All Elite Wrestling

[Coffey]

Brian Cage is not a very good promo, or a very good worker... and he looks great but he's also pretty short. He's not big enough to be a big man but he's so jacked he's like stuck in no man's land. I personally feel like it would be really hard to book him. I have no idea what you would do with him. Also, he's been everywhere non-WWE for so long he some how feels overexposed, which was the same thing I thought about John Morrison right before WWE hired him back.

I actually think he might be better off in WWE. 

[Stiva]

I liked him as Moxley’s Monster of the Month when he debuted but everything since then has been diminishing returns. Especially when Starks and Hobbs are clearly the Team Taz guys you should be getting behind. And Hook, if he’s any good in ring, has great presence already. Taz was right to bin him in kayfabe

[El-P]

Brian Cage is a guy who can do a lot of things inside the ring and looks unique doing it. In that respect he's like RVD. Paired with the right people, it can produce super fun matches. But he lacks personality and charisma, and certainly won't put a compelling match together on his own unless he's part of an insane spotfest, which is something in itself. He's useful in the upper mid-card, maybe TNT champ level if he really gets over big but I'm not sure I'd go that far.

The irony is that actually, Melissa Santos is the one person that should be thrown into the mix if they want to get Cage over as a superstar. That's exactly what they did in IMPACT and it gave us the best Brian Cage ever (that and of course being paired with Sami Callihan who's been the MVP star maker of the last few years, elevating and making care about everyone he's been paired with). Melissa was also awesome in the Dark Fénix storyline in LU and she was the best ring announcer ever there too. When Cage was signed I was hoping to see her used in a meaningfull capacity in AEW eventually, and since she won't be the ring announcer she had to be part of an angle to help her husband get over. That was be pretty awesome to see Melissa again.

Then, there's the fact Cage may not be the smartest guy in term of politics (let's say he would be right at home with Jericho I guess)... He's also good friend with Tessa Blanchard I believe. 

[funkdoc]

Bix speculated that, more so than Tessa, it's his public friendship with Redacted Penisman that keeps him from getting pushed more.  That would make sense to me considering how important that kind of stuff is to the core AEW fanbase - he's a PR nightmare waiting to happen if he gets a belt.

If you look at his recent W-L record AEW is basically using him as the Monster Job Guy a la Kane, and i'm OK with that.  Give me Powerhouse Hobbs any day!

[Zoo Enthusiast]

Brian Cage is a big fan of Drake Wuertz’s political aspirations.  If I was Tony Khan, I’d be perfectly fine with allowing Cage to chase his dream of being a superstar on the independents again.

[El-P]

In other news, the next goal post moving is..... key demos don't matter and they are an invention of Dave Meltzer ! 

I mean, it took only two years before it happened.

[FMKK]

I think Brian Cage has done just fine in AEW and his push has been at the right level for someone like him. Comes in as a top heel to challenge the babyface champion, gets cycled down to challenge the secondary champion and is now putting over a younger prospect in Ricky Starks. In prior eras of wrestling that was the normal life cycle for a Brian Cage type before he moves on to the next territory. If he stays with AEW, his best case scenario is as a credible gatekeeper for anyone in line for a bigger push or someone for an actual star to beat when they're between programmes. He doesn't warrant a bigger push than that. Honestly, I think they've squeezed all the juice they can out of him and if he's unhappy, then he should just do the clean job to Starks next week and then head for the exit. They can always bring him back in a couple of years as a surprise battle royal entrant or something. Yeah idiots will make out like its a big deal if he goes but wrestlers leaving a promotion when their story has been told is just fine.

The less said about his fucking moronic politics and personal life the better. 

[FMKK]

Tony Khan said on Busted Open Radio that All Out did over 200k buys, although he doesn't have the absolute final number. That would make it the biggest non-WWE show since WCW Mayhem in 1999 and also a bigger show than Money In The Bank 2011.

[Coffey]

For comparison sake, what kind of PPV numbers are the UFC getting these days? Or the Jake Paul boxing shitfests?

[C.S.]

