jdw

It's relevant because Vince was looking for a NASCAR Deal and got between an MLS/USMNT Deal and a NHL Deal: two jobber sports in this country.

The smart people short sold the stock and are now calling for the company's Board of Directors to replace their executive management team or explore the option of selling the business. http://www.cagesideseats.com/wwe/2014/5/17/5726192/wwe-investors-call-for-vince-mcmahons-head-on-a-platter Funniest shit I've ever heard. The board is hand picked by Vince. He has the shares to dump all of the board at any time he wants. And the "smart people" know it.

I agree. Maybe Ion wasn't too keen, either, but it didn't make sense for either side anymore. With Flashpoint having ended its run a year and a half ago, Main Event has been the only original programming on Ion since then. It didn't fit with their slate of shows at all. Bix - need a correction: It's actually $27.9M per year --> $90M per year. Old: $10M NBC + $8M ESPN ($18M English Language) + $9.9M Univision = $27.9M New: $75M ESPN/Fox (English Language) + $15M Univision = $90M +417% English +152% Spanish +323% Overall Of course it also covers a number of USMNT games, which is a major reason the English language price went up so much. Still that number has to floor Vince.

The stock is basically back where it was in October before it got run up. The smart people bought early in the run up, and got off in Feb-Mar. Good lord for any idiots who bought in Feb-Mar and are still holding today, or were trying to unload today.

So Wall Street seems to be thinking the WWE got a 50% increase in their Comcast/NBCU deal, not the 2x or 3x they were hoping for. I'm think this is in line with what a lot of us expected. They weren't going to get a $200M a year deal in the US.

Here's the thing: it was just launched in the US. They're talking about a Global number, as they launch the Network around the world. Is it realistic? Who knows. I do tend to think that over time they will be doing comfortably over 1M in the US. By the end of the year? Maybe, maybe not. By some point in 2015? No doubt... almost certainly by the time Mania airs.

Chris: It's 166,033 per the 61 that ESPN and NBCSN/NBC carried that ties to the $75M that ESPN/Fox will pay. Univision is paying $15M for their games. Of course that doesn't factor in the USMNT games, which averaged 1.3M viewers in ESPN's three games in 2012/13. The argument a lot of people make is that MLS is a loss that Fox and ESPN are willing to take for the USMNT (and a lesser degree the USWNT) games, and also simply to have the "content" more than turning a profit on it. But however we do the math, the value of a WWE Viewers is staggeringly awful relative to the value of the MLS/USMNT viewer, or the NHL viewer to NBC/NBCSN (though that was likely massive desperation at the time of that deal). On one level, the WWE viewers are wildly undervalued as people have said for a while. On the other level, we've spent decades talking about how shitty the ad rates are for Pro Wrestling and that drives the value of the contracts.

Hard to tell about the MLS. USMNT ad rates likely kick the living shit out of the WWE's. Still... Raw averages 4M viewers across 3 hours (+ overrun). SmackDown aveages 2.5M to 3M across 2 hours. MLS on NBCSN a shade over 100K per game last year, while ESPN was 220K per game. It's early in the season, and there was an initial boost this year that people were giddy about... but you're seeing less stories about it now as the season is into May and the numbers are sliding back down. Raw drew 40 times the average viewership of MLS on NBCSN last year, and 20 times the viewership that ESPN pulled in. Wrestling Fans have to be the least valuable viewers on the face of the earth... which is a point a lot of us have been making for decades.

I'd add - the deal does cover certain USMNT games. Those averaged 1.3M viewers last year for ESPN in 2012/13 qualifying. It was for just 8 games, though... and while those are lusty number relative to the MLS is pulling in, comp those with Vince's numbers.

Here's what the WWE's new deal should be judged against: http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Journal/Issues/2014/05/12/Media/MLS-TV.aspx $90M per year for the MLS. Their current deal is $27.9M. Look up the viewership numbers the MLS does in the chart in the piece. Now one understands why Fox wanted it: they need *some* futbol leading into the 2018 World Cup. They know they're going to be in a war to get the EPL rights back from NBCSN, who were playing the long game as well in this one (dump an overpriced MLS to save money for the EPL and also chase the NBA and/or Big 10). Anyway... $90M for that left of shit viewership, a more than 300% increase. Your play, Vince. Even $180M a year next to that looks embarrassing, especially when the next EPL contract in the US will jump from $83M a year (NBCU) to vastly more given that it pulls in 440,000 viewers per game, four times as many as NBCSN is pulling in for their average MLS game. Seriously... think about that for a moment.

