Readers: ABC will take Wednesdays

ABC’s ‘The Goldbergs’ averaged a 1.7 in 18-49s last season.

ABC has its strongest Wednesday comedy lineup in years.

That should be enough to hold off CBS, which has a solid lineup but can’t compete with the ratings firepower of ABC’s “Modern Family.”

That’s according to a recent Media Life poll on the new TV season, which started Monday, asking readers to weigh in on the strengths and weaknesses of every network across every night.

Asked which network will finish No. 1 among adults 18-49 on Wednesday nights, a large majority of readers, 66 percent, picked ABC.

CBS was a distant second with 21 percent of the vote. NBC was third at 9 percent.

There are three keys to ABC’s night. The first is “Modern Family,” the top show on Wednesday night last season with an average 3.5 18-49 Nielsen rating.

The second is the new comedy “Black-ish,” which has the good fortune to air behind “Family.” ABC has struggled for years to find a capable lead-out for “Family.”

Buyers and planners think the network may have finally found it. Asked to rate the chances of survival for the night’s new shows, readers gave “Black-ish” the highest marks of any new program, saying its prospects for a full-season order are good.

Finally, readers like ABC’s decision to move “The Goldbergs,” a promising second-year comedy, from Tuesday to Wednesday, where it will air behind sixth-year sitcom “The Middle” at 8:30 p.m.

Readers voted “Goldbergs” the returning show poised for a breakout year. It got 40 percent of the vote; no other program got more than 12 percent.

Still, readers do have one concern about Wednesdays for ABC, and that’s the dwindling ratings for third-year drama “Nashville.”

Readers chose that show as the veteran program most likely to see sharp declines this season.

As for the night’s other new shows, readers are not sold. They said there are iffy prospects for NBC’s “The Mysteries of Laura,” CBS’s “Stalker” and Fox’s “Red Band Society,” predicting they will finish out their initial order and nothing more.

Tags: abc, black-ish, modern family, the coming fall season, wednesday night preview, wednesday nights, wednesday overnights