After a slew of poor performing episodes of Monday Night Raw throughout December, the show has steadily climbed back from its pit of misery in 2019. But no matter what was going on from a storyline perspective, Monday’s show was destined to do big numbers; at the very least in the the first hour, after Roman Reigns was announced for the show.
During that first hour, Reigns proclaimed he is in remission, meaning the Big Dog is back just in time for the road to WrestleMania. Reigns’ return to WWE resulted in the highest-rated and highest-viewed episode since August 20, 2018, according to 411Mania. Monday’s show had a 1.02 rating in the 18-49 demographic and 2.922 million viewers.
Reigns was met with a raucous response live on Raw, and obviously the rest of the WWE audience was interested enough to tune in. After his announcement to open the show, the rating dropped from 1.09 to 1.04 and eventually 0.92.
Whether this number remains a sustainable jump in viewership remains to be seen. WWE planted the seeds for a Shield reunion Monday night, with Reigns and Seth Rollins saving Dean Ambrose from a beatdown. Pair that with Becky Lynch’s sporadic appearances on Raw and Batista’s apparent return, and you’d imagine there would be a rise in interest over the next few months ahead of ‘Mania.
