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Fox wins sweeps
with ABC second

World Series boosts network to a 3.5 average

By Toni Fitzgerald
Dec 1, 2009

ABC had just enough juice to hold off CBS for second place during the November sweeps, though neither network could catch up to a baseball-fueled Fox.

As expected, Fox captured its first-ever November sweeps victory, ending ABC's run of four consecutive wins.

Fox averaged a 3.5 adults 18-49 rating and 9 share for the four-week period used by local stations to set rates for advertisers. It was up 17 percent over last year and was one of just two broadcasters to see gains, the other being Telefutura.

The six-game World Series provided the winning edge for Fox, which built a huge lead off of baseball and then hung on the rest of the month.

ABC finished second with a 3.1/9, according to Nielsen data, about half of which is live-plus-seven-day DVR viewership. That was off 11 percent from last year, though the network points out that, excluding the World Series, it would have claimed victory.

CBS placed third at 3.0/8, down 12 percent from last year. ABC and CBS had been close all sweeps, but last week's season finale of ABC's "Dancing with the Stars" helped lift the network to second.

NBC placed a distant fourth at 2.6/7, off 16 percent from last year. Actually that wasn't too bad a performance considering the network aired only three "Sunday Night Football" games in the period and took a big hit at 10 p.m., where "The Jay Leno Show" is down from last year's scripted content.

Univision finished fifth with a 1.4/4, but that was off 13 percent from last year, when telenovelas "Cuidado con el Angel" and "Fuego en la Sangre" were doing a bit better than the current 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. timeslot occupants.

The CW finished sixth with a 1.1/3, even to last year. The network benefited from favorable year-to-year comparisons. Last year at this time its Sunday lineup was dragging down its average; this year the network is no longer programming on Sundays.

Telemundo just edged Telefutura for seventh place, averaging a 0.5/1 to the latter's 0.4/1, though Telemundo was even and Telefutura was up 33 percent for its best-ever November sweeps. Its growth was driven by "Yo Soy Betty, La Fea" (the original "Ugly Betty") and "Vecinos," both of which grew by triple-digit percentages over last year.

Overall PUT levels were down 6 percent this November, after a huge amount of television tune-in last year, when the hotly contested presidential election fell in the sweeps period.

Toni Fitzgerald is a staff writer for Media Life.	© 2010 Media Life Magazine

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