Explains a ton.

What do we mean by stars?

Talents that people tune in to see? Talents with mainstream appeal? Talents you can build a company around? Talents that have feature spots on the show?

Talent that people tune in to see. You can argue star in the relative sense, but then what’s building got to do with it? The context necessitates that it is results-based.

954k for Dynamite

ABANDON SHIP!!!!

WWE with a stellar earning report. AEW floundering.

And what results are we judging this on? Revenue, profit, TV ratings, social media engagement, merchandise sales, growth in any of those areas?

Ouch.

TV ratings and other comparable levels of engagement would make sense. To say that Adam Page is a star when 954k watched his show whereas Austin Theory is not, when double that watch his? Eh. It doesn’t add up.

Tough night last night with NBA and NHL. Not a fair comparison for AEW which is a new company. I'd disregard this rating because it's an anomaly due to sports and the recent news.

:lol:

HUR DUR NBA NHL but we don't get to use excuses when RAW is against the NFL. LULZ.

showbuzzdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/2022-2-2-Wed-FinalCable-LSD.png

Did 954,000 viewers and a 0.35 demo.

Hahaha in your face damnienray u fucking idiot. AEW sucks ass

The drawing power of Phil Brooks my friends.

You know have the appeal of CM Punk is just chanting his name. He's nothing remarkable in the ring, over suitable yes but nowhere near a Steamboat. His real gold comes from his character work and promo's and the ability to tell a story in the ring. His character as a person is nothing special, I don't really understand why he's so famous. But since he is I hope they begin using him in his strongest character which is that super egotistical verbal warrior that he was in his strong WWE runs and ROH.

Punk isn't ratings. That's for certain. But he is a star, and generally speaking his matches on Dynamite draw well.

using him as a loud mouth punk who gets his ass handed to him would be great. id buy that. like a glorified heel manager. just comically beaten around the ring for long stretches.

Another great rating for AEW. Almost a millions a sexy number.

Just going to say: I don’t care about CM Punk at all. The wise guy with the mic has been exposed. It’s so 2011. He’s been given the chance to be the star he whined about not being. Now he’s just a less famous Miz.

Likewise to say Austin Theory is a star just because he’s on a show that draws “double” the rating. Who’s genuinely watching to see Austin Theory? Kevin Patrick isn’t a star just because he’s on Raw.

You can be the “star” of a property that does a lower rating/revenue than another property. Just because [INSERT MCU MOVIE HERE] sets Box Office records doesn’t mean any actor in the cast is a bigger star than a Tom Cruise who appears in relatively smaller Box Office successes.

I’d struggle to point at anyone in WWE that has widespread appeal. Yeah you get your Sasha Banks with bit parts on Star Wars TV shows, Becky in a movie, Roman with a bit part in a blockbuster but ask the average person in the street and they’re not recognisable.

Was Shawn Michaels less of a star because WWF was getting trouched in the ratings by WCW when he was on top?

I think it might be a bit of a “misnomer” in that when he talks about “stars” what he actually means is “talents that you can anchor the show with” or “talents that get a reaction”. WWE - by your own admission - have failed to cycle people into these positions for years.

Austin Theory is a bigger star than just about anyone in AEW. Shawn Michaels was not as big a star as Hulk Hogan, no. He was a bigger star than Jungle Boy. They do not have a Tom Cruise. They have not created a Tom Cruise.

The easiest answer is a true Star in wrestling is somebody who outdraws the company. What I mean by that is are people paying to see WWE, or are they paying to see Stone Cold.

That is a very small list of people historically. Very few have been bigger than the brand in WWE, drawing people who normally would not go to a show just because WWE is in town, but Brock Lesnar is having a match, they want to check it out.

AEW does not have anybody on that level. It is why you get AEW chants, because the brand itself is the reason people go, much like ECW was. It does not matter what wrestler is on the show until they get a true Star.

The funny thing is that is what Vince wants. He wants WWE to be the draw, but his company is so big they do have to let a few people be elevated to that level.

Also funny is that Tony wishes the opposite. It is why he tries so hard to bring in new people, because he does not have anybody who is an actual star that can continually bring in viewers. Signing new people gives him a short rerm bump, and that is the best option he has.

CM Punk is supposed to be a giant star, and they built him vs MJF for 2 months, and the payoff for them was a 13% decrease in ratings from the previous week.

