CM Punk: Greatest Promo Ever

[Dooley]

Vegas always gives out freebies. It's true that the Vegas attendance numbers have stagnated a bit this year, but they've increased in other areas.

 

UFC 125 (Edgar vs Maynard) was at the MGM grand and had 12,688 attendance for a $2,174,780 live gate.

UFC 126 (Silva vs. Belfort) was at Mandalay Bay and had 10,893 and generated a live gate of $3.6 million.

UFC 127 (Penn vs Fitch) was in Australia and drew 18,186 fans for a gate of $3.5 million. Attendance was up from the previous Aussie card and the gate was up $1 million.

UFC 128 (Shogun vs Jones) was in Newark and drew 12,619 attendees and for a gate of $2.14 million. It was down significantly from the previous Newark card that was headlined by GSP.

UFC 129 was the behemoth in Toronto. 55,724 attendance and $12.075 million gate.

UFC 130 (Rampage vs. Hamill) was at the MGM Grand and had 12,816 and a live gate of $2.57 million.

UFC 131 (dos Santos vs. Carwin) was in Vancouver and had 14,685 and a live gate of $2.8 million. It was down from the previous year's Vancouver event, but was also going head to head with the Stanley Cup finals being in town, which will always take precedence in Canada.

UFC 132 (Cruz vs. Faber) was at the MGM Grand and had 12,947 and a live gate of $2.3 million.

 

It's worth noting that the two low mark gates were headlined by lighter weight class fights, which traditionally do not draw well unless you're BJ Penn. This is a necessary evil to grow the marketability of the lower weight classes. Even then, the January gate was up slightly from the event held almost exactly a year ago in the same building. UFC 126 was to be Shogun-Evans before Rashad's injury, the Jon Jones buzz hasn't translated to money yet. Rampage-Hamill is nowhere near as exciting as Rampage-Evans, which took place a year before in the same building. UFC 131 had the loss of Lesnar and the Stanley Cup finals. UFC 132 had Cruz-Faber, which is no Lesnar-Carwin which was a year before in the same building.

 

UFC is still opening new markets. Ontario is finally open for business and they're still working on opening the largest market in the US. They're still looking at holding an event at Cowboys Stadium, possibly GSP-Silva if that materializes. A return visit to Abu Dhabi rumored for the end of the year will be another big gate and there's a rumor that the next visit to Montreal will be at Olympic Stadium rather than the Bell Centre. Zuffa is working diligently on opening up India and China which will be huge when it happens. There's no tangible reason to believe that UFC's revenues won't continue to increase.

 

As far as PPV goes through June of both years, 2010 had 8 events for 3,655,000 total buys and 2011 had 7 events with 3,280,000 buys and 2011 had the disadvantage of not having a high profile TUF fight when Lesnar pulled out.

 

Looking at the data, I may have to revise my original response to cm funk. They have stagnated a bit for the time being but with several caveats, and there's no reason to believe revenues won't continue to increase moving forward.

[Sean Liska]

This was in the Observer two weeks ago:

 

"As far as ticket sales go, the 8/6 show in Philadelphia as of a few days before you are reading this had sold 4,500 tickets for $800,000. This would be the first PPV show in years and years, since the company hit it big in 2006, where I would term advance ticket sales really bad, particularly since UFC of late has been doing most of its sales the first weekend."

 

I'm not an MMA expert, but it seems like the novelty of seeing a UFC showhas worn off and people are picking and choosing shows by their star power, which was going to happen eventually.

[smkelly]

Has the WWE ever drawn a $12 million dollar gate before? Has any wrestling event anywhere in the world ever drawn that type of money before?

 

Those numbers of what UFC has done helps my argument more than it hurts it. If possible though - can someone post/PM me the numbers on all of their Pay-Per-Views please? Their market in Canada is enormous. I mean, to draw 14,000 on the same day as the Stanley Cup finals, in Canada, it has to be a gemstone upon Dana's fireplace. Because Vince couldn't do that.

 

4,500 tickets for UFC @ $800,000 might be sluggish for them, but it annihilates what the WWE is able to procure. I need to know time spans and WrestleMania ticket sales to know that for sure though.

[Dooley]

This was in the Observer two weeks ago:

 

"As far as ticket sales go, the 8/6 show in Philadelphia as of a few days before you are reading this had sold 4,500 tickets for $800,000. This would be the first PPV show in years and years, since the company hit it big in 2006, where I would term advance ticket sales really bad, particularly since UFC of late has been doing most of its sales the first weekend."

