Did Vince help or hurt the wrestling industry?
 

By popular demand

I guess I'll start.

Before Vince assumed control of the industry there wrestlers from one end of the country to the other making a living off it. Full time wrestlers buying homes and supporting families. Now either you work for him or you live off a couple hundred a night if you are exceptional/work the gimmick stand. The ones who do well do better than the ones of yesteryear but the gap between success and starvation is vast and there is no "middle class."

There is no industry now. There is one promotion.

Vince killing kayfabein federal court is a topic worth discussing as well.

If Vince didn't do it, somebody else would. The Territories were terribly run by the mid 80's. The decisions made by Fritz, Verne etc were laughable.

Let's not forget the reality of how damaging it's been to the industry as a whole since he bought wcw. I'm aware they had financial issues and someone was going to buy them but he killed his competition and then kinda pooped all over their legacy and their fans with the awful invasion. Ratings have been going down ever since.

WCW had no T.V. It was pretty much worthless to anyone other than Vince.

Moot argument. The question is did it help or hurt the industry not if it was or was not inevitable.

A territory could have died and been revived by someone else. As is there is nothing beyond 100 or so jobs in the business now.

Glad I'm not the only one that noticed this. :yes:

Considering Pro Wrestling pretty much reached it's ceiling 15 years ago. I think he obviously helped. Keeping the product relevant since then has been outstanding.

He turned it from regional garbage to a global phenomenon

A mix of both overall. For every great thing he did, something else took a bit hit either in the short or long term.

WWF's rise and Hulkamania becoming huge in the mainstream came at the cost of the old territory system. WWF's victory over WCW came at the cost of the gradual mainstream decline in the industry. Even stuff like NXT is a mixed bag since he gave Triple H all the resources needed for it to be successful but at the same time is the biggest obstacle when it comes to transitioning those gains to the next level on the main roster.

The non WWE territories went out of business because they were terrible and were minor league. Any other territory could have done what Vince did. The difference was he was way better at it.

The business was declining off its ratings peak before WCW went out of business. It's never been more successful from a business standpoint than it is now. That's thanks to Vince.

Anyone who draws a pay in wrestling in North America is doing so because of Vince.

Vince fixed a broken system

Only to become the broken system with enough money for the "broken system" that he's become/created, not to matter.

Yeah but a broken system without ties to organized crime. So, it's better. So, hooray?

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Everyone is citing the WWEs success and calling it the industry. There is no industry now, there is only one promotion.

Yeah business is soo great right now for the WWE that they suddenly need around $200 million to cover their current debts based on recent financial reports.

Network itself still hasn't come close to doing the financial things the WWE was expecting by now and even has declined a bit in terms of overall performance. Even so, it was only ever meant to replace their tv and ppv revenues which it still hasn't managed to get close to doing so.

Shhh... don't cite facts as evidence. Cynick, et al., will tell you "you don't know anything / what you're talking about" and that "you're just wrong, everything's great". Except for when things were better, like April 18, 2008, April 23, 2010, February 2, 2001, January 15, 2001 - January 30, 2001, June, 25, 2000 - September 23, 2000, October 24, 1999 - November, 23, 1999.

Vince did to wrestling what big business has done to the U.S. as a whole. He made the top guys richer and gave them the ability to become bigger stars than they ever could have before. However, he also killed the industry as a whole and made it impossible for the vast majority of wrestlers to make a living at it.

Don't take the Cynick bait, he's just gonna say you're believing everything Meltzer says or something like that

Seriously, guys...

Ask yourself if this is a guy you wanna try to have a discussion with.

So what I'm reading is that Vince helped "WWE / the promotion" at the expense of "the industry".

Without WWE being the big dog in the yard, the "industry" as a whole would have floundered long ago. WWE kept pro wrestling relevant. Could you imagine in today's cultural landscape (if WWE ceased to exist) how well a glorified carnival act would go over with millennials? I don't think Dusty Rhodes could compete with Steph Curry on a bang-for-bucks ratio

Meltzer Sheep,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Pure speculation. And one that works off the assumption that wrestling cant adapt with the times without vince, as if the product hadnt adapted and changed before he even got into the industry. It would have been different but there is no evidence to suggest it wouldn't have.

No one has yet to name an example of how the industry is better post vince outside of his company.