That tells you all you need to know about Phil. The people that watched that show, myself included, are the people that were going to watch AEW regardless of who was on the card.

Historically speaking (I don't know this info), did WWF/E have any stars outgrowing the company 3 years in their infancy?


Legit asking - have ZERO idea of historical rasslin stuff

Depends on how you define infancy. Vince bought WWF in the middle of 1982, and in January 1984 Hogan won the WWF title. The first Wrestlemania was in March 1985, so I would argue that yes Hogan had become a true star well within those 3 years.

That’s a hard question to answer because the context of the time was completely different. AEW has launched as a promotion with globally recognized stars and a national cable platform. The WWWF was an existent territory for about 20 years before Vince K. took it over. It’s not really apples to apples — wrestling just operated differently then.

Hulk Hogan was the WWF Champion within two years of Vince K. taking over in 1982. The first WrestleMania was in 1985.

The whole “AEW is still young” thing doesn’t hold much water with me. I don’t think it takes that long to get over. Austin’s run at the top basically lasted as long as AEW has been around. Something in its fourth season isn’t considered “new” in television terms. But yes, I would say the WWF did have stars within 3 years of forming. But they also had television and a presence before that.

Yeah I don't know how anybody plays that card for a company with an unlimited budget and no necessity to turn a profit. They are not making money and reinvesting and growing based on their success. There is nothing wrong with doing it the way they are, but that whole give the poor startup company that is only 3 years old a break is asinine.

Admittedly, I didn't read all that ^ - it shouldn't be this complex.




AEW started a couple years ago.


Whatever Vince McMahon or whoever started WWWWWWWWWF - where was it in the same amount of time as AEW's total time in existence.




AEW - started in 2019 - its 2022



WWF (or whatever the OG company was) started in ???? its 2022.





We can go down the "rabbit hole" of semantics with cable vs not cable blah blah blah, but that's not what I'm after. That wouldn't be a "fair comparison" to either party.



Just wanna know, did WWF have any stars that were bigger than the brand in the same amount of man made time measurement of your choosing?

Nah dude. You can only do apples to apples comparisons like comparing the company that’s had 3 years to build an audience with the company that’s had 69/41 years (depending where you want to start) to build one.

Oh, so you weren’t asking legit, you just wanted to make a false “Yay AEW!” point and stick your fingers in your ears and go “blah, blah, blah” I’m not listening when people try to actually deal with the question.

The answer is yes. Whichever way you cut the cheese. The stars in the CWC and WWWF were bigger than today. If you want to start from Vince Jr, the answer is still yes. AEW doesn’t get to walk out with “they’re doing really well for 3 years!” They’re also capitalizing on years of history. They’ve got Jericho, JR, Sting, Danielson and Punk all signed.

Big bang theory fans are getting pissed now about shitty AEW after their show. They will never hit a million again and either be cancelled or moved to a shitty timeslots in the next year.

post the next GGI match up

honestly

Honestly I wouldn't be surprised if Tony sends out directions to design a Tru TV title belt. Tru TV is a better fit for AEW than TBS and is on just as accessible as TNT is. Plus Tru TV has no hits, is kind of "in development" they are turning more similar to Vice from what I can tell. AEW could be their "crown jewel" if they moved there, I think it would be a good idea.

In particular I hate seeing the AEW logo next to the TBS logo. AEW was pretty much designed to work with TNT, so it really just sucks that they got the boot. Why didn't Dynamite just move to Tuesday night? Do they have hockey on Tuesdays?

I can definitely see better uses for the slot. Would not be surprised to see AEW move at all.

Well IF you had taken 45 seconds to read, the answer is yes.

But of course WWE had a ruthless businessman in charge and not a creepy 40 year old manchild nerd spending his daddy's money, so of course we should totally be more proud of Tony and all his hard work :roll:

So what are you gonna say next time they hit 1m? Or will you be too busy eating your ham salad sandwiches

Naw they will get a million again, Tony will spend a few more million (of his father's money) on more free agents, or a few hundred thousand on special theme episodes.

At some point that will no longer work, at which point he will start paying people with Nielsen Boxes to watch his shows. As long as Big Shad is signing those checks, Tony will spend whatever it takes to appear extra successful.

