CBS Renew/Cancel: 'The Odd Couple' Likely to be Canceled

CBS

Welcome to the second edition of The TV Ratings Guide's CBS Renew/Cancel Watch. All scripted, primetime shows are included in the prediction table below once they have premiered for the season. An analysis of any new prediction changes or observations follows. My current predictions are as of October 28, 2016.

The key to the right indicates which colors are associated with each prediction. The data in the table includes season lows, highs, and averages (Adults 18-49 demo), as well as the year-to-year changes for returning shows that have not already been officially renewed or canceled. These are provided for reasoning with and understanding my predictions. The shows are ordered by their season averages against only other scripted CBS shows.

Rank	Show Title	Season Low / High /Average	Y2Y Change
1	The Big Bang Theory	3.4 / 3.8 / 3.52	-5.6%
2	Kevin Can Wait	1.7 / 2.7 / 2.23	--
3	NCIS	1.7 / 2.2 / 1.91	-13.7%
4	The Great Indoors	- / 1.9 / 1.90	-13.7%
5	Bull	1.5 / 2.2 / 1.76	--
6	Criminal Minds	1.4 / 1.9 / 1.65	-7.8%
7	Man with a Plan	- / 1.6 / 1.60	--
8	2 Broke Girls	1.4 / 1.7 / 1.58	-1.7%
9	NCIS: LA	1.4 / 1.7 / 1.53	+16.1%
10	Mom	- / 1.5 / 1.50	-12.4%
11	Life in Pieces	- / 1.4 / 1.40	-30.0%
12	Scorpion	1.2 / 1.5 / 1.38	-22.3%
13	NCIS: New Orleans	1.2 / 1.5 / 1.33	-23.9%
14	Hawaii Five-0	1.0 / 1.4 / 1.23	+8.2%
15	Blue Bloods	1.1 / 1.3 / 1.22	-1.9%
16	MacGyver	0.9 / 1.7 / 1.20	--
17	The Odd Couple	1.1 / 1.1 / 1.10	-21.3%
18	Madam Secretary	- / 1.1 / 1.08	-10.0%
19	Code Black	1.0 / 1.2 / 1.07	-16.1%
20	Pure Genius	- / 1.0 / 1.00	--
21	Elementary	0.7 / 0.8 / 0.78	-18.8%

2 Broke Girls has been thrown around the schedule in its last few seasons to fill in where CBS has needed it to, largely because they have ordered too many comedies relative to the slots they have available, so something needed to be benched until another failed. It's aired on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays without much stability, which gives me the impression that it's more of a utility player that is also fairly dispensable, like Mike & Molly. This season is shaping up to be a little different.
CBS had cut its comedy hours last season, whereas this season they expanded to a two-hour comedy block on Mondays, while keeping the two-hour Thursday comedy block. Now, instead of having utility players at hand for whenever something fails, they are basically showing all their cards by having The Big Bang Theory, Mom, Life in Pieces, 2 Broke Girls, The Odd Couple, and newbies Kevin Can Wait, Man with a Plan, and The Great Indoors all airing in a week. As it stands, Kevin Can Wait has been solid, Mom is still performing decently for a fourth season show, and 2 Broke Girls in its sixth season is outperforming the third season return of The Odd Couple. Yes, 2 Broke Girls has had the advantage of the Kevin Can Wait lead-in, but anyone who follows the show's ratings can attest to the fact that 2 Broke Girls has consistently maintained a 1.5-1.7 range regardless of where it airs.
The Odd Couple has been saved twice now, but does it get lucky a third time? It's had two shortened seasons, and with CBS's difficulty establishing new comedy hits, it made some sense for CBS to keep it around. It's starting to make less sense now, though, as CBS is contending with three viable freshman comedies and hasn't yet ended their long-standing staple. The Odd Couple has started the season with a couple of 1.1s, which signals a deathly spring if it lasts on the schedule that long. I'm willing to bet now that its lucky streak ends.
This week, Man with a Plan and The Great Indoors premiered. The former earned a 1.6 out of Kevin Can Wait's 1.7, which is a strong hold, even if the mid-1s premiere isn't that impressive overall. The show doesn't have a Big Bang lead-in, which means it has lower expectations overall. The problem is that it doesn't have a lot of room to fall regardless. The Great Indoors premiered behind The Big Bang Theory to a 1.9, which is approximately 56 percent retention. That's roughly the retention for Life In Pieces' premiere rating last fall in the same timeslot, but Life In Pieces dropped 27 percent in week two to a 1.9. A similar percentage decline week-to-week would put The Great Indoors in the vicinity of 1.4s. It remains to be seen what type of hold either show will have in the next few weeks, so until then they will be placed On the Bubble.
On the drama side of things, Pure Genius premiered to a dreadful 1.0 on Thursday. That already puts it as CBS's second lowest series on the air in terms of seasonal averages. Could this mean good news for Code Black? Perhaps in the weeks to come, especially if CBS wants a medical drama to work, but right now it still looks extremely weak. Both are Likely to be Canceled.
Lastly, MacGyver. It continues to slide down in the ranks of CBS's shows, now at #16 overall below both Hawaii Five-0 and Blue Bloods. Really, it looked like a promising hit when it premiered but it quickly tumbled into obscurity, now fractional this past week at 0.9. It got a full season order from CBS, which shows they have some faith in it, but there's a lot of season left for this one to fall even further. The strength it has, besides the full season, is that it's the second best performing new drama after Bull, but it's barely doing better than Pure Genius (1.2 vs. 1.0). I'm keeping it On the Bubble for now, but things aren't looking good.