‘The Simpsons’ Season 32 Premiere Doubles Last Fall’s Debut in TV Ratings Thanks to NFL Lead-In

Sunday’s Season 32 premiere of “The Simpsons” was up 122% in TV ratings from the Fox animated series’ start last fall thanks to an NFL lead-in, according to initial Nielsen data. The afternoon game, which was a showdown between the Dallas Cowboys and Seattle Seahawks for the majority of markets, ended at 8 p.m. ET, cutting out an episode of post-game show “The OT” and going right into “The Simpsons” 32nd season opener, which scored a 2.0 rating in the key adults 18-49 demographic. Last year, the long-running cartoon premiered Sept. 29, without an NFL lead-in to a 0.9 rating, to show you just how much that NFL lead-in really helps, a week later, the second episode of Season 31 earned a 2.1 rating with spillover from a game. Still, “Sunday Night Football” on NBC was steady with last week’s game — which was up against the Emmys on ABC — and came in as primetime’s highest-rated show. Due to the nature of live sports, the below numbers for NBC and Fox are subject to significant adjustment when final data comes in later today. NBC was first in ratings with a 3.5 rating/19 share in the advertiser-coveted 18-49 demographic and in total viewers with an average of 12.2 million, according to preliminary numbers. Those numbers were put up by the “Sunday Night Football” game between the Green Bay Packers and New Orleans Saints and its pregame show. Fox was second in ratings with a 2.3/12 and in viewers with 7 million. At 7, an NFL overrun got a 4.7/26 and 15.3 million viewers. At 8 p.m., “The Simpsons” Season 32 premiere scored the above-mentioned 2.0 rating, plus an 11 share and 5.5 million viewers. “Bless the Harts” Season 2 premiered at 8:30 p.m. to a 0.8/4 and 2.2 million viewers. “Bob’s Burgers” opened its 11th season at 9 to a 0.7/3 and 1.8 million viewers. At 9:30 p.m., “Family Guy” closed the night of “Animation Domination” debuts with a 0.7/3 and 1.7 million viewers for its Season 19 premiere. CBS was third in ratings with a 0.6/3 and in viewers with 3.7 million. At 7 p.m., “60 Minutes” had a 0.7/4 and 7.3 million viewers. At 8 p.m., “Big Brother” received a 0.9/5 and 4.1 million viewers. “Love Island” at 9 p.m. settled for a 0.4/2 and 1.8 million viewers. A repeat followed. ABC was fourth in ratings with a 0.3/2 and in viewers with 2 million. Following a rerun, the ABC News special “Sellebrity: The Go-To Girls” at 8 p.m. had a 0.3/1 and 1.9 million viewers. An encore closed the night. Univision and Telemundo tied for fifth in ratings, each with a 0.2/1. Telemundo was fifth in viewers with 860,000 and Univision was sixth with 782,000. The CW was seventh in ratings with a 0.1/0 and in viewers with 471,000. Night 1 of 2020’s “iHeartRadio Music Festival” aired from 8-10 p.m.