Getting Lost... One Hour Later

A couple of weeks ago in a conversation with a friend, I floated an idea for Lost when it returns to the ABC schedule on February 7: shift the show from 9:00pm to 10:00pm. Such a shift, I speculated, would accompish two major things: first, it would take Lost out of the direct line of fire of that mid-season juggernaut known as American Idol. It's no secret that last season, when Lost shifted from 8:00pm to 9:00pm, Lost took a hit when Idol resurfaced on the Fox schedule. Since then, the Wednesday-at-9 time slot has gotten even tougher, with a surging Criminal Minds on CBS recording stronger-than-ever Nielsens. Once Idol is added back into that 9:00 mix, one can only wonder how many viewers won't be returning to Lost.

In addition to taking Lost out of the Nielsen time-slot equivalent of Operation Iraqi Freedom, shifting the show to 10:00 would have the station managers of the local ABC affiliates dancing in the streets. Even though ABC's fortunes have improved dramatically as of late, the majority of their winning shows are scheduled in the 8:00 and 9:00 time slots. ABC's 10:00 shows this season have failed to ignite a ratings fire (can you say Six Degrees?). Why is this important, you might ask? Well, the 10:00 network shows are the show that lead into the 11:00 local news. Weak 10:00 network shows quite often lead to low ratings for the local 11:00 news. However, with a strong 10:00 show on the network, local affiliates often see ratings jump for their 11:00 news.

So... in my opinion, shifting Lost to 10:00 would be a no-lose proposition for ABC: a less-competitive time slot would lead to higher ratings, and happier local affiliates would realize greater advertising revenues in their late newscasts. Though, as I said to my friend during this recent conversation, since it seemed to make so much sense I would never expect it to happen.

Every so often, networks actually surprise me.

Today, ABC announced that Lost will shift to 10:00pm when it returns on Wednesday, February 7. Leading into Lost will be four half-hour comedies: According to Jim, The George Lopez Show, The Knights of Prosperity, and In Case of Emergency.

I can't say that I'm too high on the ABC comedy strategy (won't you once-and-for-all please go away, According to Jim??), but the Lost strategy might just turn out to be ABC's smartest scheduling move since transplanting Grey's Anatomy to Thursdays. It may even help make up for ABC's worst scheduling move of the season... which, coincidentally enough, also involved Lost.

Regarding that "worst scheduling move"... we still have nine more weeks to go before the return of Lost. Not that I'm counting or anything...