Is the empire crumbling before our eyes?

[C.S.]

1 hour ago, fakeplastictrees said:

The adoption of the 20+ year WWE stage design.

The old stage was so much better.

I can't stand the new one. 

[fakeplastictrees]

Lucha Underground was great until the 3rd season when the network and/or LU felt the need to bring in the overexposed standard acts who bring nothing to the table. All of sudden Tommy Dreamer, Katarina Waters, and others showed up for a paycheck and that's when I checked out. There are still a lot of good things in LU season 3 and worth checking out, but I just am not a fan of seeing Tommy Dreamer on my TV 5 times a week.

[MoS]

TK needs a booker. Has there been *any* booker in wrestling history who has been great right off the bat with zero wrestling background? Watts and Patterson spent decades as wrestlers before becoming promoters/bookers-cum-agents. Jerry Jarret's mom was in the wrestling business and he worked for Gulak for a significant period of time before becoming a booker. Dusty of course was a mega-draw for Florida before becoming JCP's booker. Dory Funk Jr. was the world champion and main eventer for years before he assumed booking duties. Same with his dad I think, although I am not sure about the details. Baba, Inoki and Choshu were main-event wrestlers and in the case of the first two, cultural legends. Gedo wrestled for a decade. Gary Hart and Jim Cornette were managers for a long time before they became bookers. Hunter and Shawn were main eventers for decades. Heyman worked in various capacities for years before becoming a booker. Vince himself spent nearly a decade as an announcer and local promoter under his father before taking WWF's reins. Fritz was a wrestler for decades. Gabe Sapolsky, I guess, did not have any direct experience but even he was Heyman's protege. And Vince Russo, but the moment he stopped having Vince and Patterson to filter out his bad ideas and figure out how to execute his good ideas, we all know what happened. 

Apart from having no prior experience, TK also runs a football team and an American football team on top of booking and promoting AEW, and now he also owns ROH and is putting on wrestling shows for two promotions. All of this is simply too much for one person. At some point he has to shelve his ego and get someone to book his ideas into execution. Maybe poach Scott D'Amore from Impact? 

[El-P]

1 hour ago, MoS said:

Maybe poach Scott D'Amore from Impact? 

Don't mess with my IMPACT wrestling ! Last year I enjoyed it more than AEW overall. As long as he's not burned out (which happens to everyone eventually), I don't want him anywhere else.

But yeah, what you said. TK needs a smart booking assistant at the very least. He can't possibly manage all these activities at the same time without jeopardizing his focus (not to mention his health).

One thing that has been very often overlooked about AEW, is that they all learned on the job when they started the promotion. That they got it so far and so successful should be commended on that fact alone, they had no business doing so well considering their complete lack of experience. They are only 4 years old and still learning. The problem is that they are going against a predatory juggernaught that has been around for ever, so it's not like they can learn under no pressure (like Triple H did when he can play around with NXT with no repercussion whatsoever).

[Champagne]

Tony started AEW so he could book a real wrestling promotion, which explains why he's been so reluctant to hire an experienced person in that role despite ample evidence one is needed.

[Dale Wolfe]

It's a message board nerd vanity project 

It's why the matches are so good and the stories are so inconsistent 

[Jmare007]

I'm not sure what needs to happen for Tony to finally get some help with booking. Feels like the only way is that he's forced to do it for some oustisde reason (which I have no clue what could it be considering he's already has 4 other jobs, if you count ROH).

[Embrodak]

11 hours ago, Jmare007 said:

I'm not sure what needs to happen for Tony to finally get some help with booking. Feels like the only way is that he's forced to do it for some oustisde reason (which I have no clue what could it be considering he's already has 4 other jobs, if you count ROH).

Nervous breakdown or health thing, tbh. Can’t imagine anything else breaking the money mark autohypnosis.

[Dav'oh]

I don't believe this is Tony, nor that any of his interests are one-man enterprises.
I don't know what phone calls he's making at 3am. He could be zooming (ahem) with Choshu and Bruce Hart.

[Embrodak]

Dynamite card looking *rough* this week. Mox vs Uno, Yuta vs Orange, tag team battle royal, Saraya vs Skye Blue, Acclaimed vs The Firm, Tony maybe appearing on camera… looks like a two hour Rampage card. Danielson promo and Christian stuff should be good, but it seems like they’re dropping off steeply from those few weeks where it seemed like the old magic was back.

