The combination of the show’s ThunderDome debut and being the day after SummerSlam led Raw to its best numbers in more than four months, averaging 2.03 million viewers and a 0.67 rating in 18-49.

The numbers were up 23 percent in viewers but more importantly 40 percent in 18-49, so they did have a younger audience checking them out and about 250,000 in the 18-49 demo that haven’t been watching Raw in the past several months. It was mostly 35-49 gains since the 18-34 increase was 18 percent.

The first to third hour drop of 11 percent is slightly better than most weeks, but in the normal level, so it wasn’t people checking out new technology and then leaving. It was a lot of new curious viewers who mostly stayed, which is a good sign.

The key to this isn’t that the numbers for the day after SummerSlam were good, but they went against heavy competition with the Republican National Convention which averaged 6.54 million viewers on FOX News alone, as well as big numbers on other cable stations. Plus there was NBA playoffs on TNT (2.97 million viewers and 1.34 in 18-49 for the late game; 2.05 million and 0.66 for the early game).

It was Raw’s best numbers since the day after WrestleMania did 2.10 million viewers.

Raw was sixth in 18-49 for the night and 20th overall.

As compared with last year, the show was down 20 percent overall, 16 percent in 18-49, and 39 percent in 18-34.

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As far as keeping the audience for three hours, women 18-49 dropped 12 percent from the first to third hour, men 18-49 dropped 14 percent, teenage girls dropped 28 percent and teenage boys dropped 18 percent, while 50+ dropped 11 percent.

The three hours were:

8 p.m. 2.14 million viewers
9 p.m. 2.05 million viewers
10 p.m. 1.90 million viewers