Little questions thread

[JerryvonKramer]

As it happens Dylan I do think there is an element of Austin's run being a fad. Not a fad for any of us wrestling fans, but in terms of the mainstream, yes. I've said it many times, but in this country WWF itself was little more than a fad for thousands of people. The Attitude Era was that too.

[jdw]

I apologize for my tone, but JYD as a "fad" in Mid South is... dumbfounding.

 

Dylan mentions the Birds. It was one of the best regional runs of the 80s, totally transforming a territory and remembered by the fan base there as legendary. Not in a Dangerous Alliance hardcore fandom way... but in a pure fan away of, "That was the hottest this territory has ever been."

 

The Birds hot run in WCCW was shorter than JYD's in Mid South.

 

Ishingundan's run in NJPW was from either October 8, 1982 (Choshu's turn) or October 22, 1982 (the first Choshu-Fujinami) or January 6, 1983 (the real founding of Choshu's group with Khan's turn) to September 14, 1984.

 

Choshu's Army had a run in All Japan from either November 1, 1984 (when they showed up at a AJPW card) or December 12, 1984 (working undercard dark match) or January 2, 1985 (when they joined AJPW regularly) to February 7, 1987 (when Choshu & Yatsu dropped the tag titles back to Jumbo & Tenryu).

 

Those were two transformative runs in Japan, which drew strong crowds. Each was much shorter than JYD's in Mid South.

 

Four years is a long time. It's not a fad in pro wrestling. :/

[JerryvonKramer]

What I will say is this. This thread has opened my eyes to just how much JYD took New Orleans and Louisiana in general from essentially nothing and turned it into a big wrestling area. I had actually assumed that to an extent that area had always been a hotbed, so it is totally remarkable that JYD was able to draw 21,000 people the Superdome.

 

I recognise that and I'm not trying to diminish that achievement in any way.

 

What I'm saying is -- just like the end of the Hogan run, just like the end of the Attitude era -- there comes a point where those casual fans who jump on the bandwagon, jump off it again. Call it a fad, call it whatever you want, but there's a moment when "everyone" is into something and then almost overnight they aren't.

 

We all know this. Moments when wrestling is cool, and moments when it isn't.

 

I think -- or at least this is how it looks from the numbers. That this happened on a micro level in New Orleans and the surrounding area. JYD actually created his own mini-version of what Hogan later did nationally. I totally get that. For a while there, wrestling was cool. People -- casuals -- were into it. And then, all of a sudden, they weren't.

 

But after having read quite a few books which study such phenomena -- The Tipping Point, Freakonomics, the aforementioned Thinking Fast and Slow -- the explanations are seldom to do with a change in the thing itself. The factors are multifarious. Numerous things can account for why something becomes "a thing", takes root in a community and then all of a sudden it stops being cool. It's fashion as much as anything else.

 

For some reason, wrestling is prone to coming "in and out" like makes of trainers, yo-yos and other such things, in a way that legit sports aren't. (by which I mean, football is almost always "in").

 

This is all I was getting at with the use of the word "fad". It wasn't a knock on JYD, and I can see how you might be taking it as such. Not intended.

[BrickHithouse]

What I'm saying is -- just like the end of the Hogan run, just like the end of the Attitude era -- there comes a point where those casual fans who jump on the bandwagon, jump off it again. Call it a fad, call it whatever you want, but there's a moment when "everyone" is into something and then almost overnight they aren't.

I swear I'm not trying to be a troll...generally the point when people jump off is when The Product goes to shit. Not always, but most of the time.

[JerryvonKramer]

Is it almost always that though, or is it people retroactively looking back and pointing to it as a causal explanation?

 

I can see how this argument is almost perversely counter-intuitive because once you've made the link between a decline in quality and a decline in business it looks as clear as your face.

 

Think about Happy Days. Famously, it "jumped the shark" in 1977, but was still pulling big ratings for years after that. It was only in 82 that the numbers dropped off steeply. Now you might point to the quality of the show, or you might think about changes in fashion. Maybe what was entertaining in 1976 wasn't entertaining anymore in 1983.

 

I'll grant you that "the product" has the allure of great explanatory power, but I think it can also blind you to other factors. The relationship between product and audience is almost never a 1 to 1 thing in so straightforward a way.