12 hours ago, Coffey said:

Brian Cage is not a very good promo, or a very good worker... and he looks great but he's also pretty short. He's not big enough to be a big man but he's so jacked he's like stuck in no man's land.

So, basically a less interesting Tony Nese? (Who himself isn't interesting at all.)

[Steenalized]

3 hours ago, Coffey said:

For comparison sake, what kind of PPV numbers are the UFC getting these days? Or the Jake Paul boxing shitfests?

Askren PPV supposedly did 1.5M buys. Haven't seen anything on Woodley yet which makes me wonder if it disappointed

[Boss Rock]

The last UFC ppv, Gane vs. Lewis, is estimated to have done about 400k. https://www.itnwwe.com/mma/ufc-265-ppv-buys-payouts-salaries/. That's about their average for a non-stacked card or a main event that doesn't have huge name value.

[Boss Rock]

As for Cage, he works best as a mid-card heel or tag worker. I enjoyed his work as a heel in LU.

[Zoo Enthusiast]

8 minutes ago, Boss Rock said:

As for Cage, he works best as a mid-card heel or tag worker. I enjoyed his work as a heel in LU.

I liked a lot of his stuff in PWG but there's very little Reseda-era PWG I don't have rose colored glasses for.

[KawadaSmile]

14 minutes ago, Steenalized said:

Askren PPV supposedly did 1.5M buys. Haven't seen anything on Woodley yet which makes me wonder if it disappointed

From what I've seen, it's around the 1M mark, but they're still counting

[sek69]

The irony of Cage is that WWE would probably be the best place for him, but his one distinguishing  characteristic (being cartoonishly jacked in an era where that is rare) won't be able to pass the Wellness test. They only turn a knowingly blind eye to the tip top main guys, and even if they would do it for him, it gives the company an easy way to fire him if he becomes too much of a hassle for them ("oops you seem to have failed this test we somehow never caught you on before"). 

[MoS]

The Askren PPV numbers have been massively inflated as per Meltz, for what it's worth. 

UFC's buys are listed here - https://www.tapology.com/search/mma-event-figures/ppv-pay-per-view-buys-buyrate It is ordered per descending buys and not in chronological order, which is unfortunate. The UFC also no longer shares the PPV numbers of events that do real bad, so there are some gaps there. 

[Timbo Slice]

Cage is like 5’8. He’d be WWE John Silver. 

[Coffey]

I honestly didn't know that UFC was still that popular. Those numbers really surprise me. Maybe I just fell out of the UFC bubble but man, when The Ultimate Fighter first started, I couldn't go anywhere without UFC stuff being everywhere. Even the damn grocery store. I don't even know who the draws or champions are anymore.

[MoS]

They've gained some decent star power in the last couple of years with the three African Kings becoming legit draws, along with Masvidal and Nate Diaz still being a draw. Their non-Conor PPV buys were quite poor just a few years back. 

[Zoo Enthusiast]

UFC just runs too many shows but the numbered events are still typically a fairly big deal and worth watching.  They’re kind of similar to WWE in that their main purpose seems to be to create hours of programming for their TV partners.

[Dale Wolfe]

I'd disagree that UFC does too many shows. If you look at the fight nights as their raw/dynamite and the numbered shows as the supercards then it makes a lot more sense. I think the smaller shows have been doing a good job of making possible stars lately- think Chimaev & Holland could have been breakouts recently if not for covid & Holland's brain fart in his last fight 

Not sure what that makes the contender series though- worldwide? 

[NintendoLogic]

I wasn't aware that Cage was a legit chud. I read an interview where he implied that the Team Trump stuff in AAA was a work. Anyway, they utilized him about as well as they could when they programmed him with the world champion and then the TNT champion right off the bat. He's kind of like Sid in that he blows people away when they first see him but wears out his welcome in a hurry. He can't be a face for any length of time because he looks like a douchebag and has zero charisma, and he doesn't have the promo ability to be a top heel. His realistic ceiling in a major league promotion is #3 guy in a heel stable.

[KawadaSmile]

He'd be perfect as Miz's muscle

[Migs]

If Cage wants to be a top guy, he'd be much better off going to back to Impact or doing MLW (they are trying to do an LU type deal...).