Due to the nature of live sports programming the ratings for NBC (Sunday Night Football) and Fox (Football overrun, Baseball ALCS Game 6) are approximate and subject to significant revisions in the final numbers. See below for more information on these Fast Affiliate Ratings.
| Scoreboard |  |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Adults 18-49: Rating/Share | 5.5/14 | 4.2/11 | 3.3/8 | 2.2/6 | 0.8/2 |
| Adults 18-34: Rating/Share | 4.8/14 | 3.5/10 | 2.6/8 | 1.3/4 | 0.8/2 |
| Total Viewers (million) | 15.770 | 10.977 | 10.690 | 9.978 | 2.127 |
In the equivalent of a perfect sports ratings storm for Fox, a close NFL game overran into primetime right up to the start of the Yankees clinching win in the ALCS Game 6 and Fox pushed NBC off the Sunday night ratings pedestal for the first time this season.
While Fox would always like seven games series, they have to be pleased with the results last night. The ALCS Game 6 ran from 8:17pm-12:03pm ET and posted a 5.2 rating among Adults 18-49. with 15.5 million total viewers. If the World Series goes 6 or 7 games they might even have a chance of topping the fall broadcast primetime ratings averages. Would that be the first time ever? I'll have to do some checking.
In a related topic, How High Could World Series Ratings Go This Year?
Under the sports onslaught, ABC's women focused lineup held steady vs. last week, although America's Funniest Home Videos was up 21% to a 2.3 adults 18-49 rating.
Against the Yankees/Angels ALCS Game 6, Sunday Night Football between the Giants and Cardinals was down every half hour vs. last week's Bears v. Falcons game.
Without a football overrun, women's shows or sports CBS' line up just got trampled. When you read in the credulous TV media about how strong 60 Minutes still is, do note last night's weak results without a CBS NFL overrun. 60 Minutes piles up gaudy numbers when it gets bumped by football, but otherwise is a ratings weakling.
Fans of Three Rivers and Cold Case will have to change their ratings whines this week from "Football made our show start late!" to "Damn Yankees!". It's good to know there are always plenty of excuses to go around for bad ratings.
| Time | Net | Show | 18-49 Rating | 18-49 Share | Viewers Live+SD (million) |
| 7:00 | FOX | Football Overrun | 8.3 | 24 | 22.317 |
| CBS | 60 Minutes | 2.0 | 6 | 11.467 | |
| ABC | America's Funniest Home Videos | 2.0 | 6 | 7.652 | |
| NBC | Football Night In America | 1.7 | 5 | 4.884 | |
| 7:30 | FOX | Football Overrun/ The OT | 7.3 | 20 | 19.787 |
| CBS | 60 Minutes | 2.2 | 6 | 12.989 | |
| ABC | America's Funniest Home Videos | 2.6 | 7 | 9.132 | |
| NBC | Football Night In America | 2.3 | 6 | 6.203 | |
| 8:00 | FOX | The OT/Baseball Pregame | 5.3 | 14 | 15.536 |
| NBC | Football Night In America | 3.8 | 10 | 10.45 | |
| CBS | Amazing Race | 3.2 | 8 | 11.181 | |
| ABC | Extreme Makeover: Home Edition | 2.8 | 7 | 10.062 | |
| 8:30 | FOX | Baseball ALCS Game 6, Yankees v. Angels | 5.3 | 13 | 15.999 |
| NBC | Sunday Night Football, Cardinals v. Giants | 5.3 | 13 | 13.576 | |
| CBS | Amazing Race | 3.3 | 8 | 10.775 | |
| ABC | Extreme Makeover: Home Edition | 3.1 | 8 | 11.132 | |
| 9:00 | NBC | Sunday Night Football, Cardinals v. Giants | 5.5 | 13 | 14.303 |
| FOX | Baseball ALCS Game 6, Yankees v. Angels | 4.9 | 11 | 14.194 | |
| ABC | Desperate Housewives | 4.5 | 11 | 13.826 | |
| CBS | Three Rivers | 1.9 | 4 | 8.064 | |
| 9:30 | NBC | Sunday Night Football, Cardinals v. Giants | 5.4 | 13 | 13.923 |
| ABC | Desperate Housewives | 4.6 | 11 | 13.800 | |
| FOX | Baseball ALCS Game 6, Yankees v. Angels | 4.6 | 11 | 13.497 | |
| CBS | Three Rivers | 1.6 | 4 | 7.733 | |
| 10:00 | NBC | Sunday Night Football, Cardinals v. Giants | 4.7 | 12 | 11.881 |
| FOX | Baseball ALCS Game 6, Yankees v. Angels | 4.6 | 12 | 13.169 | |
| ABC | Brothers & Sisters | 3.5 | 9 | 10.422 | |
| CBS | Cold Case | 1.6 | 4 | 8.812 | |
| 10:30 | NBC | Sunday Night Football, Cardinals v. Giants | 5.0 | 13 | 12.598 |
| FOX | Baseball ALCS Game 6, Yankees v. Angels | 4.1 | 11 | 11.668 | |
| ABC | Brothers & Sisters | 3.1 | 8 | 9.492 | |
| CBS | Cold Case | 1.8 | 5 | 8.801 |
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You can see TV ratings from other recent Overnight ratings reports here.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
Definitions:
Fast Affiliate Ratings: These first national ratings, including demographics, are available at approximately 11 AM (ET) the day after telecast, and are released to subscribing customers daily. These data, from the National People Meter sample, are strictly time-period information, based on the normal broadcast network feed, and include all programming on the affiliated stations, sometimes including network programming, sometimes not. The figures may include stations that did not air the entire network feed, as well as local news breaks or cutaways for local coverage or other programming. Fast Affiliate ratings are not as useful for live programs and are likely to differ significantly from the final results, because the data reflect normal broadcast feed patterns. For example, with a World Series game, Fast Affiliate Ratings would include whatever aired from 8-11PM on affiliates in the Pacific Time Zone, following the live football game, but not game coverage that begins at 5PM PT. The same would be true of Presidential debates as well as live award shows and breaking news reports.
