		167	102					102	56	56	108
2017-18	60 Minutes	Wisdom of the Crowd		Wisdom of the Crowd	NCIS: Los Angeles		NCIS: Los Angeles	Madam Secretary	103 (-5%)
	2017-18	198 (-7%)	87 (-28%)		95 (-22%)	87 (+8%)		90 (+62%)		61 (+10%)	102.962161696188
	2017-18										197.571728726017	86.5480174203677	95.0732964862655	86.9555697758463	90.3006532637869	61.3237045048434	102.962161696188
	2017-18	142 (-15%)		142.059873073193	91 (-10%)		91 (-10%)	76 (+36%)		76 (+36%)	102.962161696188
VsAvg	+23%		0.2315505407653	+5%		0.0465122426982177	-4%		-0.0360116692503352	+10%
Rank	3/17		3/17	8/17		8/17	11/17		11/17	6/17

CBS slid its NCIS: Los Angeles / Madam Secretary duo to an hour later, opening up the 8/7c hour for newbie Wisdom of the Crowd. While NCIS: LA and Madam both improved their timeslots all year long, that was more than cancelled out by the losses at 8/7c.

winter

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2016-17	NCIS: Los Angeles		NCIS: Los Angeles	Madam Secretary		Madam Secretary	Elementary		Elementary	73
	2016-17	100		100	67		67	52			52	73
2017-18	Wisdom of the Crowd		Wisdom of the Crowd	NCIS: Los Angeles		NCIS: Los Angeles	Madam Secretary		Madam Secretary	70 (-3%)
	2017-18	66 (-34%)		66.1961310578822	87 (+30%)		87 (+30%)	58 (+12%)			58 (+12%)	70.3555814385307
VsAvg	-24%		-0.237356275452623	+2%		0.0164075614766386	-26%		-0.262258687104632	-16%
Rank	16/17		16/17	7/17		7/17	16/17		16/17	14/17

When there was no NFL to help out, Wisdom of the Crowd was pretty much stuck at 0.7's, even in early January.

spring

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2016-17	60 Minutes	NCIS: Los Angeles	Madam Secretary		Madam Secretary	Elementary		Elementary	74
	2016-17	133	94	63		63	47			47	74
	2016-17										133	94	63	63	47	47	74
	2016-17	113				113				63	63	47	47	74
2017-18	Instinct		Instinct	NCIS: Los Angeles		NCIS: Los Angeles	Madam Secretary		Madam Secretary	68 (-9%)
	2017-18	74 (-35%)		74.0461962803195	77 (+22%)		77 (+22%)	52 (+12%)			52 (+12%)	67.7065071141181
VsAvg	-15%		-0.147631641788308	-6%		-0.0597095647872905	-27%		-0.272171093552404	-15%
Rank	12/17		12/17	10/17		10/17	15/17		15/17	14/17

And a second 8/7c newbie, Instinct, didn't really move the needle in the spring either. The declines were a little less vs. the year-ago NCIS: LA, but the renewal still seemed like a reach.

Rating the Ratings

Name	Lo	Avg	Hi	y2y	Plus	Label	Plusy2y	Results
60 Minutes	0.7	1.33	4.0	-14%	122	solid	-4%	detail
Instinct	0.3	0.71	1.3		65	flop		detail
Wisdom of the Crowd	0.7	0.91	1.3		83	marginal		detail
NCIS: Los Angeles*	0.7	0.91	1.3	-31%	83	marginal	-23%	detail
Madam Secretary	0.5	0.62	0.8	-29%	57	flop	-21%	detail

60 Minutes: This was a surprisingly bad year for the NFL (Sunday Night Football and Thursday Night Football were down in Plus, which never happens), and that translated to the football-dependent 60 Minutes as well. It's a bit crazy that it could be down in Plus while having its strongest episode of the entire A18-49+ era (the Stormy Daniels interview). Grade: C+.

Wisdom of the Crowd: I always kinda thought this show was not as big a flop as the True formula (and thus Renewology) were saying, but all of its y2y comparisons vs. NCIS: LA are shockingly horrible. Grade: D-.

Instinct: This was a "bad" renewal, though at least according to True it was still at least a notch stronger than Wisdom of the Crowd. I'm definitely curious as to why it was renewed and what CBS will do with it next year, but I would expect the summer to be involved. Grade: D+.

NCIS: Los Angeles: Moving an hour later on CBS Sunday is even tougher than moving an hour later on most other nights, because it's an hour farther away from the big sports lead-ins, and everything CBS gave NCIS: LA as a lead-in this year did not work. I still think LA dropped a couple notches more than it "should" have, but not nearly as much in a True sense as the above trend indicates. Grade: C+.

Madam Secretary: I was kind of pleasantly surprised that this show was able to improve upon Elementary at 10/9c, and that thread was consistent through all three parts of the season. It's still a -21% year-to-year in Plus, but just a tiny decline from last year according to True Plus. Grade: B-.

The names in this last table link to the shows' War of 18-49 pages. Links with an asterisk(*) have been updated with the new info. Updates to younger shows will come later in the summer.

Here's the now updated Schedules Plus for CBS Sunday.