[MoS]

56 minutes ago, Embrodak said:

Dynamite card looking *rough* this week. Mox vs Uno, Yuta vs Orange, tag team battle royal, Saraya vs Skye Blue, Acclaimed vs The Firm, Tony maybe appearing on camera… looks like a two hour Rampage card. Danielson promo and Christian stuff should be good, but it seems like they’re dropping off steeply from those few weeks where it seemed like the old magic was back.

Is it like a busy time for NFL teams and owners or the English Premier League? His booking has become a lot more unfocused than it was just a few weeks back. 

[KawadaSmile]

1 hour ago, MoS said:

Is it like a busy time for NFL teams and owners or the English Premier League? His booking has become a lot more unfocused than it was just a few weeks back. 

Well, the NFL just had the SuperBowl a while ago, so the season is officially over - the Jags did alright, but lost their Divisional Round. As for Fulham, they are doing alright in both the domestic Cup and League, and their schedule isn't really that hectic. No idea what's up with TK. 

[Zoo Enthusiast]

Thought this was a good podcast:  

 

[The Man in Blak]

Has there been a confirmation that the Elite resigned, since their contracts were supposed to be up this month? Seems like that might qualify as a “distraction.”

[sek69]

5 hours ago, KawadaSmile said:

Well, the NFL just had the SuperBowl a while ago, so the season is officially over - the Jags did alright, but lost their Divisional Round. As for Fulham, they are doing alright in both the domestic Cup and League, and their schedule isn't really that hectic. No idea what's up with TK. 

The Jags actually made quite a turnaround, they were the laughingstock of the NFL with Urban Meyer being way over his head as coach and only winning two games. They went 9-8 and won their (admittedly weak) division this year and their new coach was in the discussion for Coach of the Year for being able to pull that off. 

From what I've been able to gather Tony is basically like a numbers and stats guy for both the Jags and Fulham so it's not like he's hands on with the day to day operations of either team. Its still a lot for one person to have on their plate for sure, but not quite the workload people make it out to be. 

[KawadaSmile]

Yeah, Trevor Lawrence was the Jags' pushed young star, much like MJF. He brought in the results, tho!

Shame they went up against possibly the greatest QB/coach combo we have seen since mid 00s Brady/Bellichick, but they are shaping up nicely. 

 

Like, you'd think he would ease up, as finally both Fulham and the Jags are doing pretty damn good (something that individually almost never happens, let alone in the same season). 

[NintendoLogic]

The main focus of NFL teams right now is evaluating talent for the upcoming draft and free agency period, so I would imagine this is actually when analytics guys are among the most active.

[Jmare007]

Yeah that Dynamite card looking awful again, not watching this week either.

 

And Danielson better cut an amazing promo to convince people besides myself and his stans that the Iron Man match Is worth a damn because MJF has failed for a month straight.

[El-P]

Last week's show wasn't awful. It was a C-show in term of star power/matches, but it was absolutely a fine pro-wrestling show. The Texas Tornado brawl was very good, the MJF & Chris Daniels promo segment was excellent (Daniels really nailed it), there was no bad match on the show (the Triple threat match was quite ok, likewise Jungle Boy vs Brian Cage). The worst thing by far was Christian Cage's totally random comeback, this feud just has been a complete miss since the turn (which itself was great).

I feel like people really have forgotten was *awful* pro-wrestling shows are. I've reviewed the death march of WCW, I've watched most of TNA's TV (soon ending that one). Believe me, I've seen PLENTY of awful pro-wrestling shows. Last's week Dynamite was fine. Kinda there but fine. This week will probably be the same thing. I feel like there's constant overstatement about everything when AEW is addressed, and really this has been this way since day one. Like I said, there's booking issues galore right now. There's plenty of stuff going on I don't care about. But out of 52 weeks of TV, it's not like it's gonna be awesome all the time. Like I said, it's been just ridiculous in term of great matches (and sorry, yes, I enjoy watching great fucking pro-wrestling matches) for almost two months straight, basically starting with the best of seven series (which was awesome). I can take a few weeks of TV that is gonna be just there. 

And actually, since I'm not gonna be able to watch current stuff for a while, I wonder how much I'll enjoy the stuff more by not caring about news and the "need" to immediately react to everything, just binge watching it weeks after the fact. The trick is not to get spoiled, although really I wonder what TK's announcement will be (and I kinda dread a "oh, ok" kinda announcement, he kinda Dixie Cartered himself with those lately). I just hope nothing crazy happens at the PPV or something, as FOMO is always looming.

[Jmare007]

I didn't say the show was awful, I salud the card was awful. As in, I have zero interest in any of the matches, therefore I won't he watching (just like last week). 

[Dav'oh]

10 minutes ago, El-P said:

But out of 52 weeks of TV, it's not like it's gonna be awesome all the time.

