Is the empire crumbling before our eyes?

[C.S.]

Quoting this from another thread:

On 8/20/2021 at 3:04 AM, MoS said:

So nice of Ariel Helwani to branch out from creating drama and spreading gossip in MMA to creating drama and spreading gossip in professional wrestling. Just what we needed!

It turns out Ariel Helwani's agent used to be - drumroll - Nick Khan.

So, I expect this to be a regular arrangement going forward - similar to Peter Rosenberg, Sam Roberts, etc.

[cm funk]

2 hours ago, strobogo said:

When the hell was ROH even remotely a threat? ROH the same month they had their biggest crowd ever up to that point (Kenny vs Cody show was like 6200 people or something WM weekend) they drew something like 250 for their next taping. By the time ROH/NJPW ran MSG, the super indy phase of NXT had been going on for 4+ years already and that was a once in a life time event. There's zero chance ROH would have sold out MSG without NJPW, and if tickets hadn't gone on sale when they had all of the Elite guys who were expected to be there when the event was announced. 

 

It was very, very, immediately clear that the only draws for ROH were NJPW and The Elite for years and even when those relationships were still active, ROH was regularly drawing a couple hundred people to shows without them on the cards. ROH was never a threat because Sinclair has never given a shit about them to put any money into them to be any kind of threat to begin with. But also because ROH has been even worse than WWE for ages.

I'm looking at it from Vince's perspective.  ROH was a potential threat if only for the fact that they had Sinclair backing them.  And Vince being Vince he certainly knew how powerful Sinclair Broadcasting was even back a decade ago.  Sinclair never attempted to be competition even on the TNA scale, but in terms of resources and reach all it took was the next Bischoff at the right time, or Vince/Linda snubbing the wrong asshole at a Repub fundraiser.  I don't think Vince liked even the possibility of competition with that kind of backing behind it after seeing what Turner was able to do

In reality everything you say about ROH, NJPW, The Elite is undoubtedly true, and that potential has manifested in AEW with ROH left in the dust

[cm funk]

nm

Edited August 24, 2021 by cm funk
double post

[Jmare007]

I'm struggling to come up with anything that WWE has in their arsenal as to get the kind of buzz and positive perception AEW is getting now and will get in the coming month with Danielson and Cole/Wyatt (or both) showing up. Not talking about drawing and making a profit because WWE can do jackshit for 12 months straight and still get tens of millions each month, but they finally have competition that is constantly getting a lot of attention and positive reactions, and I'm amazed at how little WWE has to counter that as said competition has set itself up to get even more attention and positive buzz in the immediate future.

WWE already went with Becky and Brock. Ronda can't comeback yet I think and even if Rock is available (a huge what if anyways), that's like 5 to 7 months down the line. And sure, they can still try to call on nostalgia acts to generate something, but I don't think anything of that sort can fight what AEW is doing. A mass NXT call up has been rendered useless after the damage they've done to the brand and up coming talent in the last 4 years. What else do they have??

I feel like WWE's only option is just to sit tight and try shit out with what they have, but that's gonna take a while to gain momentum and it needs good booking in a lot of fronts, something we know WWE is allergic to.

I guess them being bought would be a momentous occasion that would turn the wrestling world upside down and put every eye on them again but that's an external factor.

 

[sek69]

WWE is having the chickens come home to roost after relying on names from the past to artificially pump up numbers. Edge is pretty much the last one from their last boom period that can still enter a ring without looking like they need Life Alert (I don't see Rock ever coming back for anything in ring again), and despite hoarding talent for years the cupboard is bare since they spent so much effort educating the fans that anyone who came up through the system is a geek not worth getting behind. 

As weird as it sounds, they need a Vince Russo type again. Not the actual Vince Russo of course, but the reason why Russo was so successful was that his ideas were so different from what the WWF was doing at the time. Sure it all looks like shit in retrospect now but someone used to late 80s to mid 90s WWF tuning in to see Russo's ideas would have been blown away. He was also the perfect fit for the "edginess" of the 90s, and WWE needs someone who's in tune with modern trends. Vince/Bruce/Dunn ain't that someone. Unless they can find that person, we're going to just keep seeing them trying to combat the newer, hotter, competition by rehashing 20+ year old ideas.

