Preacher [Lewis Jacobs /AMC]
While HBO’s lineup proved resilient in the face of competition from the NBA Finals, AMC’s Sunday programs took big hits.
According to national data posted by Showbuzz, Sunday’s “Preacher” drew a 0.43 adults 18-49 rating and 1.14 million total live+same-day viewers. The numbers markedly trail the 0.68 and 1.75 million posted by last week’s broadcast.
Sunday’s “Ride With Norman Reedus” also fell sharply. The episode, which was the series’ second installment, drew a soft 0.17 adults 18-49 rating and 0.47 million total viewers. Last week’s premiere was not considered a ratings winner, but it fared considerably better, drawing a 0.27 in the demo and reaching 0.75 million total viewers.
Insofar as HBO’s Sunday programs held up against ABC’s Game 7 NBA Finals coverage, it was certainly not inevitable that non-sports programming would fall Sunday night. On the other hand, it is impossible to ignore the possibility that the heavy competition did cause some shows to fall (after all, with the NBA Finals posting monster numbers and the HBO shows holding, there were only so many viewers to go around).
We will get a workable answer in the coming weeks. If both shows fully rebound, we can blame this week’s sharp declines on the competition. If not, we may want to blame the shows themselves for the declines.