• by Wayne Friedman , January 13, 2010

If one barometer of network TV's health comes with its biggest-rated show, then "American Idol" tells us we're holding steady. The two-hour season premiere of "American Idol" on Tuesday night posted a Nielsen preliminary 11.8 rating/29 share among 18-49 viewers in its ninth season start, virtually dead-on to its numbers of a year ago.

Good news: younger viewers 18-34 witnessed a small ratings rise of 8%, to a 10.6. Not-so-good news: Overall viewership slipped 2% to 29.8 million from 30.4 million the year before.

Analysts say this is a positive for the show. In the last two seasons, "Idol" took a dip in premiere ratings versus the previous season. Some of this decline could be attributed to new early-round judges; the departure of longtime judge Paula Abdul; and the soon-to-be on-screen new permanent judge Ellen DeGeneres.

As usual, "Idol" left a lot of damage around the network schedule. The biggest hit was NBC's "Biggest Loser," which was down 30% to a 3.2 rating/7 share versus its premiere a week ago.

The damage at CBS was somewhat less -- "NCIS" was down 2% to 4.3/11. "NCIS: LA" wasn't as lucky -- down 19% to a 3.0/7.

Once "Idol" left the air at 10 p.m., the three other networks resumed their ways. CBS' "The Good Wife" posted a 3.0/9, the same versus the week before.

NBC's "Leno" 1.9/5 was in line with its usual seasonal average, getting a nice lead-in draft from the big 5.0 season premiere ratings from "Loser."

Also at 10 p.m., ABC's new show "the forgotten" seems to be increasingly forgotten by viewers, landing at a 1.2/4.

For the night, Fox won big-time among 18-49 viewers with an 11.7/29. CBS was next with a 3.5/9, followed by NBC at a 2.8/7, Univision with a 1.4/3, ABC at a 1.0/3, and CW with a 0.3/1.