I do feel a lot of criticism isn't, "Tony isn't perfect, but no wrestling promoter ever has been perfect"; rather, "Tony isn't perfect, but he should be perfect." As mentioned, it took Watts and Dusty and Graham and Gedo and the gang years inside the business, to reach imperfection.

[El-P]

16 minutes ago, Dav'oh said:

I do feel a lot of criticism isn't, "Tony isn't perfect, but no wrestling promoter ever has been perfect"; rather, "Tony isn't perfect, but he should be perfect." As mentioned, it took Watts and Dusty and Graham and Gedo and the gang years inside the business, to reach imperfection.

Agreed. And there's this constant overacting to everything whenever a show is not as good. And really, it's not like I'm praising the booking right now, I've said for a while that someone like D'Amore, with a more streamlined vision and a knack for details and follow-ups (although obviously it's much easier booking that way in a much smaller company) would be needed. Then again, it's not like TK is the only guy involved with creative right now either.

Dusty... you know, it's funny how the discourse on Dusty basically changed when WWE rewrote it. For years and years he was the Dusty finish guy, the egomaniac who killed Crockett with his shitty and self-centered booking. Then from the time he gets to NXT when the thing was fresh, and especially after he died, OMG Dusty was such a creative genius, he's one of the greatest booker of all time OMG what a legend he was the GOAT. Well. Ok. Fun fact, Dusty's stint as a booker in TNA around 2004 is some of the worst shit the company ever produced, easily one of the lowest point in its history. I'm talking about a company that had Vince Russo as a main writer for almost ten years. 

But anywoo, 

17 hours ago, Zoo Enthusiast said:

Thought this was a good podcast:  

I haven't listened to the whole thing, but yeah, they make a lot of sensible points.

As far as Dynamite's card on paper, yeah, I agree it looks even weaker than last week. Basically, Orange Cassidy vs Wheeler Yuta sounds excellent, hopefully a really good Danielson promo, and the rest is kinda meh. They better have a cool team win that Battle Royal (don't get me started on that whole "two battle royal to add two teams to Guns vs Acclaimed" thing though, I just hope it will end up with a cool result in the end, and by cool result I mean FTR winning the belts or something).

[Big Pete]

18 hours ago, Zoo Enthusiast said:

Thought this was a good podcast:  

 

I gave this a listen.

The TL;DR is that fans are overly critical and overreact whenever AEW has a poor show. They feel this is because of three types of fans/influencers:

1) Monday Night War Revivalists who rely solely on business metrics and how they compare to the WWE. If ratings are down or the show draws a bad house then it's a sign that AEW is in trouble and they need to make radical changes to compete.

2) Alternative Skeptics who grew up on WWE and believe that any other style of presentation or practice is inherently flawed.

3) Grifters who criticize the show to line their own pockets.

I think they touched on some interesting points but I don't think their analysis was as thorough as it could have been. Fans don't compare AEW's success to just minimize them, they compare it because AEW does it themselves. Whether it's comparing themselves to WCW or making references to the WWE on their television show they're inviting those discussions.

On one hand they're rallying those bitter ex-WWE fans who want to take back Pro Wrestling, but they're also inciting the 'E-drones' or 'Vincels' to respond. The fans aren't making the comparison, it's the owner and management constantly drawing references. To the point where the major storyline is that their current champion is off contract in 2024 and is threatening to go to the WWE.

The other problem is that the show itself isn't driving the discourse. Yes the talent are going out there with the intention of putting on epic matches but for whatever reason they're not captivating enough to dominate discussion. Why is that? Is it because guys are over-extending themselves? Is it the booking? Because there's more to it than the show is great and delivering all-time classic wrestling segments, the fans are just too blind to see it!

There needs to be a middle ground. AEW has produced some great wrestling but they've suffered some setbacks and they've lost the confidence of some of their fans. It doesn't mean they can't win it back and it'll be interesting to see how they shift the perception.

[Dav'oh]

I don't know if I'd be running big or hot angles while "The greatest story told in decades" (passim) is getting all the eyeballs and plaudits, and WrestleMania season is in full swing. Maybe I pick my battles and wait for the post-Mania lull to run my big stuff?

[Jmare007]

7 minutes ago, Dav'oh said:

I don't know if I'd be running big or hot angles while "The greatest story told in decades" (passim) is getting all the eyeballs and plaudits, and WrestleMania season is in full swing. Maybe I pick my battles and wait for the post-Mania lull to run my big stuff?

If that's the strategy then don't book one of your four solo PPV of the year (Forbiden Door being the fifth) one month before Wrestlemania.