Well, it will always be speculative when talking in hypotheticals. Without Vince/WWE, would Turner have bought WCW to compete? Would they ever have moved on past the "territory" style of promotions?

Without WWE providing a constant mainstream presence, interest in the industry as a whole would not have been near where it is. I can't imagine there would be any worldwide interest in American football, for example, without an NFL.

We arent talking hypotheticals here. We have a reality prior to vince and a reality post vince. In what way is the industry better off outside of the WWF?

I can only speak for myself in saying that I would literally have no interest in pro wrestling without Vince's involvement. Hell I probably wouldn't even know it existed.

To me this is simple. You take an industry that had, i dunno lets go conservative here, 1000 jobs across the country and replace it with 100 jobs you have not improved industry. If you had 15 successful businesses and replaced it with 1.

Walmart was not good for the supermarket industry. It was good for walmart.

And thats not me saying walmart was a failure theres just a diference between the two things.

WWE has created 1000s of jobs, though.

Granted, those aren't all wrestling jobs. It takes a lot of people to run a company of that size, though. Whereas a territory could be run/managed by a handful of people, WWE is a powerhouse corporate conglomerate with tons of jobs created.

A lot more people are probably making $ and supporting their families due to the state of the industry today. Just maybe less rasslers.

Not only that, but I think what Vince has done since buying WCW has definitely hurt the business. WWE's popularity has been on a steady decline and with it, since it's synonymous with wrestling, has gone the business itself. WCW thrived because Vince made wrestling a mainstream juggernaut and WCW took advantage of that. Even if TNA were actually producing a strong product over the past 15 years though they wouldn't stand much of a chance because the industry is not the draw it was. And that's also because of Vince.

So I'm kind of in between. I think he helped it and then hurt it.

Theres no maybe to the rasslers. The jobs it "created" were entertainment jobs. Jobs that people from television filled. So i guess he had a positive impact on the tv industry?

Furthermore think of the workers he employs. What is their future like post wwe? Most die in trailer parks and its not because of poor money management. The average worker bring in 55k before travel for...5 years? And after that they have no industry to go to.

:yes:

Agreed. Seems like you almost always say exactly what I'm thinking.

Ryan Clark confirms Crippy Z and Fan are one in the same

There better not be a link with hot pics coming.

How is this a bad thing, exactly? Should wrestling not be televised? Is that your gripe?

How glamorous were pre-WWE wrestlers' post-wrestling lives? (not snarky, legit question because I know 0 about anything related to the lifestyle of wrestlers)

No? If you want to credit Vince for creating jobs for sales reps, marketers, TV crews, etc thats all valid. Those are positions that benifit from the industry but arent OF the industry. If the WWF up and died those people would find work elsewhere inside their industry. But if you want to credit him as a job creater for those that would be fair. The net jobs gained v jobs lost still wouldnt favor the WWF but whatever.

They could support families off of them. Buying homes and cars. Middle class. Full time wrestler was a viable profesion. Wahoo McDaniel quit the NFL because wrestling paid better.


Job guys would make a killing but they had to travel a lot more.


Glamor? I dont think the Middle Class could be described as that.

I think wrestling would have died 1-2 decades ago if it wasn't for Vince. If you think, it is probably the silliest thing on TV and without Vince making it relevant I don't think it would have continued anywhere near what it is. Maybe it would still be a travelling carny show at best.

Rediculous. He didnt invent the business. It exists globally with out him. This is propagandized mindset. Something about wrestling works. And has worked for over a century. This notion that only Vince can run a succesful company is just silly.

I am saying it would probably still be a carny side show. It woukd still exist but I don't think it would be anywhere near what it is. Honestly don't know if it eould be on tv in North America. I have tried to watch TNA and ROH but it is so painfully bad that it is just a terrible tv show. I think television watching habits have change so much that it probably would have to be a netflix series to have any tv time.

I agree that the existing non WWF product is bad but thats is related to the monopolization as much as anything.


But the notion that it couldnt be national ignores that other companies have been national for 40 years all across the planet. The heights it reached in Japan are as monsterous and it has reached in the states. Someone else could have come along and did what Vince did and there is really no reason to think otherwise. The only difference is that someone made not have become the only show in town. We will never know.

