WWE TV 04/03 - 04/09 Adrenaline in my soul, Roman Reigns pinned Cody Rhodes

[NintendoLogic]

The historical parallel that stands out to me is Sheik/Andre in Toronto. Sheik had run roughshod over everyone and fans were certain Andre would be the one to finally end the reign of terror. When he went down to the fireball just like everyone else, the fans figured Sheik would never truly get his and it killed the city. It should be noted that Raw did a monster rating even going up against the men's title game, but that was before it was revealed that Vince was back in charge. We'll see what kind of impact the 1-2 punch of the Mania result and the return of Vince's brain worms has on business.

[El-P]

7 minutes ago, NintendoLogic said:

that was before it was revealed that Vince was back in charge.

Vince being back in charge doesn't mean shit for the broader audience. No one cares about the ethical issues, as demonstrated by the (embarrassing) success of the Qatar World Cup or the Hogward Legacy game. And the casual viewer is not ingrained into "booking issues" like the hardcore niche is. It was the biggest and most seen Mania ever, it makes sense Raw drew a giant rating.

[strobogo]

Broader audience might give a shit when the quality plummets and all the things they had been enjoying are summarily dropped.

[El-P]

I'm sure they already miss QR codes and Karrion Kross comebacks.

All joke aside, Triple H's booking has been way overrated anyway. Vince is the one who set the most successful storylines in motion (and Heyman was credited for most of the Bloodline stuff) and the company got hot again during his watch, months before he was ousted. Trip streamlined the product and corrected many mistakes, but his qualities were vastly overstated anyway. It's easy to ignore it when the product was carried by two (even three in the last weeks leading to Mania with Dom vs Rey real getting momentum) super strong and heated feuds, but let's be real, Triple H is not, and never was, the "savior of WWE", much like his booking of NXT ended up being exposed after a while. I'm sure now every little positive thing will be credited to him while every bad stuff will be credited to Vince, but it's really akin to "Vince liked me, it's evil JJ Dillon, JR, Laurinatis who hated me" mentality in term of confirmation bias.

As far as broader audience not sustaining their interest, well of course they probably won't. WWE snuffed their two hottest babyface in eons and missed their peak already. They have not learned a thing from Danielson nor CM Punk. Triple H was a lot better than late Vince overall, but he was still Triple H, the guy with the track record of the most boring, babyface killing mega-push of all-time. Pattern.

[MoS]

1 hour ago, NintendoLogic said:

 It should be noted that Raw did a monster rating even going up against the men's title game, but that was before it was revealed that Vince was back in charge. We'll see what kind of impact the 1-2 punch of the Mania result and the return of Vince's brain worms has on business.

It was also the Raw after a white-hot WM (which is hotter, red-hot or white-hot?) and they spent 2 hours 30 minutes advertising a main event of Roman and Solo v. Cody and Brock, which not only is a massive main event, but also probably made fans feel that the Roman-Cody story was going to continue. Of course, in classic 21st-century Vince style, it was a bait and switch, they did not deliver on it, they never had any intention of delivering on it, and it has now also become clear that Cody will be shunted away from Roman after losing to him, at least for a few months. And given Brock's normal wrestling schedule, their feud will probably be Cody cutting 15-min promos every week for 2 months before Brock shows up again. 

I think the ratings of the shows in a month's time or two would be far more significant 

[KawadaSmile]

Yeah, it doing good numbers show that people were interested in something, whether a proper Brock/Cody tag, or the continuation of the Cody/Roman feud. From the looks of it, we'll get neither.

If we get neither, can a Brock/Cody feud carry a show? Doubt it.

[KawadaSmile]

Gruesome Twosome is INSANE

[Strummer]

Wwe has announced HHH will open SD with another message

[Dale Wolfe]

Who are the gruesome twosome? It's such a good name but I can't watch the tv for long stretches 

[NintendoLogic]

Ronda and Shayna?

[El-P]

12 hours ago, Strummer said:

Wwe has announced HHH will open SD with another message

Which will be the exact same as the RAW one, most probably, like they did a few months ago when Vince retired. "Everything is great, WWE Then Now Forever yaddi yaddi yadda". Or maybe...

[sek69]

All Hunter had to do for the show to improve was to not rip up the script mid show and change shit until it was an unrecognizable mess.  Plus the rule always is if Heyman is involved onscreen in an angle he's the one booking it. 

To be fair to Hunter though, just sitting back and not constantly meddling is not something seen in WWE creative for decades, so it was in fact a massive improvement. 

