The Thread Killer

I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I was going to. I decided to check out the first episode and ended up binging the entire series in one night. A lot of it was obviously set up and staged for dramatic effect like most documentary series are, but I found it highly entertaining. I just can’t believe the news that broke today that Haley J actually has a tryout with WWE. Either she has matured a tremendous amount in the past year, or she was putting on her behavioural and mental problems for this documentary, or WWE has really lowered their standards, because that poor kid is a trainwreck. Either that or she does the tryout and has no shot. Although you never know. She seems like a natural when it comes to her character and promo abilities. She is just a mess outside the ring. Between the domestic disputes, the drug use before her matches, and her walking out in the middle of an angle to work some WOW tapings… I don’t see her lasting long in a professional environment. This documentary did confirm my opinion about Al Snow. He somehow manages to always come across as a simultaneously compelling, sympathetic, and yet incredibly annoying and kind of insufferable “know it all” type person, all at the same time. Apparently, this documentary has already had a massive positive effect for OVW. Their YouTube and FITE Subscription numbers have gone up dramatically, their attendance is way up, and their next pay-per-view on FITE may actually break 74 buys lol.

That gimmick would absolutely work if Keith Lee’s delivery was stronger. But he acts like he doesn’t even want to be there, almost disaffected and he stares at the ceiling, he barely speaks loud enough to be heard, and he falters when he talks. He is not an engaging public speaker. He doesn’t need to be Eddie Kingston, but a little conviction would be nice. If Jake Roberts taught us anything, it’s that you do not have to raise your voice or yell to be a good promo. But you do need to be able to deliver your dialogue convincingly. Keith Lee doesn’t.

Overall it was a very good episode of Collision. I enjoyed it much more than this past week’s Dynamite.

At least it looks like they are going to blow off this ridiculous angle on Rampage next week. I was afraid they were going to drag it out all the way to the PPV in October. But The Dark Order get their shot on Rampage, where nobody will see it.

Yeah that was really funny. She seemed preoccupied with Ricky Starks, after he left she stopped screeching.

At least The Righteous won. Watching The Hardys in 2023 is sad.

What the hell are you even talking about? At what point did I mention him being black? And I never saw the whole “Bearcat” deal with him. I’m simply pointing out his promos suck. Because they do.

Man this crowd is pretty dead for the most part.

That’s exactly my problem with it. I’d be all for his promo style if it worked, but with him it definitely doesn’t. It just comes across as goofy.

YES. In other news, sign me up for FTR vs Aussie Open at the next PPV. That match they had at NJPW Royal Quest last year kicked ass.

My buddy got me a ticket to Wrestlemania 6, and I couldn’t go at the last minute, but I have to be honest, it never really bothered me.

I dunno man, I love him in the ring when he’s on, but this whole soft spoken, “Greetings and Salutations” deal just comes across as so…weak to me.

It’s been like what…4 years? Give it up. Stop trying to make people care about The Dark Order. Although, “I googled Scissoring and you guys are doing it wrong” cracked me up.

Keith Lee has the opposite of charisma.

Proof that nobody watched Dark & Elevation, and that nobody watches ROH…The Workhorsemen come out to challenge FTR and the fans chant: “Who are you?”

Yeah that was a great match. I remember Dax saying on his podcast that people really sleep on what a great Tag Team wrestler Big Bill is…and he’s right. And I’m glad that Danielson picked up where Punk left off in helping build Ricky Starks up and giving him that final push into the main event scene.

“Now that we know the crowd can count to 20, that means they can graduate from Penn State.” I love Nigel.

I love all you guys, but in my opinion, you have all lost your minds on this issue. Brian Cage sucks and there are basic fundamentals he still can’t execute properly. That hilarious spot from a couple of months ago, where he couldn’t even take a dropkick properly and go over the top rope in the Battle Royal still makes me laugh to this day. He’s terrible.

I hear you, but realistically, if it wasn’t for Conrad, Kawada never would have made the trip. Somebody had to foot the bill, may as well be him. I would really love to get my hands on a copy of the interview that Kawada did with Eddie at Starrcast. I would be fascinated to hear him interviewed.

