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Yeah, that too. :-)

Think of the ratings! It worked for WCW when DDP vs. Goldberg was cut off mid-match with many cable carriers.

I agree it was hilariously bad, but there was a certain logic behind some of what they did that made sense, especially if you looked at it from the perspective of "we just need to get through this night and cater to the casual fan". But the problem isn't just Vince. I'm sure there are members of the creative staff who know better, but there's equally people who don't have a deep enough understanding of what would and wouldn't work in front of a such hardcore crowd to know that their plans would so horrendously backfire. Meltzer alluded to WWE panicking earlier in the show when they realised the scale of the backlash that could have been coming their way and making last minute changes to the match that upset The Rock. It's hard to believe that what we saw could have been even worse than what transpired, but it's possible what was originally planned wasn't quite so wretched.

I know the tradition in recent years is for all the big matches to go long, but that'd be quite the risk this year. I mean I certainly hope they're not dumb enough to have 56 year old Sting go 25 minutes.

I don't think Johnny was completely out to lunch. They were clearly trying to get a degree of sympathy on Daniel Bryan with his hard luck story. Not to the extent that it completely hijacked the show and ruined their planned WrestleMania main event, obviously, or was an attempt to non-organically manufacture the reaction he had last year.

Victoria wanted to punch Dixie Carter in the face: http://www.cagesideseats.com/tna-impact/2015/1/22/7872013/victoria-wanted-to-punch-dixie-carter-in-the-face

Working for TNA is preferable to being homeless? I should hope so!

Did the rage-meter idea go anywhere?

It might be worth reminding people what Dave Meltzer wrote about the issue of race during the Jackson vs. Evans build:

Humble black guy vs. cocky black guy "who doesn't know his place." Who are you speaking about here? Daniel Cormier vs. Jon Jones, but it equally could apply to Rampage Jackson vs. Rashad Evans.

I don't know if there's been many articles that clearly bugged Dave as much as Tim Marchman's Deadspin column about the build for Jones vs. Sonnen. It's clearly stuck in his craw.

I wonder if the live feed of WWE Main Event really makes financial sense?

Didn't Dave say something similar when Mauro Ranallo announced Kenta Kobashi vs. Jun Akiyama for the Fight Network?

Hogan has to induct him right? Was there any B+ level celebrity he was close to? I could see Choice #1: Hogan, Choice #2: Seth Green. I bet Lanny inducts him either that or DDP. Lanny will accept on Savage's behalf, WWE are already teasing that Hogan will induct him.

The 2005 Dome show was a disaster, even though they announced an increased crowd of 46,000 fans. Meltzer wrote the following in the Observer a week after the event: "This year’s Toukon Festival Wrestling World 2005 drew the company’s smallest-ever Dome crowd, a heavily papered 25,000 (announced at a ridiculous 46,000), and only 10,000 paid, for the 14th annual event on the day in the Dome for what was until recent years, that country’s version of Wrestlemania. The show was said to be lifeless, with mostly average matches, and it felt like nothing special except the main event really delivered. Long-time New Japan fans left the building really sad to see just how far things had fallen. When the show started, the building was empty, causing people to think this was going to be a disaster of a major magnitude. By the third match, the place was half full. The worse part about this is when they realized they couldn’t sell tickets, they began giving them away en masse. Tickets moved far slower than for any New Japan event ever in its flagship big show building, due to no major outsiders on the show and a horrible line-up for such a big building. They ended up giving away so many tickets that there were actually no tickets available at the ticket office at the Dome, and the major outlets reported only a few locations still available. What happened is that, like WCW at the end, most of the people given free tickets didn’t even bother coming. It wasn’t quite TNA giving away 10,000 ticket vouchers to get 1,000 people into Nashville, but it was an apathy level the likes of which nothing the company had ever experienced for a Dome show." So Tanahashi is at best 6 for 8, without quibbling whether increases of 1,000-2,000 announced fans represents true growth, when we don't know the rounding and papering being done. 2009 was clearly drawn by outsiders (Misawa and Mutoh), rather than Tanahashi being hot as a draw. I actually think Sakuraba & Shibata as the undefeated invading shooters probably deserves more credit for the 2013 numbers than people give them today too.

I think Meltzer's coverage of the time demonstrates that to be the case. Regarding why they weren't moved back, I think it was a slippery slope. The next generation of stars didn't get the mainstream exposure that the previous generation did, so they weren't big names to the TV executives making the scheduling decisions and there was also a gradual erosion of fans, which didn't help matters either. The MMA boom also didn't help, as pro wrestling quickly became viewed as yesterday's news.

Maybe in some alternate universe where Triple H isn't the owner's son-in-law.

This is what Dave wrote a few weeks ago: What Dave wrote clearly was written in a way where he believed that a sellout = 52,000 fans not 40,000. This isn't a case of wilful misinterpretation by Dave's readers, rather Dave being fed misleading information by his sources and him taking it at face value (which is sort of how he messed up with the Punk being at Raw story, believing the wrong people).

The 36K number was New Japan's official attendance figure. Since Bushiroad took over, they've apparently been honest about such statistics. If anything, it would be inflated upwards, not downwards.

Recent Dome Show (paid) attendance history: 2015: 36,000 (Tanahashi vs. Okada, Nakamura vs. Ibushi) 2014: 35,000 (Tanahashi vs. Nakamura, Okada vs. Naito) 2013: 29,000 (Tanahashi vs. Okada, Nakamura vs. Sakuraba) 2012: 23,000 (Tanahashi vs. Suzuki) 2011: 18,000 (Tanahashi vs. Kojima) 2010: 20,000 (Nakamura vs. Takayama, Tanahashi vs. Shiozaki) 2009: 27,500 (Tanahashi vs. Mutoh, Nakamura & Goto vs. Misawa & Suguira) Meltzer predicted a sellout or near sellout in the Observer a few weeks ago, as he was told that the advance for the show was 50% ahead of the same period last year. 36k is a good number, but New Japan likely hoped for better given the more rapid attendance growth in past years. It suggests that the company's recent popularity spurt is plateauing off, which might be a slight problem as they move away from several iPPVs a month to an online subscription channel, and thus need to appeal to a wider audience to maintain their profitability.

To be fair, Meltzer said that the Dome show two years ago was better, so he didn't go completely overboard with the praise.

I'd recommend signing up for New Japan World, Jerry. It's not too difficult to do (I signed up last night), as you can translate most of the website into English now. Here's some instructions from the Wrestling Observer site: http://www.f4wonline.com/more/more-top-stories/102-japan/40137-guide-to-ordering-new-japan-world

I think the fact that Dave has had to bite his tongue to a certain degree about Matt Striker's abilities as an announcer in the fallout demonstrates that this was a clear conflict of interest. Your mileage may vary whether it was something to be seriously concerned about under the circumstances. But regarding KrisZ's point above, clearly in such a circumstance Jarrett would lean on Dave to soften his report on the story, because that's what a wrestling promoter would do in that situation.

Was Dave Meltzer wrong to have been willing to announce for Global Force Wrestling?http://www.cagesideseats.com/2014/12/20/7428971/was-dave-meltzer-wrong-announce-global-force-wrestling-gfw-new-japan-njpw

I'm not surprised Dave would be up for doing it, given that he's a big fan of modern day New Japan. Times also change. He's been part and parcel of the business for so long that he really isn't an outsider anymore.