Is the empire crumbling before our eyes?

[Jesse Ewiak]

18 hours ago, NintendoLogic said:

Plus, granting releases to everyone to asks for one would effectively reward WWE for contract tampering. 

A reminder - contract tampering does not actually really exist outside of sports leagues who have made agreements with each other. You can get hit for contract tampering in the NBA because all 30 teams and the players have agreed not to do so. 

Legally, Triple H could wait outside the door of whatever arena AEW is at next and ask everybody when there contract is up. He just can't tell them to to do anything to illegally break their contract. 

[sek69]

32 minutes ago, Jesse Ewiak said:

Legally, Triple H could wait outside the door of whatever arena AEW is at next and ask everybody when there contract is up. He just can't tell them to to do anything to illegally break their contract. 

It would be easy (and from interviews one would suggest Tony has done this) to connect the dots between WWE reaching out to people and Andrade starting his campaign to get fired.  Is it something that could ever be fully proven? Probably not, but it's not out of the question Hunter could have called them up like "hey just so you know, if something were ever to happen and you got let go you can always land here" and let nature take its course. 

[El-P]

11 hours ago, Flyin' Brian said:

Maybe you release them with the condition they can’t sign with WWE for X amount of time like it was rumored was the condition for Black’s release. Either way, it’s the people starting trouble that are the problem in my eyes, not the ones that react to the trouble especially when it’s someone making trouble for them. 

This. It's useless to keep people who don't want to be there, unless you basically job them to death on TV (which is not very classy). But delivering them on a plateau to WWE is not exactly smart either, considering WWE would never do it, and they are in a war. There should be a middle-ground that does not keep the workers locked where they don't want to be, without just handing out talent to the opposition. And yeah, the people starting trouble are the issues, the fact Sammy may be an abrasive douchebag is irrelevant. In the end, people like Mox or Starks are the one with the right attitude about it.

[NintendoLogic]

1 hour ago, El-P said:

This. It's useless to keep people who don't want to be there, unless you basically job them to death on TV (which is not very classy). But delivering them on a plateau to WWE is not exactly smart either, considering WWE would never do it, and they are in a war. There should be a middle-ground that does not keep the workers locked where they don't want to be, without just handing out talent to the opposition. And yeah, the people starting trouble are the issues, the fact Sammy may be an abrasive douchebag is irrelevant. In the end, people like Mox or Starks are the one with the right attitude about it.

The middle ground is wrestlers not signing deals that lock them down for multiple years. The bidding war has given talent the most leverage they've had in years. They'd be fools not to take advantage of it.

[El-P]

22 minutes ago, NintendoLogic said:

The middle ground is wrestlers not signing deals that lock them down for multiple years. 

Meltz mentioned he would advise them to not go longer than two years deal. And really, having guys under long-enough but not too long contracts would probably also tighten up the booking. When you have guys for two years, you better make the most out of it. When they are locked for 5 years, oh well...

[Jmare007]

12 hours ago, Matt D said:

After hearing the Helwani interview with Khan today, here's what I think the ROH mindset is:

He feels like he needs to build the brand up with WBD, to establish it in their eyes, to put some star power behind it, to show that it can make money. My guess is that yes, it's because he wants another hour of TV and seems to think that this might be the best way to do it, but even more than that, he has the library and it's relatively huge compared to the AEW library so to get over the brand with the suits, he could potentially get a better deal on streaming the library.

I could be wrong, but that's what I'm thinking now.

Makes sense, the past few weeks Dynamite has felt like a backdoor pilot for ROH (I don't watch Rampage but from the card announcements it felt like that show was the ROH focused one for a while too).

Tony usually promotes every latest development from AEW as it's biggest most important thing -as he should- so I don't know if his enthusiasm over having so much TV this week was him getting his promoter talk on, or if he indeed wants 5 hours of TV for his product. If he can't handle 3, I don't think he'll be able to handle 5 either, so I hope that if he gets what he wants, he finally get booking committee going. Then again, in the same interview he was proud about handling everything by himself...

