7 Reasons WWE Moving Smackdown Back To Thursdays Is Smart

3. More People Watch Television On Thursdays

This one in pretty simple: more people watch television on a Thursday night than a Friday night. There are numbers to back that up that go back decades. The worst two nights to air a television show are Fridays and Saturdays. On the opposite end of that, Thursday is obviously one of the better nights. In the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s, NBC was known for loading up Thursdays with their big comedy shows like Cheers, The Cosby Show, Seinfeld and Friends. They ended up getting passed by CBS when those shows were done, but for a while it was NBC that dominated with their "must see TV" lineup. A negative aspect about going to Thursdays is that the competition is much stronger. From September through December, they will have Thursday night NFL games to contend with. That's something WWE has been used to ever since they started doing Raw in 1993. With Raw, the effect is usually that 10% less people watch Raw "live" when it's against football. There are also a number of popular TV shows on Thursday nights that draw really well, so the competition is tougher. However, more eyeballs watching TV is better for Smackdown. There are enough numbers out there that have proven that Smackdown going on Thursday is going to lead to more total viewers. That's why Syfy wants WWE to move it to Thursday and why WWE should welcome it because it will make Smackdown a higher priority for viewers. It's the right move to put Smackdown on Thursdays. In the end, WWE will get more viewers and if the product is better because of it then the ultimate winners based on the move are the fans.