[KawadaSmile]

I dunno, man. We've just seen Cole and Bryan wrestle not long ago, same with Wyatt. 2 out of those 3 names would be nice additions to their roster and generate some buzz, but nothing really tops what they had going Friday. 

Punk returning after nearly a decade away from wrestling and after a failed UFC run (and don't get me wrong, him going there somehow only added to his myth) is the biggest story you could get in 2021. It just doesn't come by very often.

I think moments like Phil's return are going to get more and more sparse. The only way I see rumbles of great magnitude happening is if a star with proven draw power and appeal crosses over from another sport - like a McGregor. Even then, there are such a number of factors that it makes it almost impossible for that to be occur.

[FMKK]

Adam Cole and Bryan Danielson shouldn’t be lumped in together like that. Danielson is a far bigger star. He’s main evented two Wrestlemanias including this year. That gives him as strong of a big show pedigree as anyone else in AEW, even Jericho. He’s not going to be as big as Punk because of all of the unique elements to Punk’s story but he’s another one of those people who represents everything that AEW is about and that that segment of wrestling fans identified with even when they watched WWE. Plus, while Punk is a master promo and storyteller, having Bryan Danielson in the ring working with all your top prospects arguably has greater long term benefits.

[Zoo Enthusiast]

Yeah, I can't say I have a lot of interest in watching Cole come into AEW.  I like the main event guys they already have and I don't view Cole on that level.  I have literal zero interest in seeing Bray Wyatt in AEW (or anywhere, for that matter) and think it's legitimately stupid.

[Clayton Jones]

In retrospect wasn't the shift to try to make the WWE brand the draw instead of individual talent tremendously stupid? I heard that talking point for years and the benefit that it meant WWE wouldn't be dependent on any particular talent made enough sense (even if I didn't agree with the philosophy) that I never really thought about it critically. But now that I am, what's the precedent? Cirque du Soleil? The Harlem Globetrotters? Dragon Gate? I guess the NFL was more what they were imagining but legitimate sport translates so poorly to pro wrestling that even keeping track of win/loss records is a monumental undertaking when promotions attempt it. It just seems like a strategy that so clearly was destined to fail that I'm amazed it hasn't been challenged more internally. Up until now I guess.

[El-P]

24 minutes ago, Clayton Jones said:

In retrospect wasn't the shift to try to make the WWE brand the draw instead of individual talent tremendously stupid? 

From Vince's perspective ? No. The WWE is idiot proof financially at this point. Vince is dying a billionnaire (you're the richest guy from the cemetery, congrats, you're still dead) and his children and grandchildren can live the spoiled brats life without even thinking about it, especially if they sell to Disney or whomever.

From the workers and audience's perspective, of course. Because it has made the product totally sterilized (with the stupidest booking this side of WCW 1999) and they haven't made ONE legit star since 2005 and they have wasted dozens of great talents in the process.

[Al]

WWE as the draw makes sense if their main business is house shows. But of course there's a limit to that and you still need to create marketable stars. And the pandemic has sent that spiraling anyway. 

[strobogo]

 Of course a moment like Punk's return is going to get more and more sparse, because the amount of big name stars made since Punk's run is basically just Daniel Bryan, who has left and come back twice and been full time active including multiple main event runs in the past 3 years. There's just no one left. All the Attitude Era guys are too old. Even Edge is nearly 50. The real top guys from the era are pushing 60 and completely broken down messes. Sting is a unique case but also hasn't been used as a guy to headline shows and title matches with AEW (but was for WWE). But guys like Austin, Taker, Foley, Hall and Nash, Hogan, DDP, Bret Hart, HBK, Goldberg, Angle are too old and/or broken down or otherwise truly retired. Rock is also getting close to 50 and so busy and probably is not going to do anything to put his body in jeopardy at this stage but has himself also made a return in the past decade.

