Reruns Already?

There seems to be a disturbing trend on network TV these days - the networks will air a rerun of a top-rated TV show a day or two after the show airs for the first time.  I noticed this about a year ago when ABC started rerunning "Grey's Anatomy" a few days after the original episode.  I thought this was an isolated incident, but the other networks did the same thing with their top-rated shows.  And sure enough, they're doing it again this season.  Last week, "Grey's Anatomy" premiered during it's new time slot on Thursday night.  The next night, they showed the episode again.  This week, they did it again.  Back in the day, they would call this an "encore presentation" instead of using the word "rerun."  I remember on the old "Saturday Night Live" episodes, instead of saying it was a rerun, the announcer Don Pardo would call it an encore presentation.  Whatever.

Maybe this is ABC's new ratings strategy to help "Grey's Anatomy" compete against "CSI" - people that didn't watch "Grey's Anatomy" on Thursday night can watch it again Friday night.  Or if they really enjoyed the episode, they can watch it again.  If you ask me, this is a ratings booster for CBS - people can watch "CSI" on Thursdays and can catch "Grey's Anatomy" the next night.  Regardless of how you look at it, it's just odd.  I guess the networks can't find enough good shows to put on the air, so they have to rerun their top-rated shows during the same week.  That's pretty lame.