Rating: Estimated percentage of the universe of TV households (or other specified group) tuned to a program in the average minute. Ratings are expressed as a percent.
Share (of Audience): The percent of households (or persons) using television who are tuned to a specific program, station or network in a specific area at a specific time. (See also, Rating, which represents tuning or viewing as a percent of the entire population being measured.)
Time Shifted Viewing – Program ratings for national sources are produced in three streams of data – Live, Live+Same Day (Live+SD) and Live+7 Day. Time shifted figures account for incremental viewing that takes place with DVRs which are currently in approximately 24.4% of all U.S. TV households. Live+Same Day (Live+SD) include viewing during the same broadcast day as the original telecast, with a cut-off of 3:00AM local time when meters transmit daily viewing to Nielsen for processing. Live+7 Day ratings include incremental viewing that takes place during the 7 days following a telecast.
For more information see Numbers 101 and Numbers 102.
Please CBS cancel Three Rivers this is a killer show… I’m sad for Cold Case
TAR is the only thing keeping CBS Sunday’s afloat without football overruns. At least it’s still doing decent, though I certainly wouldn’t mind it on Wednesdays at 8, replacing the weak comedy block and anchoring the stronger Wednesday shows.
Very good performance for The Amazing Race, holding up pretty well against intense competition
I prefer TAR to remain on Sundays, when it was on Tuesday/Wednesday there were news on cancellation I remember and allegedly their Emmy wins save them from cancellation. When they moved to Sundays, the show finally found a stable audience
Brothers and Sisters up a tick on last week. Not bad considering Housewives pretty much held steady. It’s a solid, if not spectacular, Sunday night for ABC
Desperate Housewives performed really well last night, despite TWO sport programs. I think it improved from last week. Same thing can be said for Brothers and Sisters.
Sorry, but while good fortune for FOX, nowhere close to a perfect ratings storm. Now, if the Sunday Night Football game would’ve been a blowout contest between Tampa Bay and Kansas City, instead of a close contest between San Diego and the NEW YORK football GIANTS…
Woooowww it’s just amazing the way Desperate Housewives deal against Footbal and now with Baseball at the same time, it was even higher than last week in viewers I think, right?
What’s wrong with 60 Minutes ratings??
i dont see a 5.2 18-49 avg for baseball by those #s ?
Was CBS running a couple minutes behind? That 1.9 to 1.6 of TR and then 1.6 to 1.8 of CC sure looks like it.
B&S up slightly despite DH being static. Should we put B&S into the column of shows slowly coming back towards last year’s numbers (e.g. SVU)?
Sean, a 2.1 adults 18-49 rating is weak, AFHV got a 2.3.
Yet the TV press will look at 60 Minutes seasonal averages (which are pumped by NFL overruns) and declare it to still be strong. It’s the NFL that;s still strong!
I don’t think there going to cancel Three Rivers yet they just finish taping 2 more episodes
romo, that 5.2 rating was for the entire game (8:17pm-12:03pm) the ratings table only contains the primetime portion. While the number did come directly from our ratings source, mistakes are always possible.
Tom, no information that CBS was in an overrun, I think all their games finished on time.
Good hold for the desperate housewives and the brothers and sisters! I wish ABC would have schedulded Ugly Betty as a lead-in to Desperate housewives… they are killing the show on Fridays
There were a couple of markets that only got a late CBS game; one of those went 2 min over and one 9 min.
I’m surprised COLD CASE didn’t perk up a little more after THREE RIVERS, but it seems once those viewers tune out after AMAZING RACE, they don’t come back. I still think CBS will return COLD CASE to its old timeslot sooner rather than later, but it’ll be interesting to see if any old viewers return as well — viewer patterns, once broken, aren’t always easily restored. Anyway, CBS sure can’t go on much longer without doing SOMETHING about Sunday night.
Wow at 9PM, DH, SNF and ALCS all got above 14 million.
Desperate Housewives appeals to women, while sports appeal mainly to men. this is why DH is on when it is, as it will remain consistent against sports.