[BrickHithouse]

I don't know shit about Happy Days

[Johnny Sorrow]

I don't know shit about Happy Days

I do. More than anyone should, probably. Later on after a few beers I'll delve into this comparison.

[JerryvonKramer]

A curious phenomena with these big debates we have sometimes is that I get PMs of support from silent observers. This is the fourth time it's happened now over the past year. I guess not everyone is comfortable posting in such back and forth ding dongs. I can understand that.

 

Anyway, a question from such a silent onlooker. I think a valid one, which, I suspect, will see some elaboration on what is meant by "product" here:

 

"I would actually like someone in that thread explain why wrestling is different from other forms of entertainment where the audience cares so much about quality."

 

Also, I personally can't wait for Johnny's stoned / drunk lecture on the fluctuating fortunes of Happy Days.

[Dylan Waco]

Define "quality."

[Matt D]

A curious phenomena with these big debates we have sometimes is that I get PMs of support from silent observers. This is the fourth time it's happened now over the past year. I guess not everyone is comfortable posting in such back and forth ding dongs. I can understand that.

 

Anyway, a question from such a silent onlooker. I think a valid one, which, I suspect, will see some elaboration on what is meant by "product" here:

 

"I would actually like someone in that thread explain why wrestling is different from other forms of entertainment where the audience cares so much about quality."

 

Also, I personally can't wait for Johnny's stoned / drunk lecture on the fluctuating fortunes of Happy Days.

If Johnny was a wrestling character, he could absolutely manage the Ding Dongs

[Johnny Sorrow]

If Johnny was a wrestling character, he could absolutely manage the Ding Dongs

I'd get 'em over, too.

[JerryvonKramer]

Define "quality."

I can't speak for him / her (lol, yeah right "her"), but I think the idea is that if you look at films for example, it's frequently the case that poor films -- which even the people going to see them don't think are very good -- do very well. And, of course, the inverse.

 

The same is true across most forms of entertainment. To the extent where the relationship between "the product" and its popularity almost seems random. To the extent where films that almost no one likes (or admits to liking) make all-time boxoffice lists.

 

I don't know if the "50 Shades of Grey" craze has hit the US or not, but I've literally never heard a single good word said about that book by anyone. Not in life, or on TV. But it's a smash bestseller. A "product" that virtually everyone shits on, a product that is by all accounts putrid. And yet it's a smash.

 

Why is wrestling different from that?

[ohtani's jacket]

Does fad have a different usage in the US?

 

Beauty Pair was a fad. The Crush Girls was a fad. UWF was a fad. The WWF's mainstream appeal in the mid-to-late 80s was a fad. The WWF's international appeal in the late 80s was a fad. Austin's popular was a fad. The attitude era was a fad. In the Junkyard Dog's case, it's difficult to know whether he was a fad or not because he was pinched by Vince before it was apparent whether he was another Bruno or not.

[Johnny Sorrow]

Ok, first of all, when Fonzie actually jumped the shark, it didn't affect the ratings at all.

 

Ok, so to put this in Wrestling terms. The best comparison to the JYD stuff is actually when Richie and Ralph left the show. Now, the silly storylines were getting people talking in a negative way, but as a fan of Happy Days, I remember thinking that the show couldn't exist without them, but I stuck with the show because I loved it so much, the same way a lot of wrestling fans stick with a promotion for awhile before it dies out. And when Richie left, they brought in Roger as a replacement, like Watts did with George Wells and others for JYD. They had some success with putting the focus on Joanie and Chachi. Then, they try and expand into some new territories/ timeslots with Joanie Loves Chachi, sending three beloved mid carders (Al, as well as the title characters) away from home. Things started really going downhill as you now had a show with just Fonzie, The Cunninghams, and Potsie with new characters they tried to push like Flip and KC that no one wanted to see. Old veteran Pat Morita was brought back up to the promotion, but at this point the quality of the product was pretty bad. Still, people watched out of loyalty to the promotion.

The Tuesday timeslot was also a big factor, as Happy Days owned that time for a hell of a long time, so people were comfortable flipping on ABC and seeing the show, even though the product was bad.

They attempted some hot shot booking with the two parter where Richie and Ralph come back, and while that produced some good word of mouth, but the writing was on the wall. Joanie and Chachi were brought back but by this time it was over. Happy Days was moved to Thursdays right as the Juggernaut known as NBC Must See Thursdays was getting underway.