 

When you move into the generation after them, well Orton is still active full time, Brock has been used as a special attraction for a decade now, Cena is a full time actor and any return he makes is going to be short lived like this summer which was probably his last sustained run of any kind, Batista is retired and definitely not coming back, and then who is left from that era? Eddie is dead and even if he were alive, he'd be in his mid 50s. Jeff Hardy? Completely broken down. JBL? Not a draw even at his peak and also old and broken down. WWE has already been trying to mine the Ruthless Aggression and early PG eras for nostalgia with Miz and Morrison, Lashley, Shelton, MVP, Carlito at the Rumble, the various Divas era women at the Rumbles, and so on. None of those people are going to do shit for ratings. They definitely aren't people that are going to create huge buzz and excitement in lapsed fans or current fans. And Punk himself probably wouldn't be much of a big deal if he hadn't left WWE and stayed out of wrestling for so long. If he had stuck around and been miserable with miserable booking for 7 years, most people wouldn't give a shit about him like they don't really give a shit about all but a handful of people in WWE.

[El-P]

If Alberto wasn't such a piece of shit he would have been brought back too, but he's about a JBL level act anyway.

There's nobody left. They have made no one.

The only two guys from the past 10 years who could have been huge are CM Punk & Brian Danielson. Wooops.

[Jmare007]

As El-P said, "the Brand" has allowed them to put in a system were it's really fucking hard for them not to generate a ton of money. They basically don't rely on any traditional wrestling metric, though ratings are more important than before, and don't "need" a good TV product per se. At least not right now or the coming years. It's been a decade of them profiting from it.

RE: AEW's new signings. I agree that Cole and Wyatt are in a whole different level than someone like Danielson but my main point was that even after the Arthur Ashe show (were Dragon is supposed to show up), AEW still has tricks up their sleeve to continue to create buzz. I can't stand Adam Cole but if there's one place were he'll be received like a star, it's the AEW fanbase. I'm also not a fan of Wyatt but him showing up is still a moment, shows that AEW is were people want to go to and he still has a following and sells merch like crazy.

To all of that, WWE has nothing to counter it. That's kinda crazy when you think about it. Maybe KawadaSmile is onto something and they try to get more mainstream people like Connor, or bring back Mayweather or something. 

23 minutes ago, El-P said:

The only two guys from the past 10 years who could have been huge are CM Punk & Brian Danielson. Wooops.

Poetic.

[KawadaSmile]

DB was huge in WWE too tho. Yes chants crossed over into other sports, even. They just did everything they could with him, or at least the most their creative vices allowed them to. That vegan heel run is still one of the greatest things they've done this century, and him putting over Kofi at WM is one of the all-time great moments.

He got his Memphis-like brawl with Miz. He got a heel run. He got a hero's return after a seemingly career-ending injury. DB's case is not as much as him being misused, but the pieces around him surely were. You have him wrestle some fantastic matches with Gulak, which is a good thing, but then Gulak gets relegated to the 24/7 division while DB sticks around doing bigger things.

A change of scenery is something he's been itching for for a while. Let him put over people like Ricky Starks now.

 

RE: Cole, dude was seen as THE star in NXT. Dominant, lenghty title reigns, innaugural North American champ, Undisputed Era was everywhere... People there love him to the point where they were booing the face O'Reilly in their feud (although the charisma disparity also factored in). The issue is that all that would be lost in RAW or SD. His booking wouldn't and shouldn't be the same there, and he was running out of things to do in NXT. The change was also inevitable.

[El-P]

1 hour ago, KawadaSmile said:

DB was huge in WWE too tho. Yes chants crossed over into other sports, even. They just did everything they could with him, or at least the most their creative vices allowed them to.

aka : they didn't do half as they should have. DB should have been the Man. That is a fact, he was over to that degree. No matter his injuries. Steve Austin got the most over during the period where it was not even a sure thing he could ever work again. His comeback fizzled out super quickly, he ended up "just another guy" in no time. Sure, he worked his magic at Mania to put over Kofi Kingston, which in the grand scheme of things meant exactly zilch (and why would it, Kofi was never a main event talent to begin with, not even at a Jeff Jarrett level) and then what ? The pro-wrestling audience wanted Daniel Bryan in the mid 10's. Even after WWE finally gave in (and reprogrammed their own collective brain into thinking *they* got him over), his first feud as a world champion was against fucking Kane, a feud where he, as a babyface, was running away from the monster, letting his girlfriend alone at danger. That was the genius booking of Daniel Bryan *before* he had that "career ending injury".

The fact Daniel Bryan & CM Punk reached their prime during the WWE monopoly is really shitty timing.