[Flyin' Brian]

2 hours ago, El-P said:

Meltz mentioned he would advise them to not go longer than two years deal. And really, having guys under long-enough but not too long contracts would probably also tighten up the booking. When you have guys for two years, you better make the most out of it. When they are locked for 5 years, oh well...

 Most of these guys are negotiating deals on their own, right? They don't have agents or anyone looking out for them to my knowledge like in other sports. They may not know how or the best way to negotiate, or even really what the contracts they are signing mean. They may just be looking at the bottom line of x amount of dollars for x years and thinking that sounds good and that's about it.

[Flyin' Brian]

Out of curiosity, do any of the Elite guys actually own any trademarks for 'Elite' stuff, or is that all owned by AEW and Tony Khan?

[Matt D]

Obviously WWE just released Nigel to mess with Tony. (This is a joke).

[NintendoLogic]

25 minutes ago, Flyin' Brian said:

 Most of these guys are negotiating deals on their own, right? They don't have agents or anyone looking out for them to my knowledge like in other sports. They may not know how or the best way to negotiate, or even really what the contracts they are signing mean. They may just be looking at the bottom line of x amount of dollars for x years and thinking that sounds good and that's about it.

A lot of the top guys have agents. Chris Jericho and Kenny Omega are both represented by Barry Bloom.

[El-P]

35 minutes ago, Matt D said:

Obviously WWE just released Nigel to mess with Tony. (This is a joke).

So they release Nigel and put Booker T on the NXT announcing. *facepalm*

SIGN HIM TONY ! (I mean, why the hell not, he's got a great ROH heritage)

[El-P]

47 minutes ago, Flyin' Brian said:

Out of curiosity, do any of the Elite guys actually own any trademarks for 'Elite' stuff, or is that all owned by AEW and Tony Khan?

I would guess the Bucks got a bunch of Elite trademarks (I mean, Being the Elite existed way before AEW), but everything All Elite is obviously the Khan's IP (yeah, I've been listening to Jarrett's podcast quite a bit lately).

[KawadaSmile]

 

What the fuck is this

[The Man in Blak]

14 hours ago, Matt D said:

After hearing the Helwani interview with Khan today, here's what I think the ROH mindset is:

He feels like he needs to build the brand up with WBD, to establish it in their eyes, to put some star power behind it, to show that it can make money. My guess is that yes, it's because he wants another hour of TV and seems to think that this might be the best way to do it, but even more than that, he has the library and it's relatively huge compared to the AEW library so to get over the brand with the suits, he could potentially get a better deal on streaming the library.

I could be wrong, but that's what I'm thinking now.

This makes sense, but it's also incredibly dire, given how WBD has been operating as of late. Even in the most optimistic scenario, WBD would likely tuck AEW and ROH under a "Wrestling" tab in Discovery+ so that they can say that they have content parity with Peacock.

[Jmare007]

12 minutes ago, KawadaSmile said:

 

What the fuck is this

The truth, the Space broadcast was hilariously bad.

[Champagne]

1 hour ago, The Man in Blak said:

This makes sense, but it's also incredibly dire, given how WBD has been operating as of late. Even in the most optimistic scenario, WBD would likely tuck AEW and ROH under a "Wrestling" tab in Discovery+ so that they can say that they have content parity with Peacock.

You mean AEW and ROH would become "some tab on a sh*tty, confusing app that's hard to navigate"? Punk might be happy to see both buried as such now; Funny how things have can change in a few months.

[Matt D]

37 minutes ago, The Man in Blak said:

This makes sense, but it's also incredibly dire, given how WBD has been operating as of late. Even in the most optimistic scenario, WBD would likely tuck AEW and ROH under a "Wrestling" tab in Discovery+ so that they can say that they have content parity with Peacock.

It’s not dire if they can basically “flip” the property and make a bunch of money on the library. They’re a deal compared to Snowpiercer or whatever WBD isn’t going forward with. 

