'Frasier' Finale Calls Off 'Bets'

See Also: 'No More Bets' Episode Guide

CSI: Crime Scene Investigation had to give up its crown as the king of Thursday night television for the second week running last week.

This season's penultimate episode, "No More Bets", was trumped in the ratings by the series finale of NBC's Fraiser, which came to an end after eleven years, Mediaweek reported. CSI scored a 16.2 overnight rating / 23 share, which means that approximately 16.2% of American households with television sets were tuned into CSI, while the episode was viewed by 23% of households watching television at the time.

22.46 million people were tuned into CSI, while Frasier attracted 3 million additional viewers to win the hour with 25.44 million. The ratings were an improvement on the previous week, when "Turning of the Screws" was soundly beaten by the finale of NBC's Friends, with the CSI episode attracting the show's lowest first-run ratings in 2004 (story).

At 10:00 p.m. the season finale of NBC's medical drama ER trumped CSI's lead-out series, Without a Trace, scoring 24 million viewers to Without a Trace's 17.67 million. But expect improvements next Thursday, when CBS will screen the season finales of CSI and Without a Trace, which will air opposite repeats on NBC.

NBC won the evening overall with a 17.4/24 rating, followed by CBS with a 13.8/20. On a year-to-year comparison, however, the peacock network's viewership was down by 2%, while CBS's audience rose by 10%.

The original report can be found here at Mediaweek.

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