Cornette’s podcasts do more than 300,000 a week. That’s just the download number Conrad listed as being required to make major money. At his height, before he returned to WWE, Bruce Prichard was doing well over 500,000 a week and Cornette’s podcasts beat his. Hell, Steve Austin’s show still does monster download numbers and it is all repeats, he has not recorded a new show in over a year. Keep in mind, like Conrad pointed out that is just downloads, not the actual engagement numbers. At one point my podcast app was automatically downloading both of Cornette’s podcasts every week, but I rarely listened to the entire thing. Back when I was a subscriber to Ad Free Shows, Conrad used to do a monthly AMA podcast and it was always fascinating. He would get into the really nitty-gritty of the podcasting business, he talked about advertising rates, production issues, and even the technical specs on their equipment.

Doesn’t work like that anymore. I think Cornette basically advertises Stephen P. New in exchange for free legal services. The rest is all done through an advertising agency. In Cornette’s case, he actually recently fired his advertising agent because he doesn’t like paying a percentage back in commission, so he is hiring his own advertising sales staff. Conrad Thompson has the same now, that’s why he started that company Podcast Heat. When Conrad Thompson first started his podcast with Bruce Prichard they actually had to go out and stump for advertisers on their own. Once advertisers saw how many downloads podcasts started to get, and they basically discovered that podcasting was replacing terrestrial radio in a sense, advertising agencies started bundling advertising packages and shopping them to Podcasters, prorating them based on downloads. Basically the more downloads your podcast gets, the more money an advertiser will pay to advertise on your show. I think it’s somewhat similar to the way YouTube has been monetized, except for it’s a lot more transparent with Podcast advertising. The major Madison Avenue advertising agencies are now shopping advertising to podcasts, the same way they used to do it to TV and radio. I have mentioned it elsewhere, but Conrad Thompson has been upfront about the fact that the magic number is 300,000 downloads. If your podcast can get more than 300,000 downloads in a week, you are pretty much guaranteed a six-figure advertising contract from a major advertising agency. They will pick the ads, and they will rotate them in and out, you just have to read the copy and rake in the money. Both of Cornette’s podcasts are consistently the top two Pro Wrestling podcasts on the Apple Pro Wrestling podcast rankings, every week. They both do well over 300,000 weekly downloads. I only know this, because Conrad Thompson once did a really interesting interview with Sean Oliver where he explained the ins and outs of the Pro Wrestling podcast business. Thompson did mention that he thinks it’s going to change, and the bubble is going to burst because advertisers are going to start insisting on not just finding out if the podcast has been downloaded, but if it was listened to all the way through. If advertising agencies start insisting on engagement data, this entire model might change.

He’s hardly rich but he’s not hurting either. Jim Cornette is pretty open about his finances if you listen to his podcasts. He has always said the most money he ever made in the business was $350,000 a year but now he probably makes about $750,000 a year when you combine the income from his podcasts and his memorabilia business. That is not a bad amount of money when you consider the fact he never needs to leave his house to earn it.

You may be in luck, sooner than you think. He was talking on the recent podcast about the fact that he is seriously considering changing up his business model…and soon. Cornette has already retired from the highly lucrative convention/personal appearance business, because he is basically agoraphobic and hates leaving his house. It has already been established that one of the main reasons he does not work in the actual Pro Wrestling business today is because he now refuses to fly anywhere and if he can’t get somewhere by driving, he will not go. This is why he quit MLW. The pandemic pretty much triggered his pre-existing germaphobia, so now he is not only at the point where he will not leave the South he won’t even leave Louisville. He has stated that the next thing he wants to eliminate from his life is his memorabilia business. Cornette’s Collectibles has gotten so huge that he can’t run it himself anymore. He has a staff that runs it remotely. But I think just managing that business is aggravating him. He is going to be 65 soon and he wants to retire. He has stated that he will continue to do the podcast because it is too lucrative for him to give up and supplies a good source of income, from which he does not even need to leave his house. He did however, state recently that he really wants to focus on his archives and there are a couple of books he wants to write about pro wrestling history. If you read between the lines, he has made it pretty clear he is getting tired of reviewing WWE and AEW programming every week, and I think he would like to get back to one podcast (The Jim Cornette Experience) being about current wrestling and the other (Cornette’s Drive Thru) being about pro wrestling history. Essentially, he made it pretty clear that once he has turned 65 he is going to scale way back on a lot of his activities and focus on his archives, writing, and historical podcasting. Which is good for everybody, honestly.

Thank Gawd the second half of that show was better than the first. Still not at all a fan of Penta singles matches, though.

HOLY CRAP that bump Darby took from the top to the outside was SICK.