https://www.metv.com/stories/the-a-teams-popularity-caused-happy-days-and-laverne-shirleys-ratings-to-drop

Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley reigned supreme until The A-Team came along.

Had the A-team debuted during the 1970s, it would have been a nothing burger show because both HD and LS were in their prime. Both HD and LS were sputtering along in the 1980s.

Were people still watching these shows without Ron or Cindy?

The decline of Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley began with NBC having Mr. T in promos bellowing "Hey Fonz! Your Happy Days are over!" And it worked. The A Team became a huge success with the young audience that tuned into Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley for a period of almost 10 years.

The decline of Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley began with NBC having Mr. T in promos bellowing "Hey Fonz! Your Happy Days are over!" And it worked. The A Team became a huge success with the young audience that tuned into Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley for a period of almost 10 years.

I remember those ads with Mr. T. They were really something!

I just wish we had a better idea of exactly how badly the ratings for Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley have gotten after The A-Team's debut, because both HD and L&S still ranked in the Nielsen Top 30 at the end of the 1982-83 U.S. broadcast season.

After A-Team started airing on Tuesdays on February 8 of 1983, only six original episodes of HD's tenth season and eight original episodes of L&S's eighth season were directly up against A-Team. Based on what I've seen on Broadcasting magazine, HD and L&S continued to do excellently until at least mid-November of 1982, still finishing in the weekly Nielsen Top 20. Because HD's and L&S's performances after their December 7 of '82 episodes couldn't be recorded in Broadcasting's Ratings Roundup, did their ratings already start declining before A-Team premiered?

The last time HD and L&S did good business in the ratings together was when Part 3 of the The Winds of War miniseries aired (coincidentally, it was on the same day of A-Team's first Tuesday airing), and even then, L&S still beat A-Team!

*Fonz hits the jukebox*

*Knee Grow with jewelry fetish falls down dead*

too soon? ;)

Here is a breakdown of the ratings for Happy Days's and Laverne & Shirley's final original airings of the 1982-83 broadcast season in comparison to The A-Team's.

February 18, 1983: HD: 18.2/26; L&S: 20.2/28; A-Team: 18.5/26
February 25, 1983: HD: 16.7/25; L&S 16.2/24: A-Team: 20.6/31
March 1, 1983: HD: 14.2/21; L&S: 14.2/21; A-Team: 20.4/30
March 15, 1983: HD: 16.3/24; L&S: 16.2/24; A-Team: 21.3/32
March 22, 1983: HD: 16.6/24; A-Team: 21.3/32
May 3, 1983: L&S: 11.3/18; A-Team: 20.9/34
May 10, 1983: L&S: 11.4/19; A-Team: 18.8/32

Happy Days's 10th season finale: 16.6/24
Laverne & Shirley's penultimate original airing: 11.3/18
Laverne & Shirley's final original airing: 11.4/19

Source: TV Tango (https://www.tvtango.com/series/laverne_and_shirley/episodes/sort/episodeNumber/type/asc?page=4) and this post by TVFactFan (https://sitcomsonline.com/boards/showpost.php?p=6291164&postcount=38).

So it's safe to say that Laverne & Shirley died on a series low ratings-wise rather than just creative-wise. Who else wishes they had been swapped out in favor of a one-hour farewell episode on May 10, 1983? (To be addressed on this thread (https://sitcomsonline.com/boards/showthread.php?t=283807).)

The show’s were both tanking at this point on their own. HD should’ve ended years before and LandS had no Shirley.