The NFL helped Fox reign supreme on Thursday night, with a showdown between the Philadelphia Eagles and Cleveland Browns that scored the network a Nielsen ratings touchdown. The preseason game’s numbers topped everything else on the Big 4 for the evening, including ABC’s “The Story of the Royals,” NBC’s “Trial & Error” finale and CBS’s hit “Big Brother.”
Though the former two programs fumbled more than the latter one when stacked against football.
Fox was first in ratings with a 1.7 rating/8 share in the advertiser-coveted 18-49 demographic and in total viewers with an average of 6.1 million, according to preliminary numbers, filling its entire primetime block with the game. However, due to the nature of live sports, those fast-national numbers are subject to change.
CBS was second in ratings with a 1.0/5 and in viewers with 4.6 million. Between reruns, “Big Brother” at 8 p.m. scored a 1.6/7 and 5.5 million viewers.
ABC, NBC and Telemundo tied for third in ratings with a 0.5/2 for the first two and a 0.5/3 for Telemundo.
ABC was third in viewers with 3.8 million. “The Gong Show” at 8 received a 0.5/2 and 2.9 million viewers. From 9-11, “The Story of the Royals” got a 0.5/2 and 4.2 million viewers.
NBC was fourth in viewers with 2.3 million. Sandwiched between repeats at 9, the night’s first episode of “Trial & Error” sttled for a 0.4/2 and 2 million viewers. The finale at 9:30 managed a 0.4/2 and 1.7 million viewers.
Telemundo was fifth in viewers with 1.34 million
Univision was sixth in ratings with a 0.4/2 and in viewers with 1.28 million.
The CW was seventh in ratings with a 0.2/1 and in viewers with 727,000, airing only encores for the evening.