What's going to be fun is seeing how Endeavour is going to handle one of their brands having actual competition. If a UFC fighter is unhappy, what are they gonna do? No one's going to pay them what UFC does, even if's peanuts. WWE folks have options that (depending on their position) would pay them the same and in most cases more. 

[Dale Wolfe]

I dunno, Bellator/PFL/ONE/BKFC have all given UFC fighters departing better contracts that UFC did

Not sure about RIZIN

 

[Embrodak]

Did Bron Brekker turn heel? Saw a gif of him giving Carmelo the Mark Henry salmon suit special.

[Strummer]

Newest Observer says Roman is not scheduled to work the Backlash show next month in Puerto Rico.

[KawadaSmile]

17 hours ago, Dale Wolfe said:

Who are the gruesome twosome? It's such a good name but I can't watch the tv for long stretches 

Like bubba Nintendo said, probably Ronda and Shayna. I think it's a bit of a nasty name specially when you imagine someone like Vince saying it. It's hilarious, at the same time.

[Strummer]

PWI says Vince is not at SD tonight but reviewed the script remotely.

also Drew has been pulled from the show due to illness (didn't this happen not long ago?) 

[Strummer]

Triple H announced the Draft is happening in 2 weeks

[KawadaSmile]

From the looks of things, SD was a much better show.

[sek69]

On 4/7/2023 at 10:39 PM, KawadaSmile said:

From the looks of things, SD was a much better show.

It was, and I'm sure it was just a wild coincidence Vince wasn't around backstage.

WWE's going to come to a crossroads (no pun intended) real soon: talent is super uneasy at the idea of Vince having creative control back, and there's apparently more than a handful of upper card folks who won't want to stick around if things go back to the way they used to be.  The new owners at Endeavor are not likely to be looking at breaking the bank to entice anyone to stay, and it's pretty clear AEW is going to have more money to play with since it's pretty clear that they are going to be getting extra TV money barring anything catastrophic happening. At the very least WBD will option them for another year with a decent bump in pay, if not them getting a whole new deal. So Vince has to consider is it worth wanting to flex nuts on Hunter for thinking he could pull off a coup if it means half your talent ends up on Dynamite?

[Timbo Slice]

Like he thinks about that even a little bit. 

[Perfectly Straightedge]

8 hours ago, Timbo Slice said:

Like he thinks about that even a little bit. 

This 1,000,000%

[Strummer]

WWE photoshopped Stephanie out of Logan Paul's contract signing pic with her, HHH and Paul.

[pmo]

14 hours ago, sek69 said:

It was, and I'm sure it was just a wild coincidence Vince wasn't around backstage.

WWE's going to come to a crossroads (no pun intended) real soon: talent is super uneasy at the idea of Vince having creative control back, and there's apparently more than a handful of upper card folks who won't want to stick around if things go back to the way they used to be.  The new owners at Endeavor are not likely to be looking at breaking the bank to entice anyone to stay, and it's pretty clear AEW is going to have more money to play with since it's pretty clear that they are going to be getting extra TV money barring anything catastrophic happening. At the very least WBD will option them for another year with a decent bump in pay, if not them getting a whole new deal. So Vince has to consider is it worth wanting to flex nuts on Hunter for thinking he could pull off a coup if it means half your talent ends up on Dynamite?

I think the bigger question is that if things go poorly how long does a guy like Ari Emmanuel, notoriously a cutthroat kind of guy, put up with mediocrity and this Vince.  I wonder if he set it up to sinecure Vince if he runs things poorly.

[The Thread Killer]

58 minutes ago, pmo said:

I think the bigger question is that if things go poorly how long does a guy like Ari Emmanuel, notoriously a cutthroat kind of guy, put up with mediocrity and this Vince.  I wonder if he set it up to sinecure Vince if he runs things poorly.

I wondered the same thing when I watched that interview with the two of them on CNBC. Emmanuel kept talking about how he has been totally hands off with the UFC since Endeavor bought them out. He keeps talking about how he lets Dana White run UFC however he wants. 

The big difference is, UFC is doing great business right now. I know Endeavor went in there with an axe and cut a bunch of UFC office jobs right after the purchase, but since then they have been pretty much hands off. I am not confident that Vince McMahon will not fuck things up if he gets involved with WWE again, which might necessitate Emmanuel dealing with him.

Then again, if WWE gets a good enough deal on their next round of TV rights, who really cares I guess? I don’t know if they will be driven by ratings as long as they are generating revenue, regardless. And if that interview is anything to go by, Ari Emmanuel seems to think that Vince McMahon is some sort of visionary and genius or something, so who knows if he would be willing to butt heads with him.