Dale Wolfe Posted November 8, 2019 Report Share Posted November 8, 2019 I would argue that these venues are quite optimistic for a small organisation to fill weekly, despite hype within internet wrestling bubbles. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ricky Jackson Posted November 8, 2019 Author Report Share Posted November 8, 2019 The modern hardcore audience is extremely passionate and supportive of what they love, but there just isn't enough of them to turn back the clock to 1998. This is more like 1995 in many ways, low attendance and irrelevance for WWE, a new contender on the national stage (of course WCW had been national for years, but Nitro was new and different) and a similarly passionate hardcore fanbase wanting change. Things are so different now, though. Who knows what the future holds, something could catch fire, but I dont know if a major boom is still possible Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Dog Posted November 8, 2019 Report Share Posted November 8, 2019 4 hours ago, Ricky Jackson said: The modern hardcore audience is extremely passionate and supportive of what they love, but there just isn't enough of them to turn back the clock to 1998. This is more like 1995 in many ways, low attendance and irrelevance for WWE, a new contender on the national stage (of course WCW had been national for years, but Nitro was new and different) and a similarly passionate hardcore fanbase wanting change. Things are so different now, though. Who knows what the future holds, something could catch fire, but I dont know if a major boom is still possible That's been my thought the last few weeks. The last 6 weeks of TV just tells me there are far fewer wrestling fans out there than we thought. I have said on here before, the wrestling industry is starting to look like the comic book industry. A shrinking fanbase getting more and more burnt out on endless amounts of meaningless content. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Log Posted November 8, 2019 Report Share Posted November 8, 2019 There won't be another "boom period" anytime soon. The problem is, everyone wants to recreate the last boom instead of thinking of something new to appeal to draw in new fans. Seriously, name one promotion today who is doing something unique to grab new eyeballs? I'd say the only fairly recent examples are Lucha Underground and that promotion MTV tried to start up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dale Wolfe Posted November 8, 2019 Report Share Posted November 8, 2019 No-one has enough charisma to create a boom. A lot of talk about Cody's promo and Jerichos video but ultimately its only catering to a specific niche and a half-decent funny or die sketch, at best. Maybe at some point it will click- and AEW is okay I guess- but they're not doing enough to really be a unique product Edit- fair play Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sek69 Posted November 8, 2019 Report Share Posted November 8, 2019 Cosplay really needs to disappear from the vocabulary of wrestling fans nowadays. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FMKK Posted November 9, 2019 Report Share Posted November 9, 2019 Realistically, anyone who thought there was a boom period coming in October 2019 was very naive. WWE has dominated the landscape for twenty years and have been running off audiences steadily while reinforcing their vision of wrestling as the only one in the eyes of most people. They have such institutional rot that it would take them years to turn around fan perceptions about them even if they started producing amazing shows consistently. AEW is trying to carve out a niche from nothing in that monopolised environment. They haven't been a runaway success like WCW 1997 or whatever but they're going steady, producing good shows and gradually getting new people over with the fans. Yeah there's room for improvement but I think they're doing well in a tough environment and the changes they need to make are minor enough that it's conceivable that they can find that ideal formula for weekly TV. They need patience for a long slog. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C.S. Posted November 9, 2019 Report Share Posted November 9, 2019 22 hours ago, sek69 said: Cosplay really needs to disappear from the vocabulary of wrestling fans nowadays. Don't venture into the NWA Powerrr thread then, where that word is overused rather obnoxiously. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sek69 Posted November 14, 2019 Report Share Posted November 14, 2019 AEW: 957,000 NXT: 750,000 AEW gets a nice PPV bump, and apparently the main roster fans who checked out NXT last week didn't come back for week 2 of the invasion angle. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FMKK Posted November 14, 2019 Report Share Posted November 14, 2019 Just now, sek69 said: AEW: 957,000 NXT: 750,000 AEW gets a nice PPV bump, and apparently the main roster fans who checked out NXT last week didn't come back for week 2 of the invasion angle. Was just about to post this. I think the lesson WWE will take from this is that they need to load up the Survivor Series go-home shows with NXT stars on Raw and Smackdown and main roster guys on NXT and promote it hard. I actually think that could be enough to give them a one-week win. But the main roster TV was cold this week so the lack of excitement there probably drags down NXT. Ultimately, even if NXT win a couple of weeks by loading up the shows with Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins, AJ Styles, Becky Lynch etc. that is hotshot stuff that isn't sustainable. I'm impressed by AEW remaining patient, not booking in a reactive manner and playing the long game to get over new stars when they could do their own hotshots and run gimmick matches, Omega vs Cody, Moxley vs Jericho or whatever on the weekly show. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeteF3 Posted November 14, 2019 Report Share Posted November 14, 2019 As we learned in week 1--and I'm assuming it's continued though I confess to not having checked--there's less crossover between AEW and WWE audiences than you might think. So WWE might be able to increase the number of their fans who'll tune into NXT, but AEW needs to worry about booking to their own audience, period. Their audience is not only not that likely to flip over to see Roman Reigns, he might make it even less likely that they do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MoS Posted November 14, 2019 Report Share Posted November 14, 2019 Yeah, reading the quarter numbers in last week's Observer, the problem was not that the audience was switching to NXT; NXT grew its own audience throughout the two hours. This is definitely a step in the right direction. This week's Dynamite was probably the best one so far, so they are listening to their audience and giving them what they want. They will have to make peace with the fact that if WWE REALLY wanted to beat them on Wednesdays, they would just advertise Becky, Roman and Bryan for Wednesday and they would win. The NXT invasion angle, if done well, can be huge and AEW simply don't have the resources to do something similar in response. The focus has to be to build their own characters and get over everyone on the roster as big stars on a major show, so that they increase their numbers and get more fans. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sek69 Posted November 14, 2019 Report Share Posted November 14, 2019 If WWE would have promoted that AJ and the Club were going to be on NXT instead of making it an internet announcement, they probably would have won last week. It was a real "in the bubble" moment for WWE. AEW is doing everything smart so far, they may make comments to pop the fans or poke the bear, but they largely ignore the "war" and focus on building their programs. Plus the expectation from TNT going in was 500,000 to 600,000 weekly so they are playing with house money. Since they are doing well in the 18-49 demo they probably are making money off the ad revenue (not Smackdown on Fox money, but decent money most likely) and with TNT covering production costs they might just be making a profit off this already or are close to it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted November 15, 2019 Report Share Posted November 15, 2019 2 hours ago, sek69 said: apparently the main roster fans who checked out NXT last week didn't come back for week 2 of the invasion angle. Considering the history of WWE booked invasion angles, that's not very surprising. 1 hour ago, sek69 said: AEW is doing everything smart so far, they may make comments to pop the fans or poke the bear, but they largely ignore the "war" and focus on building their programs. Yeah, this is really what I thought with this week's show. They are doing the exact opposite of what WCW was doing when they began to lose. No hot-shotting, focus on your own product, build and listen to your own audience. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gulus Posted November 18, 2019 Report Share Posted November 18, 2019 We now have another company drawing about million tv viewers each week. How often has that happen in past two decades? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gulus Posted November 18, 2019 Report Share Posted November 18, 2019 On 11/15/2019 at 11:50 AM, El-P said: Considering the history of WWE booked invasion angles, that's not very surprising. Yeah, this is really what I thought with this week's show. They are doing the exact opposite of what WCW was doing when they began to lose. No hot-shotting, focus on your own product, build and listen to your own audience. Same formula WWF used to beat WCW Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FMKK Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 NXT finally wins a week. 916k to 893k, although AEW still won in every demo except over 50s. Both sides can make their arguments for a good night here but the difference is that AEW just had a standard show while NXT threw the kitchen sink at it booking-wise. Is that sustainable? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 1 minute ago, FMKK said: NXT the whole WWE Universe finally wins a week. 916k to 893k, although AEW still won in every demo except over 50s. Both sides can make their arguments for a good night here but the difference is that AEW just had a standard show while NXT threw the kitchen sink at it booking-wise. Is that sustainable? No. Unless you have main roster guys running rampage every week on NXT. While being paid like main roster guys, working with guys with NXT contracts. Can't wait for the WWE fanboys to act like their corporate darling finally trumped (see what I did there) the godforsaken pissant company and it means AEW is gonna be dead in a few weeks/months. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FMKK Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 Well it's clear that AEW is playing more of a long game, trying to build stars in Darby, MJF, Scorpio and others as time goes on. NXT to a degree lucked into this angle with the Saudi flight delay but I'm not sure if they keep running with invasion stuff post-Survivor Series. I guess they could but it will get watered down. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sek69 Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 If they keep it up, then it's not really NXT it's just another main roster show on Wednesdays. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Dog Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 I think the law of dimenishing returns is going to kick in quick with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FMKK Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 Meanwhile, Cody Rhodes is the smartest man in the business pulling the old Hogan trick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sek69 Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 If nothing else, watching AEW will show you Cody clearly is working from his dad's playbook for pretty much everything he's doing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SirEdger Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 Interesting dynamic though; NXT needed everything RAW & SD could offer to finally get that first win over AEW. Conversely, RAW & SD has done a bit better with ratings since the NXT invasion angle started. What's gonna happen when everything returns to normal on Monday? Sure, we can say that NXT has gained many eyeballs during the past month but can they stay the course? If I'm AEW, I'm not even sweating this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FMKK Posted November 21, 2019 Report Share Posted November 21, 2019 I wonder what impact the overrun makes for NXT. This was close enough that it may have been what tipped them into the victory. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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