They make up all this other stuff about Punk expanding other metrics. TK’s paying out the ass for guys who aren’t drawing. He’s going to have to up everyone’s contract to keep them too.

Has anyone honestly said they would never hit 1 million again? All I’ve seen is people saying they won’t likely be hitting it consistently. Which has proven to be true.

I don’t think it’s “people”, it’s specifically the backyard guy.

What’s Hogan got to do with anything? Surely a more “apples to apples” comparison would be to claim that Disco Inferno is a bigger star than Michaels by virtue of the fact that he was exposed to a bigger audience. Nobody in 96 was tuning in to Nitro to watch Disco, as nobody today is tuning into see Theory. Which is literally the metric by which you determine who is a star.

Little baby XL crying that AEW can't hit 1 million viewers lmao

Where?

From your eyes probably :rofl:

:rofl:

:rofl:

No, I’m talking about guys in the same position in the different companies. Austin Theory is a guy being groomed for main events. He’s in one at the next PPV. He’s in segments with Vince every week. He’s a bigger star than AEW guys.

Only he’s not a star according to the definition you gave; talent that people tune in to see.

He might be being groomed for Main Events, and for my money he’s a good horse to back, but people are not tuning in to see him. Does he “spike a rating”? He might, I don’t know, the numbers are not the be-all and end-all to me in the same way they are for some. He’s a good talent, a great prospect, he may even be better right now than AEW’s very best, but he’s not pulling the “1.8”m people in. AEW have positioned Page as their champion. He’s not pulling in “1.8”m, but it’s reasonable to assume that a higher proportion of AEW’s audience of “900”k are tuning in to see Page.

I’ll remind you that you made the comparison between Page and Theory, before then pivoting to compare guys in the same position.

As things stand I’d personally much rather say there are barely any/almost no stars in wrestling today.

That’s not my argument at all. My argument is that if you are anyone of any remark in WWE, mathematically you are going to be more “famous” than anyone in AEW. I see what you are interpreting, but it’s not the same thing. More people do tune in to see Theory. They tune into Raw. And they see Theory.

Theory is a bigger star than Adam Page. I’m not pivoting on anything. AEW doesn’t have the reach.

Punk can draw a certain type of people nobody else can, and that is the small subsection of MMA fans who enjoy watching colossal failures go on different shows and still pretend they can win a fight against anyone. Punk is the king in that demo.

Punk’s always been able to generate hype for one event. Outside of Money in the Bank 2011, did he ever actually draw money before getting his ass handed to him in the UFC and getting ghost cum on his face in shitty horror films?

We started the conversation about WWE and AEW’s ability to create “stars”. You defined “star” as someone that people tune in to see. Seeing someone because you tuned in is not the same thing - otherwise Kevin Patrick (that’s the Irish backstage interviewer btw) is also a “star” by your working.

Now you’ve introduced the notion of “fame” to the conversation. I’m not going to argue your “mathematics” because that would be stupid, I’d just be cautious of extrapolating too much from the numbers. You’ve also changed the benchmark of what we were originally discussing. Or at least what I thought we were discussing given the actual words you used. :lol:

I’ll take your word that you didn’t know what I meant.

:roll:

The WWE universe are the biggest stars. They are featured every single minute of every Raw.


AND WITHOUT A CONTRACT, SAXON!

Course we have a resident star here in Shisen KOTF - getting his sign on national TV.

I wish there was a way to have a thread showing everyone who got a TPWW sign on TV. I'm sure Shisen would know what to call it.

Man the NBA and College Basketball plus all the excitement and self preservation for The Pro Bowl and Superbowl coming up put a lot of guys off AEW Friday night.

517,000 viewers and a .19 in the 18 to 49 demographic for Rampage.

It really sucks that AEW has to compete with the biggest names in sports like NBA and NFL, directly which pulls lots of viewership.

But without that big sports competition, people going out to party or breaking news days Rampage probably would EASILY break 850k each week and if it wasn't basketball season Dynamite would EASILY break major records.

:lol:

Can you imagine if there was a brand new sitcom with an ensemble cast like Friends in 2022 that came out and got 500,000 viewers?

Now can you imagine the actors on the show CONSTANTLY talking about how great their ratings are and getting into Twitter fights with random people calling them cunts/twats/small white dick energy ect.?

Something tells me that wouldn't fly.

