Sweeps Stakes

CBS upstages ABC

For the past few seasons, television insiders have tended to talk mostly about two networks--front-running ABC and third-place NBC. Last week all that changed. After the 1979-80 season's first Nielsen sweeps, second-place CBS quietly rose to the top of the ratings. It was the first time since January 1976 that ABC had not won the network numbers game.

Though ABC is still likely to be the ratings leader for the season as a whole, its November loss to CBS is the strongest indication yet that its era of sovereignty is over. Explains Joel Segal, a senior vice president at the Ted Bates agency: "Minus the World Series and 1978 election night, ABC is down 10%, CBS up 5% and NBC up 2%, compared with last year. This is the beginning of a three-way horse race." Since a single rating point is worth $40 million to $50 million in advertising revenue to a network, this horse race is not being run merely for a trophy.

ABC's decline is largely a result of corporate overconfidence. In an effort to bolster the few weak spots on its schedule this fall, ABC broke one of TV's sacrosanct laws: it moved winning shows to new time periods. Such traditional Top Ten hits as Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley and Mork & Mindy have all suffered from being shifted. Some have at times fallen to the bottom half of the Nielsen chart. Made-for-TV movies and miniseries, usually a strength for ABC, have also proved poor draws this season.

The key to CBS'S resurgence is its schedule on Sunday, the night when the greatest number of TV sets are in use. With the powerhouse 60 Minutes as a lead-in, such tired CBS sitcoms as Archie Bunker's Place, One Day at a Time, Alice and The Jeffersons are consistently near the top of the Nielsens. Trapper John, M.D., a dim hospital drama, is the season's biggest new hit, mainly because it caps CBS's winning Sunday lineup. CBS has shown other new signs of life: modestly successful shows like Dallas, WKRP in Cincinnati and The Dukes of Hazzard have started to build big audiences.

NBC has not come up with any runaway hits so far this season, but Fred Silverman's troubled network cannot be counted out. Its winter replacement shows include United States, by the creator of M*A*S*H, and a new dramatic series, Skag, starring Karl Maiden. This summer NBC has the bonanza of the Olympic Games. Says Advertising Executive Chuck Bachrach: "The jury is out on Silverman. If he can maintain his standing until the Olympics, then I think everyone has a shot at No. 1 for next year."

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