 

I'm not an MMA expert, but it seems like the novelty of seeing a UFC showhas worn off and people are picking and choosing shows by their star power, which was going to happen eventually.

Based on one show in one market? And I'm not saying it definitely will, but what if the show kills on PPV? Does that make up for the slow gate?

 

UFC's buyrates and attendance numbers are definitely down from their peak

I'd still like to know what you consider the "peak".

 

 

Those numbers of what UFC has done helps my argument more than it hurts it. If possible though - can someone post/PM me the numbers on all of their Pay-Per-Views please? Their market in Canada is enormous. I mean, to draw 14,000 on the same day as the Stanley Cup finals, in Canada, it has to be a gemstone upon Dana's fireplace. Because Vince couldn't do that.

To clarify, game 1 and 2 were at Rogers Arena the previous week. Game 5 was on friday the 10th, UFC was there the next day. But Cup finals tickets being as expensive as they are, it's not like most people can afford to do both.

[Strummer]

I guess they realized Punk was too hot to not have him work Summerslam. I kinda feel bad for Del Rio but they really have to go Punk/Cena again while both are molten hot

 

oh Punk returned on RAW

[NintendoLogic]

So much for a slow burn.

[Loss]

Rey winning the title, Rey/Cena and Punk returning is potentially three months of TV. They got two hours out of it.

 

Also, I didn't see the show, but did I read correctly that Punk came to the ring via the main entrance ramp just like everyone else?

 

So ... we're back where we were before this whole thing started, I guess.

[Strummer]

again polarizing reaction to the final segment online

 

I kinda dig this back and forth wrestling stuff. It's been years

[NintendoLogic]

Not only did Punk come down the entrance ramp, he had a brand new Titantron. Also, this is kind of a minor detail, but his belt had a CM Punk nameplate.

[Blehschmidt]

Punk came out to "Cult of Personality" which shocked me a bit. I am guessing most people here are familiar, but if not, he used that in ROH after he won the title on his "last night" with the company and went all heelish on them. Nice little nod.

 

However, I was appalled when people on other boards I frequent were going "OMG Punk has a new theme song, what is it?"

 

How do you not know Cult of Personality? Sure you may not know it from him using it in ROH, but that song is a classic.

 

Damn these kids and there Justin Bieber.

[Victator]

Rey/Cena was a great match. They should of saved it but it was still a great match.

[Strummer]

It just hit my mind that WWE used "Cult of Personality" for Steve Austin's HOF video package! Slow build!

[MJH]

I don't think Rey/Cena was a great match as such - it had no middle and was far too short/rushed - but it had the carefully put together opening few minutes that established everything perfectly, one of the main things I thought Punk/Cena lacked, and was much more smartly put together in general. They also found less obvious ways into the 619 teases than you normally get, had some other creative spots, and it's clear that if given 25' on a PPV they could have a very good, if not a great match together.

 

Punk's return? It makes perfect sense for SummerSlam, as they don't have a big PPV after that until Rumble and they tend to let the Rumble match itself carry that show. But it was both far too quick, and should've featured him coming through the crowd. They didn't even need to have him get to the ring, he could've been up in the crowd by a box and simply raise the belt to Cena from there.

[smkelly]

I agree with the analysis on the Rey/Cena match...but it has already been given the moniker of a MOTYC. Good luck defending that position though.

[BBscout]

Survivor Series is in MSG this year and Rock is confirmed. Should be a big bridge between SSlam and Rumble.

[jdw]

I didn't expect Rey --> Cena. I didn't expect Punk returning tonight. I didn't expect him to return in the rather "normal" was he did (others pointed the normal items).

 

I wasn't optimistic about WWE Creative sustaining it, but this is... kind of wow. It's so Russoific that it's almost giving me a reverse psychology vibe now:

 

A. "Well that's totally ruined."

B. "Anything good now would be a postive."

C. Underpants Gnomes

D. "This angle is starting to be cool again."

 

Strange. PPV finish was good. Raw last week wasn't the best, especially the uncreative watered down title tourney and the return of Trip. Comic Con was a pretty damn good start to "free agent" Punk being a burr in the ass of the WWE, even better than the trip to the ball game and putting the belt in the frig: it was a more direct slap at the WWE. This... a quick return to normalcy.

 

I'd be interested if this always was the plan (he'd be gone for just one week off TV), or if they changed gears for some reason. If so, I'd love to know the reasons.

 

[sidebar: I do wonder now thinking about it how from a storyline standpoint they could have gotten the Comic Con footage onto TV. A mole in WWE Creative? Don't know where you go with that... hadn't really thought about that. The WWE officially wouldn't want it on, so there'd have to be a hook there. Good writing could come up with something.]