Can you recommend anything in particular? I have most Torches from 2002-12. I'm not asking for a specific date, just good writing around a particular incident or topic. I was more interested in his stuff in the 90s. At some point after the website got up and started putting up a big archive of Bruce's columns, I C&P'd a pretty much everything available in that decade and up to his 2001 WWF vs WCW "template" piece into a nicely formatted collection that I called Honor Among Thieves after one of his columns. Looks like only two of his Quizzes were in it... possibly that Wade hadn't put the yearbooks up by that time. Sent to Bruce, and he enjoyed it. Have no idea where my printed out copy is laying around... perhaps on the bookshelves with my other wrestling stuff, or perhaps in a box. Anyway... some of his best pieces? Twenty-Five Million Dollars - on Joe P either being a liar or an idiot. Onward Cornette’s Soldiers - on SMW's use of the Gangstas and famous for pissing off Corny to no end Honor Among Thieves - Bruce goes to AAA Everybody Sucks But Us / The Extreme Problem / Some Revolution - basically the ECW Trilogy in 1995-96 Adult Contemporary - a look at "edgy" wrestling in early 1998, with the classic closing section on Raven that freaked out a certain asshole writer In an entirely different direction, Bruce would point to one that has a special place for him: the piece on Brian Hildebrand. It's very good, and from the heart.

Jumbo was teaming up with Vets? Sure... other thank Fuyuki and Nakano. Tiger Mask II teamed with a lot of people since putting on the mask in 1984. That's the lot of a midcarder. But you might have some fun trying to figure out how often he teamed with Kawada between the founding of the Revolution and telling Kawada to untie the Mask. I'm still trying to figure out how people watching Misawa tag with Kawada, Taue, Kobashi and Kikuchi exclusively across two series after taking the mask off, those guys being in his corner and backing him at the both of the biggest matches of his career up to that point, would result in Fans not thinking that these are his guys? It was obvious to all of us watching it. As far as the Group Proper, it's moot: Taue immediately started tagging with Jumbo after the group "formed". I'd be happy to post all of Misawa's results for 1990 when he returned from the knee injury, across the New Year Giant Series, Excite Series, Champion Carnival, Super Power Series and Summer Action Series so you can see what the rest of us were seeing at the time, how the change is nakedly clear starting with the Super Power Series (teaming exclusively with Kawada, Taue, Kobashi and Kikuchi) and then nakedly clear again right from the start of the Summer Action Series II (Taue moves over to become Jumbo's protege because Kabuki left).

I'm pretty cold-hearted about it because the standard contracts call for various buckets of money to be set aside by Vince/The Company for different things (video bucket, merch bucket, TV bucket, PPV bucket) and to be split up in a way that Vince / The Company determines. So... if wrestlers don't negotiate something more clear ($5 a t-shirt / $1 for every dvd/video they appear on, etc), then... well... um... fuck them. They were happy with Vince's Buckets when it gave them more money than they thought. Now they're unhappy... tough shit. :/ Chris has a rather good explanation why the dvd/video royalty has gone in the crapper: that business is dead / dying / took a massive hit. It's easy enough for Vince to call a meeting and explain that. The PPV thing... I think we all pretty much agree that the WWE is likely to make more $$$ next year off the WWE Network + PPV than they made last year with just PPV. Chris might crunch the number a little differently, but I think the revenue will get there. The profit probably won't, but it will eventually. If there's an issue, it's that Vince has done a poor job of: * explaining the finances of the company to the workers as a whole * failed to show he will eat some "lean" times as well The first is just stupid, but it's also something that he probably never has had to do to the Boyz. So I get it. But he also should get off his ass and explain. On the second, there's a pretty easy solution: not payout dividends to the Family's class of stock. That would allow the company to retain a large chunk of money to throw at the costs of starting up the network, and the loss of revenue. They still would be paying dividend on the shares that are publicly traded, which would keep the shareholders who hunt for dividends happy. So I'm mixed. I think the workers are a bunch of idiots for the most part, and have been for decades. But Vince is being a bit of a lunk head in getting across to the workers the issues the company is dealing with, and show them that he'll take a "cut" as well until the company gets to the other side. A cut which is vastly more than any of them are taking, not just in total $$$, but also as a % of "income" that any of them get in a year. John

I agree with the comments that Road/Hog Wild is a tough non-wrestling crowd to work if you're doing what Benoit and Melenko typically did in that period (outside of Benoit working with Sully). Worse, they were given 27 minutes to work, which is just batshit "Let's Fuck With Them" type of booking on someone's part. All that said, if you want an even worse In The Bubble Match, Malenko had one with Eddy at the LA Forum a little over a month before. Technically solid, but Dean couldn't be bothered to work to the crowd, and Eddy let the match be a Dean Match rather than trying to force it to be at least half an Eddy Match. Dean really was an odd pain in the ass in 1996 and into 1997. Very solid, but he could dominate Rey for 10 minutes before giving him 2 minutes to get his shit in before hitting the finish. The contrast to me always was the Dragon-Rey where Dragon did dominate the match via control, but he let Rey get his shit in via spurtty comebacks before cutting him back off. Dean... he's just keep people down when he felt like it. The Dean-Psic at WWIII was a mind numbing fuck up of a guy laying out a match without giving a shit about what his opponent could being to a match to make it entertaining for the fans and viewers. John