I get what you are saying, but Vince came around at the right time then WCW came at the right time. Vince almost went out of business, had that happen I think wcw woukd have eventually gone out of business too. The 90s were an interesting time with the explosion of tv and internet but I do think without vinces balls and genius wrestling could have disappeared altogether on tv due to the changing face of tv. Think about the world today minus wreslting, does anybody think if wrestling comes to tv now anybody watches? I think Vince is why wrestling is still on tv.

I can't speak for wrestling overseas or in Mexico because I live in North America, but I don't think American Wrestling works now had it not been for VKM.

Debatable, but moot. Can you state in one way the industry is better outside of the WWF today than it was before him?

I wasn't around before him nor am I a wrestling historian so I can't truly answer that question. But I would guess you have more real athletes as wrestlers now than before when any big muscular guy or fat ass could compete. I hate with a passion watching Roh and Tna but it is so much better in ring than up to the early to mid 80s.

We're about to get super side tracked here but I keep thinking if the Fed hires anymore fat guys they need to put them all in a stable

It's better because all the other promoters were either behind the times (Verne Gagne) or inept (Verne Gagne, Fritz Von Erich) or didn't have the financial means to sustain the long haul (Bill Watts). Vince actually organized things and I shudder to think what would have happened had Vince not did what he did. The AWA, WCCW, FCW, Central States etc would have collapsed regardless. JCP was the only competition and the way they book didn't have mass appeal. It's better because you have something rather than nothing.

But that's all speculative. You dont know what would have come down the pike. Either new promoters or new ideas. What you know is there was a successful industry when vince came on the scene in 1980 there was an industry. In 2016 there isnt. Those are real facts. Vince took control not because he was the only guy with a good show but because he was smarter. He knew more about business and marketing. The territories died out BECAUSE of how Vince shifted the market. They were unequipped to respond...but if he had never existed? No reasons to think they wouldnt have stayed the course.

If it wasn't for Vince then wrestling would never have become as huge as it was or is now.

Wrestling isnt huge. The WWE is.

Never meant to replace TV revenue. The issue was PPV was a very volatile business, they figured out something that flattened monthly revenues and wound up increasing revenue compared to the PPV model years. Costs are higher now, but that's to be expected during the early stages of a new venture. They have tons of opportunities to further maximize revenues with tiered pricing and as they conquest overseas markets. Long run they made the right call and it's paying off in spades.

Have you ever contributed ANYTHING to a discussion?

BTW, how are the Walking Dead ratings this season? Still increasing like you said?

But that's not on Vince or the crappy supermarkets.

The crappy wrestling promotions were crap and they went out of business. Vince didn't force them to not be able to sell tickets to their events. Vince didn't force them to be failures on PPV. Vince didn't force them to draw terrible TV numbers.

The proper statement would be thank God for Vince, because without him, those crappy wrestling promotions would have went out of business and there would be no industry today.

There's no barrier to entry in this industry. Literally anyone with deep enough pockets could get TV time, buy some rings, rent arenas, contact talent and start a company. Anyone who tries has failed or had minimal success. Goes to show that Vince has figured out something that the others haven't.

It's funny reading statements about TNA lack of growth is somehow the wrongdoing of Vince. He ran his business and watched every competitor fail. Their lack of success should not be blamed on him.

Agreed

What do you know, a fellow Canadian bringing more logic to the table.

Just flat out wrong.

Vince made some moves, but others could have followed suit. WCW survived for a long time. There's no reason to think other promoters could have been successful as well. The problem was they were no good. Line up side by side a WWE show say in 1985 and compare it to any other promotion at the time. The non WWE products looked like they were filmed in a smokey high school gymnasium. Likely because a lot of the times, that's where they were filmed.

Even today, why can't TNA match what WWE does? Look at the rest of entertainment, lots of shows come and go. They gain a following, it dips off, and then something new takes over. TNA was on the same cable channel WWE and had the same opportunities but couldn't capitalize. Just like AWA and other groups could have taken off in the 80s. They didn't because they suck (ed).

New Japan and Japanese wrestling would have gotten more popular quicker in America had Vince never shown up.

Guys... Guys...

Don't do it, guys...

No, just no.

A) Japanese wrestling isn't really entertaining,
B) North Americans hardly watch anything not North American.

The huge shelves of Magna at my Local Barnes and Noble beg to differ.

When American animation turned somewhat kiddie many people turned to Japan. Very similar situation could have taken place in wrestling.

Cynick must be trolling.

