WWE and SyFy today announced that Smackdown will be moving to Thursday nights beginning January 15 at 8PM EST.
The move ends months of speculation of what was going to happen with Smackdown. First, WWE production trucks changed their decals of the show to advertise the new Thursday move but then once SyFy officially released its Fall schedule, Smackdown was left in its Friday time slot.
Last month SyFy announced that their new series, based on the movie 12 Monkeys, was going to start airing on Friday nights in Smackdown’s time slot starting mid January 2015, suggesting that this time Smackdown was finally moving to its original time slot.
“Quite simply, more young men watch television on Thursday night than on Fridays,” said Michael Engleman, Executive Vice President, Marketing, Digital and Global Brand Strategy, Syfy. “Among Men 18-49, PUTS are 15 percent higher compared to Fridays, expanding the potential audience for SmackDown. Since the majority of broadcast programming skews female, we’re also using Thursday nights to counter program.”
Smackdown moved to the Friday night “death slot” in Fall 2005 after six years airing on Thursdays.
