WWE Raw And Smackdown Both Post Ratings Losses

Following a Payback Pay-Per-View that was technically Raw exclusive but saw heavy involvement from Smackdown, both shows should have posted strong numbers. Instead, not only were both Raw and Smackdown down from last week in terms of viewership, but both shows drew their lowest ratings in a while.

The news was worse for Raw, which drew 2.87 million viewers off hours of 2.924 million, 3.039 million, and 2.649 million. Not only was this number - a 4.5% drop from last week's 3.007 million - the lowest of the year, but it's also the lowest non-holiday, non-football-season number posted in the past 20 years. The show faced competition from the NBA playoffs, but also dropped sharply with a closing hour that hosted a widely praised triple-threat match to determine a contender for the Intercontinental Title.

Smackdown also drew its lowest number of the year, dipping to 2.3 million viewers. This was a 7.74% drop from last week's 2.493 millions viewers which, at the time, was the lowest-rated edition of the show in 2017. Like Raw, it suffered stiff competition in the form of the NBA playoffs.