AEW’s ratings are pitiful and they act like fucking twats about them. No one in television acts that way, because that’s not the way ratings work.

I was actually trying to think of a good analogy but wrestling is so unique it’s really difficult.

Your analogy to Friends isn’t quite 1:1 as Friends isn’t still running new programming. Comparisons to movies don’t quite work either. Or to shows like Game of Thrones.

The best I came up with was long running soap operas as they run for years with multiple new episodes a week and no break. In the UK there are 2 huge long-running soap operas on opposing channels; BBC1 has Eastenders which has run since 1985, and ITV has Coronation Street which has run since 1960. They have both pulled huge ratings in the past; 5/10 of the most watched shows (non-sports, non-news) of all time in the UK are episodes of the 2 shows (4 Eastenders, 1 Coronation Street) with an episode of Eastenders the most watched show of all time with 30 million aggregate viewers (only 2m viewers less than the 1966 World Cup final - that’s the one hosted and won by England, and the coverage of Princess Diana’s funeral).

These shows were ratings juggernauts, but have seen significant declines over the years. Eastenders average rating in 1987 was over 21m, in 2020 it was around 5.5m and last year it registered its lowest ever overnight rating. Struggling to find year-by-year average ratings for Coronation Street but their highest rated episode of the year has steadily declined from a high of 27m in 1989 to 7.1m in 2021.

Over the years other soap operas have been launched, most notably, Brookside (Channel 4, 1982-2003) which regularly drew an audience of 8m+, Emmerdale (ITV, 1989-present) with it’s highest ever rating of 12.5m, and Hollyoaks (Channel 4, 1998-present), viewing figures harder to come by but current figures have them at around 500,000 viewers per episode. These “upstart” soaps have struggled to “muscle in” on the kind of viewing figures achieved by Eastenders and Coronation Street.

So I guess, Coronation Street is WWE, Eastenders is WCW, Brookside is ECW, Emmerdale is AEW, and Hollyoaks is Impact.

If you think the wrestling twittersphere is polarised, you should see it when the UK soap fans get heated.

Then I realised that’s also not quite a 1:1 analogy.

AEW would be the equivalent of a new soap opera launching but with a bunch of already established characters from EastEnders and Coronation Street amongst its cast. Which would probably draw pretty huge if suddenly Gail Platt and Kat Slater were calling each other SLLLLAAAAAAGGGGGG in the middle of the street.

So, I guess this leads me to conclude that AEW is shit, and nobody should get any enjoyment from it.

I don’t know who those EastEnders characters are, but that’s basically what you have going on. They’re not brand new. They’re building off an existing wrestling climate and have access to top names and a national platform. They just haven’t captured imaginations because they suck.

And look — I’m all for people enjoying what they want. But the idea that AEW is helping things is a myth. Interest in wrestling continues to hit all-time lows. They’ve soaked up talent so groups like ROH and Impact Wrestling have suffered. WWE is under no threat so they can deliberately be more like the WWE they want to be, which is apparently the big no-no AEW is supposed to be fighting against.

My argument from the start is that AEW is bad for wrestling. Especially long-term. A lot of people take issue with that because they think short-term and just see a bunch of people getting a lot of money and another show and think it’s great. Since AEW has come along, we’ve also seen NXT boosted to cable television, so we’ve now got an extra five hours of wrestling a week. Eight when AEW runs a PPV.

It’s too much bad wrestling poisoning the well. My only hope is that people become even more nostalgic for good shit through social media, YouTube, streaming services and it just being so far removed that it can make a glorious comeback in a few years time (we could be talking decades though).

And look, here is another hypothesis of mine: If another billionaire threw their hat into the ring. Let’s say they poached a couple of key AEW guys and got a basic cable platform. I guarantee they could use that talent better and get better ratings. Guaranteed.

AEW is not operating at the highest level that an alternative product to WWE could. It’s basically more of the same in many ways.

I’ll take your word that you don’t know who those Eastenders characters are.

Thanks. We get it over here on cable, but I’ve never watched.

Also, you cannot seriously rest the issues of Impact wrestling at the (forbidden) door of AEW. TNA/Impact is the blueprint of what not to do when you’re trying to be the competition. They’ve had to scale down entirely due to their own missteps.

Alas, it does seem AEW are following that blueprint a little too closely for now.

