Something funny happened as Seinfeld went off the air: It became, possibly, more popular than ever. Viewers could now watch it, if not any time, at several times, on several stations throughout the country that had purchased those pricey syndication rights. Even as fans grumbled over the finale, they relished watching Seinfeld after work, with dinner, during sleepless nights. They knew the terrain now and enjoyed the repetition, the routine, the night-after-night way the show just became part of their lives. They knew which parts of Seinfeld they didn’t like, and accepted those for the parts they did—as if it were a family member. Patterns and trends and strong feelings emerged.
In the summer after the 1998 finale, the 236 stations that syndicated Seinfeld aired viewers’ top ten episodes of all time, as voted in a nationwide poll—the first indication of the episodes that would stick with viewers for the long hall, for generations to come:
10. The Outing
9. The Parking Garage
8. The Marine Biologist
7. The Opposite
6. The Bubble Boy
5. The Hamptons
4. The Pick
3. The Junior Mint
2. The Soup Nazi
1. The Contest