We saw some pretty brutal numbers in viewership for WWE’s SmackDown Live in late-May and early-June, but it looks like this past Sunday’s Money In The Bank may have helped boost those as we continue heading in the right direction. Last night’s episode, which was headlined by a Number One Contender’s Gauntlet Match with the winner getting a shot at AJ Styles’ WWE Championship at Extreme Rules. For the second straight week, we saw a jump up for the blue brand, going from last week’s 2.183 up to a 2.315, an increase of roughly 6%.

It was also more good news in the demographic department for SmackDown Live, once again coming in at number one in Cable’s Top 150 Rankings for the 18-49 segment of the audience. There was no real competition, as we reported with our RAW viewership due to the NHL, NBA and NFL all being in the offseason. Coming in at numbers two through four were Below Deck Mediterranean, Chrisley Knows Best (at 3 and 5) and four was Deadliest Catch.

Here’s the last four weeks of ratings for SmackDown Live:

• May 28th: 2.195
• June 5th: 2.138
• June 12th: 2.183
• June 19th: 2.315

Source: Showbuzz Daily

EA’s Take: Things are starting to make more sense now after some really strange weeks for the blue brand. I’ve always been of the opinion that SmackDown Live has consistently been better than RAW, but it doesn’t always show in the ratings. To reiterate my previous prediction, I still believe we’ll see this continue to trend upwards as we get towards SummerSlam in August now that we’re nearly out of the annual low period. Add on top of that the only other sport on television right now is MLB, which has had dying interest in the last number of years and that’s a recipe for success.

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