Don’t let not watching get in the way of writing 300 word op-eds about it. :p

:rofl:

I’m not well-versed in it enough. But I could certainly write about its influence or success.

1.38 million for RAW on SyFy, the network change definitely had an effect on ratings

RAW went to SyFy? Huh?

yeah this week and next due to the olympics

Its not about the actual show, it is about the people on the show acting like assholes over bottom of the barrel ratings.

https://i.redd.it/6rr2qvc7qbu61.jpg

Holy shit, they still beat AEW?! I thought for sure AEW would win this week and they’d trot around with it like a real victory, ignoring that Raw was on SyFy. Holy shit.

This is such a fantastic meme and it suits AEW so perfectly.

Yeah I did mean to say something about that but forgot. It’s not a good look either way is it? Best case scenario is you look like an ungracious winner. I hated it when WWE used to do those little things where they were like “Last week’s Raw had more ____ than _____ combined”. I was always like who gives a fuck? :lol:

It looks bad if you’re “winning,” but it looks especially sad if you’re not winning but act like you are. And if you are winning it draws attention to when you’re not.

Assuming AEW gets the standard rating pop for all the hype of a major debut, it could be close. I would like AEW to beat Raw in total viewership once so all the dummies that work there can brag about how total viewers suddenly matters :rofl:

Exactly.

That would be amazing actually. If it doesn’t happen on one of these SyFy shows then we’re going to be waiting for a lot of these 49 yr olds in the “key demo” to have their birthdays before the narrative changes.

400k for NXT on SyFy

That’s even lower than a Rampage!

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">AEW Dynamite last night on TBS:<br>1,129,000 viewers<br>P18-49: 0.41 (541,000)<br><br>Highest total viewership since Sep 29.<br><br> More demos &amp; analysis: <a href="https://t.co/1SscdBCpr8">https://t.co/1SscdBCpr8</a> <a href="https://t.co/9DoABiZs2Q">pic.twitter.com/9DoABiZs2Q</a></p>&mdash; Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrandonThurston/status/1491877943446061058?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 10, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Wow TBS and the stars of AEW like Keith Lee, Moxley, Punk, FTR, Archer & Hangman more over than Nathan Chen and the Olympics! Also, NHL and NBA was playing and NCAA basketball too! Big 10!

Is this the part where Rick calls me a faggot for watching AEW?

He’s still on the hunt for those posts where I’m “crying about AEW not hitting 1m viewers”. He might be a while…

Like milk left in the sun.

Hahaha, 1.13 million people tuned in for a big surprise just to get a broken Keith Lee. The number itself is sad, but good by AEW standards. They’ve only got so many people who will give them attention left to burn.

Raw on SyFy beat them. Woof.

Haha I love Mr. Nerfect. Bobby Big Wheel.

473k for Rampage. Maybe selling your soul for a one week Dynamite boost only to disappoint people wasn’t the brightest idea?

It's happening, all those 49 year olds are starting to turn 50.

R.I.P. to "Muh Demos"

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">99.178 million viewers for the Super Bowl (24.07 P18-49 rating, or about 31.4 million in the demo), according to Showbuzz Daily. <br><br>Last year's Super Bowl had 91.6 million viewers.<br><br>Puppy Bowl won among cable originals for Sunday in 18-49 (0.42 rating).<a href="https://t.co/Pwb32qhiSR">https://t.co/Pwb32qhiSR</a></p>&mdash; Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrandonThurston/status/1493605876225265666?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 15, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/WWERAW?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#WWERAW</a> did really well last night considering they were on SyFy. It averaged 1.602M viewers (+15.5% from last week) &amp; a 0.44 18-49 rating (+22%). Those numbers beat a lot of numbers they've done on USA. RAW was #1 for the night on cable, even beating the Olympics <a href="https://twitter.com/WrestlingInc?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@WrestlingINC</a></p>&mdash; Raj Giri (@RajGiri_303) <a href="https://twitter.com/RajGiri_303/status/1493696411749298181?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 15, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

RIP Olympics.

Imagine what the Raw Ratings will be once the show is built around Cody!

RIP AEW

Lol at another SyFy Raw beating AEW.

Even if you add Rampage to the Dynamite number…nope.

869,000 viewers for Dynamite

Cody knew the ship was sinking

Ouch! I expected under 1 million because of the letdowns, but wow.