Here's the tl;dr

Vince is god and we are lucky to have had him

Lol. Ok.

I didn't read his specific responses this time but... come on. We can safely assume by now...

Right right. Touché

They would have died regardless. The promoters were completely inept.

Do you have any idea how many times Vince brought over Inoki, Sakaguchi, Yatsu and Choshu? They got over like a fart in church.

I fucking love Japanese wrestling, but what the fuck are you talking about here? What are you basing this on? Manga and Anime? What does that have to do with anything? They are completely different forms of entertainment.

Maybe if candy sales in vending machines starts falling, they'll start selling panties, because Naruto was a big hit over here.

STD manga, Anime,Wrestling WWWWWAAAAY different in terms of marketing,target audience, and a whole truckload of other stuff.

:lol: @ Cynick's logical reasoning skills. It would be sad if he wasn't such a douche.

Have you checked TWDs ratings season to date. Down again. They had a big first night because they had a massive teaser. But the falloff since then has been quite large.

But as usual you don't like facts that fly in the face of your narrative. You are probably a low energy type as well.

I would take a wager that I'm one of the nicest people you would ever meet. If you ever get out of your mom's basement that is. Cheers mate.

Not God, but if they built a Mount Rushmore for the industry, he would be the lone person on the mountain.

That's great, but I'm not concerned with how nice you are.

I don't live with my parents and I haven't lived with them in over 15 years, nor do they have a basement.

For supposedly one of the nicest people I would ever meet, that's not exactly the "nicest" presumption you're alleging about me by the way.

Dont feed the troll.

He's trying hard. Throwing out softballs that make it difficult to call him out on. Resist the temptation, guys...

Resist the temptation...

Wait. Already did that one in this thread.

DON'T DO IT, GUYS.

I was being ironic. I don't actually think you live in your parents basement.

There's no barrier to entry in this business...except if you're not a multi-millionaire that can afford to lose a bunch of money on start up/running a new wrestling company.

That can be said about most businesses the size of WWE. If youer point is that a guy working at McDonalds likely can't start up a wrestling company tomorrow, you're right. But that doesn't mean Vince did something bad to the industry.

I don't think many McDonalds workers were starting up wrestling companies before Vince got involved in the game.

Nope, not my point. Just enjoyed the way you said there are no barriers except for this HUGE barrier.

You're great value for money I'll give you that.

Resist. Resissssst!

You clearly never went to business school since you don't understand what a barrier to entry is. When I start CyNick University, I will let you take business 101 for free.

all that testicular fortitude has to be a positive thing right.

oh and every time I think of Vince I think of that scene from 'Beyond The Mat' where he wanted to call Droz 'Puke'

I used to believe some of the McMyths, but I now find myself in the same camp as educated folk like Destor, #1-wwf-fan and BigCrippyZ. Vince has smashed people over the head with the assertion that he somehow saved wrestling, took it out of smoky halls and legitimized it. All you need to do is account for inflation and you can see how he has scorched the earth.

Creatively, wrestling is fucked. If you prove yourself to be a good wrestler with anything resembling an ounce of creativity, the WWE will eventually snap you up. It has been presented as the "dream" to work there, and the kids getting into the business today eat it up. They'll be sent out there with some caricature of their gimmick, do scripted interviews that don't build any heat, and then they'll have the same match every week. Look at the wonderful talent signed to the WWE to train in Orlando -- and look at how everyone comes out with the same style, the WWE style (now influenced more by independent hybrid style), the "right way" to wrestle. This is despite guys getting injured a lot more frequently -- and they are breaking their bodies for almost no one.

The WWE product is gentrified. It's where pro-wrestling as art goes to die, and the artist goes to be force-fed until they become fat, lazy cats that don't mind lying in the sun for as long as Vince will pay them. And being there, traveling the world, seeing kids smile (because they've been conditioned to the cold), and having a reaffirming locker-room tells them all that they are doing the right thing, and that this is the "evolution" of wrestling.

With the death of WCW, hope for wrestling died out. There was no one to make Vince McMahon sweat and go at someone else's pace. He had no reason to be good anymore. It might seem counterproductive to try and purposely be bad, but Vince has had no reason to churn out quality when he is the only legitimate product there is.

