Early WWE SmackDown Rating #’s, Tribute To The Troops, NXT

— As noted earlier, WWE will be taping their “Tribute to the Troops” special for this year on December 10th.

— WWE will premiere a preview special for NXT Takeover 2 on the WWE Network this Thursday at 4pm EST. There will also be a NXT Takeover 2 “Kickoff Show” prior to the special on September 11th.

— After initially keeping him out of the ring during live events to sell his storyline knee injury, WWE had Jey Uso return to action on Sunday night in Dayton, Ohio as we noted earlier. Uso worked a six-man tag-team match with his brother Jimmy and The Great Khali, defeating all three members of The Wyatt Family. Jey had his knee heavily taped up and sold it throughout the majority of the match.

— Friday’s episode of WWE SmackDown scored 2.76 million viewers and a 0.8 rating in the 18 – 49 demographic. Those numbers are up 1% and even with last week’s 2.73 million and 0.8 demo rating.

While John Cena’s appearance didn’t seem to help the numbers, it did manage to beat out ESPN’s Pittsburgh vs. Boston College football game and scored the highest original program rating of the night for cable.

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