 

So you see, people do tend to stick around after a show/ promotion loses it's biggest attraction. That being actually Richie, not Fonz. Or to be fair, it was Richie and the Fonz as a team. Once the show actually starred the Fonz, they had a lot of trouble finding ways to use him. He's a teacher, he's Dean of Men at a boys school, etc, etc...

 

But the quality of the product caused the show to eventually lose fans over the course of time, and the death knell was desperate attempts at replacing the stars who made the territory so hot that at one point they expanded into two more timeslot territories successfully with Laverne and Shirley and Mork and Mindy.

 

We won't discuss Blansky's Beauties, as it was a disaster.

 

I'm not a big numbers guy, but I think they tell the story of Garry Marshall Promotions

 

Ratings

 

Season 1 (1974): #16 [27] (21.5 rating)

Season 2 (1974–1975): Not in Top 30 "Good Times", booked on CBS by Booker Fred Silverman was booked there as a direct challenge to Happy Days.

Season 3 (1975–1976): #11 [28] (23.9 rating) Change of promotional style, Silverman then jumps to ABC and has to save the show he was trying to bury the year before.

Season 4 (1976–1977): #1 [29] (31.5 rating) Change of style mixed with Fonz as the now #2 Babyface

Season 5 (1977–1978): #2 [30] (31.4 rating)

Season 6 (1978–1979): #3 [31] (28.6 rating)

Season 7 (1979–1980): #17 [32] (21.7 rating) Silly storylines do start to affect things

Season 8 (1980–1981): #15 [33] (20.8 rating)Richie and Ralph leave

Season 9 (1981–1982): #18 [34] (20.6 rating)

Season 10 (1982–1983): #28 [35] (17.4 rating)

Season 11 (1983–1984): #63

 

Now, the show did manage to hang onto viewers after Richie left, but you can see that the combination of bad pushes, leaving characters, and bad storylines all which are "the product" caused the fall of the promotion.

 

 

[goodhelmet]

That was fucking awesome.

[shoe]

Now someone needs to do a Dallas one.

[Bix]

A curious phenomena with these big debates we have sometimes is that I get PMs of support from silent observers. This is the fourth time it's happened now over the past year. I guess not everyone is comfortable posting in such back and forth ding dongs. I can understand that.

If JVK was a Resident Evil sock puppet that would explain a lot. I'm having flashbacks to his mythical surveys.

[El-P]

Define "quality."

I can't speak for him / her (lol, yeah right "her"), but I think the idea is that if you look at films for example, it's frequently the case that poor films -- which even the people going to see them don't think are very good -- do very well. And, of course, the inverse.

 

The same is true across most forms of entertainment. To the extent where the relationship between "the product" and its popularity almost seems random. To the extent where films that almost no one likes (or admits to liking) make all-time boxoffice lists.

 

I don't know if the "50 Shades of Grey" craze has hit the US or not, but I've literally never heard a single good word said about that book by anyone. Not in life, or on TV. But it's a smash bestseller. A "product" that virtually everyone shits on, a product that is by all accounts putrid. And yet it's a smash.

 

Why is wrestling different from that?

 

Agreed.

 

We're getting into tricky territory when talking about quality and the success of a wrestling product. Hell, of any "cultural" product. Would anyone argue that 1999 WWF was a great wrestling product and that's why they were so successful ? WWF in 1999 was nearly unwatchable to me, to the point of driving me away. The booking was awful. The wrestling was awful. But the product was hot. WWF fans loved Sable, her platic tits and her godawful delivery. WWF audience in 1999 didn't give a shit about *wrestling* and only wanted to chant along with catchphrases and show their sign on TV. The product delivered that in spades. The product was hot. But was the product *good* ?

 

There was this movie in France a few years ago, "Bienvenue chez les Ch'ti", which beat nearly every box office records in the country, including the biggest grossing comedy of all-time dating back from the 60's "La Grande Vadrouille." It nearly beat "Titanic" ! It was a cultural phenomenon, nobody could escape it. There were people that supposedly didn't go to the movies in more than 20 years suddenly going to see that one. And why ? It was a decent popualr comedy, nothing shameful but nothing to brag about either. There are reasons why this huge success happened, we can analyze them after the fact, as it wasn't even a huge marketing campaign that made the movie this awesome grossing machine. It just happened. Same thing happened again with "Intouchable" two years ago, attaining the third place in biggest box-office success ever for a French movie. Again, decent comedy at best, nothing special. Yet it became like this amazing phenomenon. The "product" was nothing exceptionnal, hell some would argue it wasn't very good at all. Yet it clicked like no one's business.