[strobogo]

3 hours ago, El-P said:

If Alberto wasn't such a piece of shit he would have been brought back too, but he's about a JBL level act anyway.

There's nobody left. They have made no one.

The only two guys from the past 10 years who could have been huge are CM Punk & Brian Danielson. Wooops.

Lmao. No one in America has ever given a fuck about Alberto Del Rio no matter how many main event pushes they kept giving him.

[NintendoLogic]

59 minutes ago, El-P said:

Even after WWE finally gave in (and reprogrammed their own collective brain into thinking *they* got him over), his first feud as a world champion was against fucking Kane, a feud where he, as a babyface, was running away from the monster, letting his girlfriend alone at danger.

The Kane feud was indeed shit, but this specific point is incorrect. Bryan never abandoned Brie and only ran from Kane to try to get her to safety. When they were cornered, he stood his ground and fought back. Really though, the booking of Bryan in WWE was a comedy of errors. Remember that the only reason he got the title run in 2014 was because they had to retool Wrestlemania after Punk walked out. Even then, it was only so he could be the sacrificial lamb to feed to Lesnar at Summerslam. The Yes chants were indeed huge, but getting WWE to acknowledge that was like pulling teeth. He was in the World Series parade and they never even mentioned it on WWE TV. When he came back, they stuck him in feuds with fucking Big Cass and the fucking Miz. Before you knew it, he was dead in the water to the point they had to turn him heel to salvage him. Honestly, the only time I'd say he was booked reasonably well in WWE was during his run as The Planet's Champion. That's why I'm more unfazed by Becky Lynch returning as a heel than everyone else seems to be. Given WWE's track record, they likely would have fucked her up to the point where they'd have to turn her heel eventually anyway. They might as well just cut to the chase.

[FMKK]

Bryan Danielson came back after what seemed like career ending injuries and his big return match was in a tag team with Shane McMahon before he immediately went into a feud with Big Cass and ended up as a heel six months later because his heat had died. Let’s not say he wasn’t misused. 
 

Becky Lynch turning heel isn’t necessarily a bad thing imo, just that their way of getting there was so bad. Why not have her come back for a face-off with Bianca, soak up her return pops for a few weeks and then have her turn in a future match when she realises she can’t beat Bianca fairly? This way, she’s only a heel because she was booked to win and Bianca was booked poorly. They are obsessed with the meta narrative where the true top heel in the company is WWE booking itself.

[Strummer]

I know a lot people were excited about the Miz feud in 2018 but honestly Bryan lost too much and was constantly out fooled by Miz at every turn. It could have been so much better. And the blowoff came on one of the Super shows in Australia in a 3 minute match with .Bryan winning on a flash pin

[FMKK]

Surely the whole crux of the feud was that Bryan had to annihilate the Miz, not do job after job

[sek69]

I remember when pro and college sports teams were doing the YES deal after winning championships and WWE would steadfastly refuse to acknowledge it since god forbid an actual wrestler be seen as a bigger star than the all encompassing BRAND. 

[El-P]

42 minutes ago, NintendoLogic said:

The Kane feud was indeed shit, but this specific point is incorrect. Bryan never abandoned Brie and only ran from Kane to try to get her to safety. When they were cornered, he stood his ground and fought back. 

Forgot about the specifics, but like you said it was shit anyway.

Danielson feuding with the fucking Miz was a sad joke. The Miz is probably everything wrong about modern WWE style pro-wrestling. He was tolerable for two minutes when he had Maryse at his side (the Lance Storm Theory) and feuding with Cena & Nikki, but that's about it. Danielson making a comeback should have been shot right at the top of the card like a super special attraction if they were afraid for his health. The fact he made a comeback in a tag match with Shane McMahon totally deflated anything special about him from the first minute. 

I sure hope Roman tweets something about Daniel Bryan being a B+ player for real just before he debuts for AEW. Then let's unbox the ratings together...

[sek69]

Also they tried SO HARD to make anything about Bryan a "moment" completely divorced from the man himself, like when they tried so hard to make "Yestlemania" a thing. 

[Childs]

The bottom line is that they never, never bought into him as their top guy. An elite hand who could be thrown into a main event whenever? Sure. But never a made guy, not even after the all-time Wrestlemania moment.