Did the royalty count against the Downside, or was it in addition to the Downside? On other words: $130K downside + $65K video royalty + other stuff above the downside or $130K downside with $65K royalty going against it and other stuff going against it until finally some amount popping over $130K If it's the first, I doubt they're going to have a tough time finding guys on the "low end" willing to make $130K guaranteed + $10K video royalties + modest PPV add-ins taking all of it up over $150K rather easy. Unless the indy circuit is paying all those people who would love to get into the WWE a hell of a lot more than I'd expect.

Thanks Keith!

That's really cool... especially since Taue's over there teaming with Jumbo, and Kawada & Kobashi have been teaming with Misawa for 3 full months by that point. But I'm glad to see that the announcer and the promotion were dumber than the fans who already knew that Misawa had his group of young guys back in May, the same guys who were carrying him around the ring in June after he pinned Jumbo. Daniel: I here in the US who didn't speak Japanese, and the puroresu trainee who I worked with who did, both knew about Misawa's group being with Kawada, Taue and Kobashi two series earlier. So... were we just pulling it out of out asses, or was it nakedly obvious to everyone watching the shit?

Thanks for continuing to pull these over, Chris.

Either: (i) when the WWE gets the figure they want; or (ii) the clock runs out and they have to take whatever they can get There's no clock on the first. For the second, their deals run out later this year, and there needs to be a decent amount of lead time if they move off of Comcast/NBCU. John

Taue was part of Misawa's group in Super Power Series (May-Jun) and Summer Action Series (Jul). By the start Summer Action Series II (Aug-Sep), he was over in Jumbo's team. Kawada and Kobashi were part of his group from the start in the Super Power Series, pretty much from the unmasking going forward. Kikuchi evolved over time into the group, largely due to his showings opposite Fuchi in May and the June fan appreciation show. By the start of the Summer Action Series in July, he was firmly the "junior" in the group. Ogawa is a different bird. If I recall correctly, he was out hurt during the transition period. He came back in October, largely preliming. In the Tag League, he was teaming with Fuchi and opposite Kikuchi several times. He farted around in the New Years series, before firmly being in Jumbo's group in the Excite series (Feb-Mar 1991). Weekly Pro Wrestling says they became a group at a training camp held in Chiba in August 1990. I think Asako, who was still a trainee at the time, was the sixth member and not Ogawa. According to WPW, the purpose of the camp was to strengthen the unity of the remaining young wrestlers after the defections. So they weren't a "group" in the prior to series despite Misawa, Kawada, Taue and Kobashi all teaming with each other all across the prior two series. And then Taue *not* teaming with Misawa, Kawada & Kobashi after the "training camp"? So much for unity. Misawa, Kawada, Taue and Kobashi were a group in the Super Power Series (May-Jun) and Summer Action Series (Jul). Look up the results and watch the weekly TV. If you're too lazy for that, watch the Jumbo-Misawa singles match from June and keep any eye out for who is in Misawa's corner. It's not terribly complex, and it's something we all knew at the time. Right down to Taue working the opening night in the Summer Action Series II in August with Jumbo & Fuchi against Misawa & Kawada & Kikuchi at Korakuen Hall: http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/17716-mitsuharu-misawa-toshiaki-kawada-tsuyoshi-kikuchi-vs-jumbo-tsuruta-akira-taue-masa-fuchi-ajpw-summer-action-series-ii-081890 John Perhaps they were not officially a group until August despite having tagged together, or perhaps they simply hadn't been named yet. The WPW timeline makes sense in regard to the opening night of the Summer Action Series. MISAWA: "Hey... we've been tagging since the middle of May. Perhaps it's time to come up with a name?" KOBASHI: "How about the New Kids on the Block?" KAWADA: "Shut the fuck up, Donny." TAUE: "You know that Baba is moving me over to Jumbo's side because that jerkoff Kabuki jumped to Tenryu's promotion." KOBASHI: "I never liked Kabuki. Maybe Yatsu can team with Jumbo and you can stay with us, Akira." KAWADA: "Oh for Christ... will you shut the fuck up, Donny." KOBASHI: "Why does he keep calling me Donny?" TAUE: "Kenta... Yatsu jumped to Tenryu's group more than a month ago." KENTA: "Oh... that's why I haven't seen him around for a while." TAUE: "Anyway, I'm off to Jumbo's group..." MISAWA: "So what do we tell these reporters around for the photo opp thinking we're all still together?" KAWADA: "Awww, fuck it Dudes. Let's go bowling."

