Last Week's WWE SmackDown Opener Brings Pre-Pandemic Ratings

Well, big for 2020.

by Andrew Pollard
Sasha Banks Bayley
WWE.com

While you can easily poke fun at WWE viewing figures from the past several years - with each year bringing record low after record low - 2020 has been particularly tough on the ratings front because, well, because 2020.

In a more positive turn for WWE, the opening segment of last week’s episode of SmackDown, as per Dave Meltzer, brought in an impressive 2.5 million viewers. That opening segment, of course, saw SmackDown Women’s Champion Sasha Banks successfully retaining her title against rival-turned-BFF-turned-rival Bayley. From there, the viewing figures dropped throughout the rest of the episode and massively tumbled by the time of the show’s main event.

To the credit of Banks and Bayley, that 2.5 million viewership is one of the highest figures brought in by any wrestling show or segment since the world went to the dogs earlier this year. In fact, that number is extremely close to what WWE was bringing in pre-global situation.

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SmackDown started hot, drew in eyes, and managed to maintain one of the most-watched first halves of WWE programming since March… just the second hour saw those numbers fall off a cliff as the show’s final hour saw over 15% of viewers tune out.

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Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is co-host of the Fearless in Devotion podcast, which won the Club Podcast of the Year gong at the 2024 FSA Awards.