 

Going back to Cena-Punk at SummerSlam, if that's the plan... wow.

 

John

[MikeCampbell]

I expected Punk to be on RAW tonight, but I expected him to do something more. I was thinking they'd end the show with the Miz/Rey tournament final and Punk would somehow interfere and cause a non-finish and declare that he's the WWE Champion.

[Bix]

They should make the storyline reason for the return be that Punk had decided to test them to see if they'd license "Cult of Personality."

[Victator]

Realistically they gave into his demands and gave him a shitload of money. They let Cena and Rey kill themselves winning an Interim belt because HHH is a dickhead.

[cm funk]

It totally works on the level of Punk just being sick of working for Vince McMahon and willing to come back now that Vince is gone. The theme of the show was basically about how things will be different now that HHH is in charge, from the attitude era nods w/ the beer commercial and divas being a little more pg-13 in their match, to JR being brought back and Zach Ryder actually getting on tv. Some people will complain about how the Punk angle was marginalized to get HHH as CEO over....but it works.

 

It does suck that they didn't milk the Punk as renegade champion angle longer, and the title v. title angle is essentially meaningless, but all of the really out of the box ideas for this angle were a pipe dream, they did more with it than I ever thought they would, and I can't blame them for wanting him on TV while he's red hot, and wanting to pop a big SS buyrate with him and Cena. At the end of the day Punk has become a super over anti-hero character who they are giving a huge push to....it's hard to complain

[Matt D]

I'd be interested if this always was the plan (he'd be gone for just one week off TV), or if they changed gears for some reason. If so, I'd love to know the reasons.

Wasn't the plan for him not to get the belt in the first place? I think when they're too far out into unfamiliar territory they have a tendency not to want to stay there for long.

I harped on it on DVDVR but yeah, this has just become Cena's Summer Feud. Just like how Nexus did last year. I imagine Punk's smart enough to realize that too and will leverage it for as much as it's worth while he still can (see Colt, Claudio, Hero, theme) before they devour his heat, ... And please note, John, this isn't me thinking the angle is real, just commenting on Punk capitalizing on his current heat/momentum to position himself in the best place possible when it comes to those murky backstage politics!

 

All of that said, can you IMAGINE what vince'll be like if this doesn't pop a rating (and in some ways it shouldn't, because if you weren't watching the show at the beginning/middle of the night you wouldn't know Rey/Cena was going to happen)

 

In general, it sort of makes the longform Christian/Orton storytelling all the more impressive (even if I swear to you Christian even getting the rematch on PPV let alone the long program was an audible after the outcry).

[Loss]

The angle isn't necessarily destroyed. But it's something different now and I'm way less interested. Punk was the first guy since I don't know when that was not just being put in a headline position, but was being put in a position to draw money and actively challenge the status quo. Most of the guys in a headline role I wouldn't honestly say have been put in a position to draw. Punk was put in a position to draw (which he may have done, we still don't know the MITB buyrate). He may still end up a star when this is over, but this seems to be headed toward making him more an Edge-type headliner than an Austin-type headliner. This had legs until Wrestlemania had they played it right, but probably will be forgotten by Survivor Series at the latest.

[Dylan Waco]

How does Punk draw if hes not on the show. This isnt 97. We have a much more add culture. I wish they would have kept him off tv longer, but i struggle to think of how this makes him less of a draw. He was too hot to keep off tv and that moment at the end of the show made him look like a major star in a way nothing else has before.

[kjh]

I think the best Punk can really hope for is a solid Edge-type or Chris Jericho-type sustained headliner role, as the family will always be the real stars while they're still on TV and he doesn't fit the mould of the type of guy they'd build the promotion around. Anything else would be ice cream bars on top.

 

For all John's talk about how WWE creative ruined the angle, according to Meltzer their original idea was much worse than this (he wouldn't divulge what that was, but I guess it may have involved Del Rio stealing the title from Punk somehow), so I suppose we should be thankful for what we got. It sounds like they're booking on the fly worse than ever, leaving key decisions to just before they go on the air. Apparently they went back and forth several times over who would win the title tournament and lose the belt to Cena.

[Loss]

How does Punk draw if hes not on the show. This isnt 97. We have a much more add culture. I wish they would have kept him off tv longer, but i struggle to think of how this makes him less of a draw. He was too hot to keep off tv and that moment at the end of the show made him look like a major star in a way nothing else has before.

He doesn't draw at Summerslam obviously, but he draws huge with his first match back at Survivor Series, not appearing on TV until October, but running stuff off TV and buying time on TV in the meantime.