There were always Misawa fans, and Kawada always had his share of fans. Misawa had more.

Taue was part of Misawa's group in Super Power Series (May-Jun) and Summer Action Series (Jul). By the start Summer Action Series II (Aug-Sep), he was over in Jumbo's team. Kawada and Kobashi were part of his group from the start in the Super Power Series, pretty much from the unmasking going forward. Kikuchi evolved over time into the group, largely due to his showings opposite Fuchi in May and the June fan appreciation show. By the start of the Summer Action Series in July, he was firmly the "junior" in the group. Ogawa is a different bird. If I recall correctly, he was out hurt during the transition period. He came back in October, largely preliming. In the Tag League, he was teaming with Fuchi and opposite Kikuchi several times. He farted around in the New Years series, before firmly being in Jumbo's group in the Excite series (Feb-Mar 1991). Weekly Pro Wrestling says they became a group at a training camp held in Chiba in August 1990. I think Asako, who was still a trainee at the time, was the sixth member and not Ogawa. According to WPW, the purpose of the camp was to strengthen the unity of the remaining young wrestlers after the defections. So they weren't a "group" in the prior to series despite Misawa, Kawada, Taue and Kobashi all teaming with each other all across the prior two series. And then Taue *not* teaming with Misawa, Kawada & Kobashi after the "training camp"? So much for unity. Misawa, Kawada, Taue and Kobashi were a group in the Super Power Series (May-Jun) and Summer Action Series (Jul). Look up the results and watch the weekly TV. If you're too lazy for that, watch the Jumbo-Misawa singles match from June and keep any eye out for who is in Misawa's corner. It's not terribly complex, and it's something we all knew at the time. Right down to Taue working the opening night in the Summer Action Series II in August with Jumbo & Fuchi against Misawa & Kawada & Kikuchi at Korakuen Hall: http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/17716-mitsuharu-misawa-toshiaki-kawada-tsuyoshi-kikuchi-vs-jumbo-tsuruta-akira-taue-masa-fuchi-ajpw-summer-action-series-ii-081890 John

I'm sure that Trip would have run away to save Steph.

Baba's plans for Misawa as the top guy out of that generation are pretty clear when he moved him out of the junior division after just a year and put him in with the heavyweights. The problem in All Japan is that there's a slow elevation to the very top, and usually only when "shit happens" as I walked though above. Jumbo was 34 in 1985, and only really became the ace of the promotion in the late 1983 through mid-1984 period: just the year before. Misawa was just 23 at the end of 1985, with Tenryu well ahead of him as well, Choshu's army in the promotion, and still a strong gaijin crew. Even getting pushed out of the juniors didn't mean he'd be at the top level for a while. So who was the ace pre-83, still Baba? Baba. Kind of a transition period in 1983-84, and they kept Baba having his own things going on. Aug-31-1983: wins Int'l Title from Brody Nov/Dec-1983: teams with Tenryu rather than Baba in Tag League Feb-22-1984: wins AWA Title from Bockwinkel May 1984: Baba & Jumbo vacate Int'l Tag Title Sep-03-1984: Jumbo & Tenryu win Int'l Tag Title Dec-12-1984: Jumbo & Tenryu win Tag League The first one was winning Rikidozan's Title. Then you had the multi-stage process of moving away from teaming with Baba. Then you have him winning a US version of the World Title, which Rikidozan, Baba and Inoki had done as Ace's of promotions. Then cementing Tenryu as Jumbo's partner in his new dynastic tag team. You could point to the first, or the AWA, or... it really is a series of things. In the same time frame you have Baba regaining the PWF Title from Hansen in July 1984, so it's not like he was put out to pasture. Jumbo was gone, so there is no one thing that can be pointed at. I've always pointed to the May 1993 Triple Crown defense over Hansen as when Misawa became the Ace of the promotion. * Jumbo was still the Ace until he went out prior to the 1992 Tag League. * The promotion was less than forth coming initially that he wasn't coming back. * Misawa jobbed in 1993 to both non-Jumbo people who held the TC since his push began (Gordy and twice to Hansen) * two jobs to Hansen in the 1993 Carny gave the impression that the 1992 Triple Crown win was a fluke So Misawa did what Ace's do: his belt on the line, back to the wall, he beat Hansen in May. Then he went and ran the table into the following year.

I don't think either New Japan or All Japan had a fear that one of their guys would jump to the other group with the top title. Even Tenryu went out the door losing to Jumbo one last time. John