'Cougar Town' Leaves ABC, Headed To TBS

If you're a "Scrubs" fan from way back, this isn't exactly what anyone would call "new."

Bill Lawrence's Courtney Cox-starring comedy "Cougar Town" is bolting ABC for a new zip code on TBS, Reuters reports.

The comedy was at one point left entirely off ABC's 2012 schedule, but when the guys-as-dolls sitcom "Work It" tanked this past February, it was brought forth from Hiatus Purgatory. Unfortunately, despite hiatus cast cameos everywhere Lawrence could probably swing a favor or two, the ratings just never took off once it returned. It's bad enough that this past Tuesday's episode pulled a 1.5 adult demographic rating.

It's so very much worse when painted with the perspective that the lowly mark was a 15-percent from the series-low rating it posted two weeks ago.

Ratings anemia notwithstanding, the good people of TBS appear ecstatic to have acquired the show.

"'Cougar Town' is a smart, whimsical sitcom that draws its humor from likable, relatable characters," TBS, TNT and Turner Classic Movies programming head Michael Wright said in a statement. "We are thrilled to have 'Cougar Town' moving to the TBS neighborhood as the network continues to expand its slate of original comedy series."

Could Lawrence really be blamed if he's feeling jinxed (or blessed) by irony at this juncture?

It was 2008 and "Scrubs" had just survived the Writers Guild of America strike that cast many a show into Limbo to complete a seventh season on NBC. Though Lawrence and star Zach Braff remained adamant that the last NBC season should be the show's swan song, ABC and their corporate sibling ABC Studios survived threatened legal action by NBC to purchase the show and produce an 18-season eighth season that debuted in May that year.