Sometimes football ruins everything.
Thursday’s fast-national Nielsen numbers are subject to major adjustment as high-rated NFL preseason games were all over the place in local markets, inflating broadcast networks’ nationally programmed ratings. That professional pigskin will be stripped out in final numbers, when we’ll likely see CBS standing alone again thanks to “Big Brother.”
For now, take the below rankings and data with a grain of salt — or whatever those weird black pebbles kicked up on astroturf are.
For the moment, CBS and Fox tie for first in ratings, both with a 1.3 rating in the advertiser-coveted 18-49 demographic. CBS is first in total viewers with an average of 5.4 million, according to preliminary numbers. Fox is third with 4.775 million overall audience members.
Last night, NBC was third in ratings with a 1.0 and second in viewers with 4.782 million.
ABC was fourth in ratings with a 0.8 and in viewers with 3.3 million.
Telemundo was fifth in ratings with a 0.7/3 and seventh in viewers with 1.6 million flat.
The CW was sixth in ratings with a 0.6/3 and fifth in viewers with 2.4 million.
Univision was seventh in ratings with a 0.5/2 and sixth in viewers with 1.604 million.
Don’t even worry about individual show ratings — it’s all a mess at the moment. Suffice it to say, “Big Brother” Thursday will be the No. 1 non-football broadcast of the night.