[Migs]

17 hours ago, Matt D said:

After hearing the Helwani interview with Khan today, here's what I think the ROH mindset is:

He feels like he needs to build the brand up with WBD, to establish it in their eyes, to put some star power behind it, to show that it can make money. My guess is that yes, it's because he wants another hour of TV and seems to think that this might be the best way to do it, but even more than that, he has the library and it's relatively huge compared to the AEW library so to get over the brand with the suits, he could potentially get a better deal on streaming the library.

I could be wrong, but that's what I'm thinking now.

You know, that's fairly logical. He can't really sell a 20 year library if the suits see it as being worth peanuts. He needs to establish some value in the brand so that an AEW/ROH library is as valuable to corporate as I think wrestling fans would see it.

[strobogo]

Give Bryan the ROH book and let him cook

[Flyin' Brian]

Has anyone ever pulled off buying a 2nd promotion and running a big angle between the two that was good? The examples I can think of are Crockett buying the UWF and WWE buying WCW. Neither turned out that well. Tony isn’t leaning into AEW vs ROH yet, if that is even a plan at this point, but is there a successful example of something like that working anywhere before? 

[KawadaSmile]

I think they are resisting the temptation of running that angle. I mean, basically all of the ROH champs are AEW talent, so what is the point?

[NintendoLogic]

Well, NJPW vs. UWFi was biggest money-drawing feud in history up to that point. NJPW technically acquire UWFi, but it called all the shots in the feud since the other company was in such dire financial straits.

[Jimmy Redman]

I honestly wish that Tony Khan had just never bought ROH.

Especially after this week. The entirety of the anniversary Dynamite show felt like some sort of ROH backdoor pilot, with every match trying to enforce the Code of Honor for no apparent reason, ROH belts all over the place.

The AEW shows and roster were already squeezed as it was, and then you add all of the ROH belts and import unnecessary talent like Jay MF Lethal, there's no room for anything, especially when he's signing more people and adding more AEW belts on top of that too.

Has anything at all been gained, creatively, from adding ROH to AEW television? I honestly can't think of anything.

It has helped ROH as an entity, sure, because they added all those AEW names to the ROH PPVs and drew big. And I understand that he has to expose ROH as much as he can to try to shop around for a buyer or TV slot or whatever he's doing. But that's his problem. My problem as a viewer is that it has taken over the AEW product and I haven't enjoyed any of it.

I wish there was some alternate timeline where he acquires ROH and then just waits until he can set up a separate TV or streaming deal to relaunch it as its own thing. Then down the line, hell, have ROH turn up to AEW TV and it's a big deal.

[Matt D]

1 hour ago, Jimmy Redman said:

I honestly wish that Tony Khan had just never bought ROH.

Especially after this week. The entirety of the anniversary Dynamite show felt like some sort of ROH backdoor pilot, with every match trying to enforce the Code of Honor for no apparent reason, ROH belts all over the place.

The AEW shows and roster were already squeezed as it was, and then you add all of the ROH belts and import unnecessary talent like Jay MF Lethal, there's no room for anything, especially when he's signing more people and adding more AEW belts on top of that too.

Has anything at all been gained, creatively, from adding ROH to AEW television? I honestly can't think of anything.

It has helped ROH as an entity, sure, because they added all those AEW names to the ROH PPVs and drew big. And I understand that he has to expose ROH as much as he can to try to shop around for a buyer or TV slot or whatever he's doing. But that's his problem. My problem as a viewer is that it has taken over the AEW product and I haven't enjoyed any of it.

I wish there was some alternate timeline where he acquires ROH and then just waits until he can set up a separate TV or streaming deal to relaunch it as its own thing. Then down the line, hell, have ROH turn up to AEW TV and it's a big deal.

Macro, I hear you.

Micro, FTR/Briscoes and Mercedes/Serena were some of my favorite things out of AEW this year.

[southofheavy]

On 10/7/2022 at 2:18 PM, strobogo said:

Give Bryan the ROH book and let him cook

Exactly what should be done.