 

I heard one interesting remark about Steve Austin. Dutch Mantell said in an interview, talking about the all-time great talkers, said that Austin had to "cheat" a little bit. Don't get me wrong, Dutch gives full credit for Austin and his talent but he also points out that Austin had the luck to be the very first one to say "I'm going to kick your *ass*" on national TV on a wrestling show. And since he was the first one, it set him apart big time. Of course it totally fit his character, more than it would have with anyone else, but still, I thought this was an interesting remark. I always thought that guys like the Road Warriors having to say "I'm gonna kick you butt" did feel a bit goofy and cartoonish. Austin said *ass* first. Set him apart. Just a side remark.

[JerryvonKramer]

All I was trying to point out last night was that as wrestling fans we're going to be drawn most to a causal relationship between "the product" and the size of the audience. It is also a kind of self-justification -- wrestling "experts" can derive a certain sense of self worth from seeing their own knowledge of the product reflected back at them when they use it to explain the box office. This happens in pretty much every field -- not just wrestling -- every field.

 

Now, I suspect jdw and the other people on that side of this argument will come back and say that they weren't talking about "quality" so much as "what the people want to see".

 

But this argument is circular. "What the people want to see" is fickle. Fashion is fickle. Audiences are subject to change without warning. And as a wrestling promoter there's one thing you can't control: the name on the marquee is wrestling, and wrestling might be the thing that people don't want to see.

 

This brings me back to my point about wrestling often being a fad. For whatever reason, the wider wrestling audience, historically, has not worked like the audience of Happy Days that Johnny Sorrow described. I very much doubt that the millions of people who continued to tune into that show after 1977 were all hardcore "loyal" Happy Days fans, they weren't. They were mostly "casuals" who were sticking on the TV who were just ok with watching it. So that show somehow was able to continue drawing an audience despite the fact it had mostly gone to shit. Why is that? It's because the genre of middling mainstream sitcoms are "over" with the US audience en masse. Mainstream sitcoms are not a fad. Happy Days wasn't a fad.

 

Wrestling doesn't enjoy that status. The US audience en masse has always fluctuated. Audiences are much more prone to "appear" almost over night and just as quickly evaporate. This is the very definition of a fad. It is also what happened in New Orleans. It is also what happened during the Attitude Era.

 

Let's think of other fads in culture and ask ourselves what is mostly to blame for the fact they decline after a spike? Here are some options:

 

- It is the product (think now, lots of times the product stays the same)

- the consumers lose interest because the novelty wears off and then move on to something else.

- the market dynamics shift or something changes in the economy

- regression to the mean

- something else (cite your own explanation here)

 

And once again, the question remains: what makes wrestling any different?

 

We'd all love to believe that strong booking and strong cards = big gates and high ratings and by the same token bad booking and weak cards = bad gates and bad ratings. That really makes "sense" to us. It underlines everything we believe as wrestling fans. It justifies our criticisms of certain promotions. It makes us feel clever that we can pinpoint what Bill Watts or Eric Biscoff did wrong at a given moment. And -- this is the clincher -- it makes for good narrative, a very coherent story with cause and effect. We humans love a good narrative.

 

But let's face it -- Watts, Bischoff, Vince, any promoter, any booker -- are often dealing with forces far beyond their control.

 

Who KNOWS what killed New Orleans. Hell, I mentioned Mario earlier, what's to say all the New Orleans kids didn't spend the summer of 1986 playing Super Mario Bros and Punchout!! Fuck wrestling, that was last year, I want to stomp on some goombas now. We can't know what it was for sure. But we sure as hell can't be 95% certain -- as jdw has said -- that it was "the product".

[Dylan Waco]

The problem with this is that I don't think anyone in this thread is saying that good booking/good matches will yield good results or vice versa. That's an assumption you have that you are projecting onto those who are arguing that the product was the source of Watts failings.

[JerryvonKramer]

The problem with this is that I don't think anyone in this thread is saying that good booking/good matches will yield good results or vice versa. That's an assumption you have that you are projecting onto those who are arguing that the product was the source of Watts failings.

