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What's the story?
RAW has been facing some stiff competition in recent weeks and as a result has not been scoring the big numbers. Unfortunately for the red brand, it could only garner 2.396 million viewers, one of the lowest scores in the brand's history.
On the other hand, this was the first time in well over a year, that SmackDown Live scored a better number than RAW did. I thank NoDQ for the statistics.
In case you didn't know...
SmackDown marked its 1000th episode with some special appearances from the men and women who helped build the brand. Some of the notable superstars that returned were The Undertaker, Evolution, Edge, Teddy Long and Vickie Guerrero.
The show was a huge hit on social media as well and had the whole wrestling fraternity talking. As a result, a lot more eyes were on the product than usual. Not surprisingly then, SmackDown Live outdid RAW when it came to viewership scores.
The heart of the matter
Boosted significantly by the big returns and the overall historic significance of the show, SmackDown 1000 drew in 2.545 million viewers. This is a significant number because it is the first time SmackDown Live beat RAW since the early days of the WWE brand split.
Moreover, what is a heartening fact for WWE is that Batista's return video did over 3 million views on YouTube in a day. This is a very solid figure and proves that the WWE Universe is still very much invested in 'The Animal'. One of the most discussed aspects of this episode was the mini-confrontation between Batista and his stablemate, Triple H.
What's next?
As we go back to regular SmackDown Live programming one wonders if WWE will be able to keep these scores up. RAW should be able to bounce back heading into the Survivor Series pay-per-view. A lot could happen in weeks to follow.
Which show did you enjoy more this week, folks? Let us know in the comments.