The thing is, if a millionaire sank money into a wrestling promotion, it wouldn't be that unreasonable to imagine it competing effectively with Vince, provided the right minds were involved. All Vince has is the money. His television ratings are not unbeatable. He has no real stars. He's actually conditioned a lot of his wrestlers to be bad at their jobs (get over and draw money). Vince made the assertion that PPV is a dead industry -- a legitimately wrestling promotion could blow that right open. You watch how quickly Shawn Michaels came back and made a star if a billionaire went toe-to-toe with Vince. You watch how quickly Vince gets around film companies not wanting The Rock to wrestle if there is another wrestling show getting a higher rating share than him every week. You also watch how quickly talent jump if a viable alternative pops up too. You'd be seeing Nick Nemeth, Claudio Castagnoli and Bryan Danielson identifying with a different initialism very fast if there is something secure there.

And for proof, look at NXT. It's generally regarded as being better than RAW or SmackDown every week. It's wrestling done as wrestling was done prior to Vince taking over. Matches booked with talent you want to look strong going over strong so that your fans accept them as a big deal and are willing to pay to see them compete. Now, it is kept around on the good graces of Vince's money, and it can spend the dough to get the top independent talent in the world to work for it, but that talent generally gets very over, very quickly. In fact, the most over acts on the WWE roster haven't been around for that long either (James Ellsworth, Chris Jericho's pen).

It is still my jizzy-cock fantasy for The Rock to decide to compete with Vince. The Rock is the one dude that could make wrestling cool and sway instant smark opinion away from the Vince McMahon is God myth. He is charismatic enough to carry a show by doing a shit in the ring, and I have no doubt he could piece together a decent enough roster with relatively short notice who would be just dying to be seen as part of The Rock's crew.

Why would Rock fight Vince? Because if he can make the promotion profitable, it's an extra source of income for him and something for his production company to attach itself to. But it would also be good for the wrestling business. It would give guys like Nick Nemeth and Claudio Castagnoli places to work and be the stars that Rock got the chance to be. It's unlikely that either will be as great as The Rock -- especially in a crossover sense -- but they could be mainstream wrestling figures as long as it's in a place where that isn't against the Vince McMahon narrative.

I don't think it will happen, but if it did, wrestling would be in the spotlight again. Vince has taken it out of the spotlight.

meltzer sheep,,,,,

That's why they call you Dastardly.

i do what i can

I miss gorgeous Dale

Drew 100k people to Mania last year. If that's out of the spotlight, well the spotlight must be brighter than the Sun. I'll never forget when mid South used to put 70k people in a stadium every year. Those were the good ol'days.

TNA is apparently thinking of PPV again, let's see how well they do. When they fail on PPV, you'll have some excuse. The fact is nobody has figured out the formula to draw money on PPV with sports entertainment. Even WCW was largely unsuccessful save for as couple years when they pushed stars Vince created.

NXT is great. But I'm a hardcore fan. I'm in the group with the 1.4 million people who are passionate sports entertainment fan. If NXT was the way to book to the broader audience, the NXT house shows would be in the Staples Centre and The RAW and SDL house shows would be in bingo Halls. It's not like NXT is some new promotion, they have been around and been strong for several years. But to the AVERAGE fan they're not seen as big time. The genius of Vince and Hunter is that they are catering content to the hardcore fans and putting it on The Network. So sure you may claim to hate RAW (and watch every week), but you can still enjoy NXT, 205 Live, this British Deal, the upcoming Women's Show, etc.

Meanwhile in the main roster they continue to play to large crowds every week, are one of the most watched shows every week on cable, and draw more revenues year after year. You're blind hatred of Vince can't let you see the truth, which is guys methods are very successful. The multi millionaires he's created would echo that statement. Meanwhile Matt Hardy is taking bumps in his back yard for 50 people.

This is the argument people use when they want to keep their head in the sand. Everything's great, everything's great. Yeah, until it's not. You don't get an immediate drop-off. People use the 100k line to justify the creative direction coming out of the show. That's putting the cart before the horse.

He's laying out the fallacies more blatantly now. He's tempting you all. RESISSSSSST!!!

shit's about to get lit

No! We're gonna have a nice conversation between everyone else and pretend the troll doesn't exist. Nothing is getting lit. I believe in TPWW.

100k+ crowd for Mania got debunked pretty quickly. Real number is around 94k but being assumed the paid number is actually somewhere between 74k-86k and the rest being given away to pad the numbers for the new record.

Oh shit. Facts. This is bad...