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Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Fri.-Sun., Aug. 28-30) -- Cowboys ride "small" in the saddle

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom on Twitter
The Dallas Cowboys’ latest pre-season loss also underperformed in the D-FW Nielsen ratings despite being the annual “dress rehearsal” game in which QB Tony Romo made more than a cameo appearance.

The Minnesota Vikings’ 28-14 win at Jerry’s Palace, which ran until 9:05 p.m. on CBS11, averaged 439,362 total viewers and 151,387 in the advertiser-prized 18-to-49-year-old demographic.

Both are pre-season lows, particularly when compared to the Aug. 23rd loss at San Francisco, which had 634,634 total viewers and 271,227 in the 18-to-49 age range. On Saturday nights at least, many potential in-home viewers apparently went out instead. But Nielsen Media Research no longer even tries to measure sports bar viewing, executives told unclebarky.com at this summer’s Television Critics Association “press tour.”

The loss to the 49ers came on Sunday night while Game 1 of the pre-season, a late night defeat at San Diego, was on a Thursday. It averaged 536,998 total viewers and 245,996 in the 18-to-49 motherlode.

Whatever the night, the audience for Dallas and Minnesota was rather remarkably low. But the Cowboys still bludgeoned the competing Texas Rangers, who are very much in post-season contention and currently on a four-game winning streak.

Saturday night’s competing Rangers’ home win against Baltimore drew 97,636 total viewers on Fox Sports Southwest and 37,846 in the 18-to-49 realm. That at least bettered the Seattle Seahawks-San Diego Chargers pre-season game, which was exiled to CBS11’s sister station, TXA21. That one had 41,844 total viewers and 25,230 of the 18-to-49 persuasion in competition with both the Cowboys and the Rangers.

The Rangers’ most-watched weekend game was Sunday afternoon’s 6-0 shutout of Baltimore, with pitcher Derek Holland going the distance. It pulled in 139,480 total viewers on FSS, with 44,153 in the 18-to-49 measurement.

On Sunday night, AMC’s second episode of Fear the Walking Dead ranked as prime-time’s biggest draw in both ratings barometers. It had 209,220 total viewers in the 8 p.m. hour, with a staggering 157,690 in the 18-to-49 age range.

NBC’s Sunday Night Football pre-season game between the Oakland Raiders and Arizona Cardinals averaged 188,298 total viewers, with 69,384 of them in the 18-to-49 demographic.

The NFL scored on Friday night, with CBS’ Lions-Jaguars pre-season snarl drawing the most total prime-time viewers (132,506) while also leading among 18-to-49-year-olds (59,922).

Here are Friday’s local news derby results.

TEGNA8 had the most total viewers at 10 p.m. while CBS11 ran first with 25-to-54-year-olds (main advertiser target audience for news programming).

Fox4 notched two more wins at 6 a.m.

NBC5 and CBS11 shared the 6 p.m. top spot in total viewers, with TEGNA8 just a sliver behind. Fox4 and TEGNA8 tied for first among 25-to-54-year-olds.

Fox4 and NBC5 tied for the most total viewers at 5 p.m. The 25-to-54 golds also went to Fox4 and the Peacock, with TEGNA again finishing just a hair back.

Email comments or questions to: unclebarky@verizon.net