A high-flying rivalry took soared in a crazy game on NBC that took a hit for the Philly team & the ratings

UPDATED with Sunday ratings chart: The Battle of the Birds between the Atlanta Falcons and Philadelphia Eagles have seen dramatic finishes in their last two faceoffs, and last night on proved no different — except for who won.

With their wings clipped by injuries, the Eagles fought hard in the Georgia metropolis on Sunday to keep the hometown team tethered, but their beak just wasn’t sharp enough. Failing to contain the Falcons’ Julio Jones, who whipped off a 54-yard catch-and-run for what was the game-winning touchdown, Philly with the rest of America just had to watch in awe.

THE BEST RECEIVER ON THE PLANET. PERIOD. pic.twitter.com/Citfu2G3xD — Atlanta Falcons (@AtlantaFalcons) September 16, 2019

Having been in the lead at one point and looking for that third win against Atlanta in the past 20 months, the Eagles ultimately fell 24-20 to the Falcons.

It wasn’t just Philadelphia that fell on SNF. The primetime matchup snared a 12.2/22 in metered market results, an 18% drop in the early metrics from the New England Patriots’ blowout victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers in last week’s SNF season opener.

Injuring the Comcast-owned net and the league a little more, last night’s NBC flagship show was also down 12% from the Dallas Cowboys’ SNF win against the New York Jets on Week 2 of the 2018-2019 season, on September 16 last year.

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Coming off a strong 100th-season debut September 5, a rising SNF opener and an upward-moving Monday Night Football starter, last night’s double-digit decline for the sometimes spellbinding game has to give the NFL and its broadcasting partners pause. Could the tide be turning back to the ratings ills of the pass few seasons after an initial swell?

Time and a few high-profile games will tell on that one, but no one but the Falcons can be feeling good about last night’s SNF right now for now.

In that tone, and with the Los Angeles Rams taking on the Cleveland Browns next week on SNF against the 71st Primetime Emmy Awards on Fox, we’ll update with more football numbers as they come in. We’ll also take a look at how Big Brother, The Masked Singer‘s new season’s sneak peak and the rest of the non-NFL action on the Big 4 did last night. (See the chart below.)

Before then, if you’re needing more math: the Falcons’ win over the Eagles last night also dipped 9% in metered market ratings from when the two teams met up in the September 7 season opener last year. That late-starting game went on to score 19 million viewers, a nine-year opening-game low.