There must be something in the water at NBC, because viewers are giving the network a second chance.

Only two new shows have premiered for the fall season, but people are watching them, including the series premiere of "Outlaw" Wednesday night that pulled in virtually the same sized audience as the Jimmy Johnson-led "Survivor: Nicaragua."

"Outlaw," starring Jesse Bradford and Jimmy Smits, premiered to a 6.8 rating/12 share in Fast National overnight ratings from The Nielsen Co. It's the best numbers earned by an NBC series since "The Marriage Ref" debuted to an 8.7/13 on Feb. 28, then the highest rating NBC had seen "Biggest Loser" picked up an 8.8/14 on Dec. 8.

With just 10 episodes in the books so far this week, NBC is not doing too badly, averaging a 5.9/11 between "Outlaw" and a strong season premiere from "Parenthood." CBS, which has only aired "Survivor" through Wednesday, has picked up a 6.8/11, and currently leads all networks. ABC has a 3.1/4 from "Final Witness" while The CW is putting up little challenge with a 1.4/2 average.

"Survivor," by the way, recorded its smallest audience since April 1, when it picked up a 6.6/12 on what was an overall slow night for television at the time. The 6.8/11 was below the 7.0/12 the show averaged in 2009-10, but was better than the 6.7/11 "Survivor" premiered last September with, before the world got to really know Russell Hantz, considered one of the most popular villains of all time for the reality series that helped the show peak at a 7.7 household rating in the middle of November sweeps, and allow the spring premiere to clock in with an 8.2 household rating.

"Outlaw" has allowed NBC to see significant improvement in the Wednesday 10 p.m. timeslot. The premiere of "The Jay Leno Show" on Sept. 16 earned an 8.4/14, but quickly lost almost half its audience by the second week, pulling in just a 4.3/7, and finishing Wednesdays with a 3.7/6 average.

"Jay Leno" was replaced by "Law & Order: Special Victim Units," which averaged a 6.0/11 in the timeslot, but never reached higher than a 6.7/12.

But if "Jay Leno" taught us anything, it's to wait and see. NBC was averaging a 6.0/10 in the first full week of the 2009-10 season, behind only "Survivor" on CBS, but quickly fell to fourth place the following week when audiences tired of Jay Leno quicker than anticipated.

Oh, and speaking of The CW (OK, no one was, but just humor us), "Top Model" held steady from its premiere with a 1.9/3, still continuing below last season. "Hellcats" lost 16 percent of its premiere audience, and 16 percent from its "Top Model" lead-in, to finish its second week with a 1.6/3 on Wednesday. That is still far better than the 0.9 household rating The CW averaged in the timeslot last year thanks to a combination of "Fly Girls" (0.8/1), "High Society" (0.7/1) and "The Beautiful Life" (1.0/2).

Fast Nationals usually provide a snapshot of what Americans are watching by pulling numbers from the top urban markets that include both live viewing and same-day timeshifted viewing. A rating point generally represents more than 1.1 million households while the share indicates the percentage of televisions turned on that was tuned to the specific program. These numbers typically shift when final ratings are issued.

Data collected from The Nielsen Co., as distributed by Zap2it. BlipNetwork tracks non-news, non-event programming, and figures for this story reflect airing of new episodes only. For more information on the Audience Loyalty Index, click here.