Following the news that Raw had done its lowest ratings of the modern era, there was a degree of expectation that SmackDown might be able to defeat it.
It could not.
Despite the promise of a payoff to the Lana-Milwaukee storyline and a tease of a big surprise from Becky Lynch, the show pulled its fourth lowest rating since the brand split.
The only episodes that have done worse are the show that went head-to-head with the election in 2016, a show that went against the NBA finals in 2017 and the July 3 holiday weekend show from earlier this year.
SmackDown pulled 2.095 million viewers, retaining 92% of Raw’s audience but only finishing in 10th place on cable for the night.
The number is down almost 10% for the equivalent show last year, which did 2.323 million viewers.
SmackDown in general is down year over year at around this percentage.
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