Let's take a look over the thread:

 

Another possibility for the complete collapse of the New Orleans attendance figures as compared to their other key cities: maybe something happened in New Orleans to kill the town? My guess would be that this idea on the previous show that drew 13,000:

Barbed Wire Steel Cage: Terry Taylor d. Buddy Roberts

Steel Cage: Steve Williams d. Michael Hayes (these matches were at the same time with one cage on top of the other)

 

was a real disaster of a match and really turned off the fans.

To me the evidence points most to theory #1. The first few Superdome cards listed are absolutely loaded. R&R vs. MX all over the place, NWA title matches, JYD vs. Butch Reed in a ghetto street fight, prime Jake Roberts, prime Duggan, prime DiBiase, Steve Williams. It goes on and on. I'd pay to see those cards.

 

The last card has some strong performers for sure, but I don't think there's a single match where I find both participants compelling. And the freebirds wrestling twice? I'm not even sure I'd watch that card for free.

I think you'd agree that this assumption is not something I've parachuted in.

 

95% of the time companies drop or die, it's because of the Product. It stops pulling in the fans.

I also believe that in the above post, if you read it carefully, I point out that jdw (and implicitly you) aren't saying that product and quality are the same thing. Read what I said. Can you also see how that argument is circular and how it might not be the booker's fault?

 

Also, there's a post I missed earlier.

 

 

Have you read Daniel Kahneman's Thinking Fast and Slow?

Yes. And I'm laughing at you applying it to pro wrestling.

I actually don't understand what this is meant to mean. It implies that pro wrestling somehow functions with a different set of principles from the rest of the world. I find this the most baffling comment anyone has made thus far in this whole debate.

[Dylan Waco]

I've read what you said a few times and don't understand the point. To me it just comes across as the opposite of what you are suggesting "the product" people are saying. I.E. "I don't want to believe it's the product, so it's not the product."

[khawk20]

As a fan of Happy Days, that comparison is pretty much bang-on.

[Log]

Does fad have a different usage in the US?

 

Beauty Pair was a fad. The Crush Girls was a fad. UWF was a fad. The WWF's mainstream appeal in the mid-to-late 80s was a fad. The WWF's international appeal in the late 80s was a fad. Austin's popular was a fad. The attitude era was a fad. In the Junkyard Dog's case, it's difficult to know whether he was a fad or not because he was pinched by Vince before it was apparent whether he was another Bruno or not.

 

I'm born/raised in US, and this is how I'd define fad, too. WWF's boom in the 80's was totally a fad at my school. I was probably 3rd or 4th grade when it really hit (87-88). By fifth grade, there were only a couple of us still watching. The 90's Austin thing came about when I was in college. By 2000, there were very few of my friends still interested in wrestling.

 

I think guys like jdw may have a different perspective from me. I lived through that time as a kid who was a fan of WWF, etc. I had no insight into the dirtsheets or whatever. I just know that wrestling was a "cool" thing to watch/talk about for a while, then it wasn't. That's a fad, to me.

[soup23]

I think 92 WCW was really awesome. Catered very well to my interests. But it did not cater well to the interest of consumers. Were there external factors? Yes. But SMW was doing well in the same region and there is no way to excuse how poorly they were doing. The only explanation that works is "not enough people liked the product." Just because I think it's great and hardcore fans now really love the Dangerous Alliance doesn't mean it was good for business.

 

 

 

I don't know that I would use John's tone there and I enjoy discussing wrestling with you Jerry, but I find it bothersome that JYD's run is being casually referred to as a fad. Was Hogan's run in the AWA a fad? Austin's in the WWF? Mr. Wrestling II in Georgia? Freebirds in World Class? Four years is an awfully good run in wrestling. Not everyone is Lawler or Colon as a homesteader or Andre as an attraction all over for years. Calling JYD's run a "fad" is weak and though I'm about as un-PC a guy as you'll find, but there I can't help but read it and think "would anyone say this if a white guy had that sort of record?"

The first paragraph sums up how I view wrestling product. I can freely admit that most of the time my favorite type of wrestling is generally not the one that did the best at the box office. That is why I love when that difference does overlap.

 

The second paragraph I think is important in establishing parameters on what everyones base is to consider something a fad. If we set a 5 year mark, then very few in wrestling history I think could pass the parameter of being more than a fad.