Will Monday's WWE RAW Be The Lowest-Rated Ever? Here Are Some Predictions
WWE could make history on Monday night — though not the kind of history they'd like to be making.
Sports statistician Danny Tuccitto has forecasted this Monday's RAW television rating will be 1.58. That would fall just short of the all-time low of 1.5, recorded on December 23, 1996. For what it's worth, that episode was taped, not live. The lowest-rated live episode of RAW was the very next week, December 30, 1996, which got a 1.6.
Tuccitto's forecast model takes into account a number of factors. "[It's] based on a moving average that's regressed towards the mean, with time-adjusted effects from variables in these general groups: post-PPV, [competition from other live] sports, holidays, [whether RAW is] live or taped, and special episodes," he says.
Over the past year, his model typically provides a prediction within around 0.10 of the actual rating.
@adecorativedrop late on this (or early actually?), but final 7/4 forecast: 1.58 w/ 98% chance of sub-2.0.
? Danny Tuccitto (@IR_DannyT) July 1, 2016
This coming Monday's RAW is on Independence Day. RAW's rating is typically lower than usual when it airs on a holiday, especially one like the Fourth of July, when viewers might forego watching WWE to go out and watch fireworks displays.
How hard has the rating fell when the Fourth of the July was on a Monday in previous years? In 2005, RAW averaged a 4.00 for the month of June, then did a 2.60 on July 4 that year: a 35 percent drop. In 2011, the average for June was 3.12, and the July 4 rating was 2.40: a 23 percent drop.
RAW averaged a 2.24 rating for the month of June this year. A 35 percent drop from that average would mean a 1.46 rating. A 23 percent drop would mean a 1.72. Or if the drop-off continues to decline as it did from 2005 to 2011, and it drops just 15 percent, the rating would be 1.90.
If not the lowest-rated RAW of all-time, in all likelihood, this will be the program's first sub-2.0 rating since a 1.9 rating on March 3, 1997: a time when RAW was going head-to-head with WCW Nitro, so the total wrestling audience was much higher.
The rating will probably come out on Wednesday, as opposed to Tuesday (when it usually comes out), due to the holiday.