Loss

My take is typically that censoring these things empowers denialists who like to revise history and claim that things were never as bad as they were purported to be. However, this is a for-profit platform, not an official historical record, as was mentioned above. The streaming service is not intended to be a historical project. If it was, I'd have a different view.

I don't disagree with this in the sense that you can't sell a show on match quality. It just doesn't work, and one reason is that if the only appeal is a great match, there's no urgency around it, and no need to see it live. It'll be just as great if you watch it later. The key is to create context around the matches that make people want to see them take place.

Not sure if that's true. I do know the idea was proposed of Rousey tapping out, which Heyman shot down hard, because he thought it would be a bridge too far since she never tapped out in UFC. That was likely the right call. I had no problem with the WM finish. I think they wanted to keep the door open to a rematch. However, I'd be surprised if we get it at this point. WWE's incentives have totally changed. They gain nothing by paying top dollar to bring in big names. To me, the bigger Becky Lynch issue was that after Mania, they tried to put her with Lacey Evans, who wasn't ready for the spot. They hadn't thought ahead to groom any challengers.

If WWE was still as good as it was 20 years ago in terms of creating new stars and delivering satisfying payoffs, I think most people would accept that premise without much disagreement. We may have reached a point now where no matter what WWE does, they are just going to be where they are and that's that, but I wouldn't say that's been true for the entirety of the last 20 years.

Yes, Nielsen households report who is watching with them. Ratings are broken down for kids just like they are for adults.

If parents watch with their children, this is reflected in ratings.

No subtlety. Lots of ongoing moralizing and exaggeration. At every step of everything, you're told as a viewer what to think of everything you're seeing. A constantly screaming announcer. Mid South reflects Watts' world view every bit as much as WWE reflect Vince's world view.

That's what prompted the tweet! Awesome.

I don't know how unusual it was, but even of those 6 cards (or 7 now, with the Detroit show added), all but two of them drew more than 15,000 and three of them drew more than 20,000. Three 20K+ shows in three different markets from three different promoters over a two week period (4/20 - 5/4) can't be something that has happened very many times. It absolutely hasn't happened *since* 1986.

A great point! I forgot about Detroit. Wrestling has been hotter at a few points, but that may be the last time the wealth was spread quite that way.

I think the more relevant point is that I can't think of another relatively brief spell with that many gigantic shows in that short a period of time. WM2 in Chicago was the lowest drawing of them all with 9,000 in attendance, but I'd still roll all 3 WMs together since it was meant as a multi-location show. Between all three, you still end up with just under 40,000 fans buying a ticket to see part of Wrestlemania. Both Wrestlerock and the Parade of Champions drew more than 20,000 people. Crockett Cup, the least successful of them all, still drew 13,000 fans to the Superdome. A disappointing number I'm sure given what I'm sure the expectations were with the weeks of UWF cross-promotion and loaded lineup, but still not a bad one. All in all, you have nearly 100,000 tickets sold to supercards across multiple companies. That doesn't even consider that within that same time period, the WWF drew 15,000 to MSG on 4/22. All in all, if you break WM2 up into three shows, you have 6 cards drawing more than 10,000 people from four promotions over a 5-week period.

I'm mostly joking. (Mostly.) It's a personal quirk, not anything approaching a board rule.

My take on the star ratings debate is that it looks like the rating system as it was popularized was always full of shit, but at least some people (self included) have gotten and will continue to get something useful out of it.

The being in a couple with someone above your push getting heat thing is pretty universal in wrestling. Kidman got heat in WCW for Torrie Wilson too.

Or don't quote! We all saw the previous post.

I thought Cornette's whole thing was not being a prude and being into wild sexual stuff with his wife. Yet here he is going after Penelope Ford for what he thinks of her personal sex life. It goes back to my earlier thought that his guiding principle seems to be that if you don't like something or someone, you can say anything you want to make them mad, and it doesn't matter if there's a consistent logic to it or not. She is in AEW, therefore she's bad and all insults are justified, the end.

In spite of that, Steamboat had longevity that he might not have had if his body had always been his gimmick.

I don't even know how to break up a single post into multiple quotes where you retain the who said it and timestamp, but it seems like it would take a lot of effort. I really hate the quote function and wish I could disable it. Watch someone use the quote function to reply to me.