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So many things to disagree with.
First, the Heyman idea:
Even if you have one main event program on the "B show" it will still seem like a B show and people will miss it. On Velocity they promoted Cena, JBL and RVD on different shows, but guess what? It didn't help ratings any. Why? Because people know all the top stars are consistantly on RAW and SD, so they miss the weekend shows. Same would happen under your plan. The guys you listed like Batsita, Flair, Jericho and so on, none of those guys are main eventers, and if they are the key drivers for a show, it will fail.
And with the PPV thing, the WWE wants to increase their PPVs, they are already at 14 for the year and are going to at least 15 next year. So only being able to do 12 would be going backwards and I dont think the WWE would be interested in that. Live events would suffer if you create a touring group with no main eventers on it. Why would people buy tickets to that? I mean you can say whatever you want about the WWE favouring RAW over SD, but SD still has Eddie, Kurt, Taker and Cena to sell tickets. If they were to lose those 4 guys, then I would say you have a point, but they are still on the blue team so.
Just to clear up, SD's numbers are basically on par with RAW. Some weeks RAW will be slightly ahead, other weeks SD will be ahead. Unfortunately for SD, they were drawing about 6 million viewers consistantly before the draft lottery, but now its down below or at 5 million. So the draft lottery basically drove away 1/6 of the SD audience, and only slightly increased the RAW rating.
Another point, GAB did a higher buyrate than Vengeance, so while I agree the WWE favours RAW over SD, the fans clearly dont, at least not to any huge degree.
The live TV thing has been talked about to death. The smart people on here know the right answer, the not-as-smart ones keep asking it (if its your first time asking, my appologies, the rest of you, smarten up!). That said, I think SD will be live on the week of the RAW Taboo Tuesday PPV. Who knows, they might one day make SD live, but I haven't heard that. The problem with going live is that A) it costs more money and B) they would force the TV and office people to go on the road twice a week, rather than only once. This would create an extra day of travel and lessen time in the office. It seems like more trouble than its worth. Which is nothing BTW.
In terms of making RAW inferior to SD? Why do that? Why would you kill off one of the WWE's strongest brands they've built over the last 11 years? Why not just keep going as they are, have main eventers on both shows, and try to make both shows good. That way you have two groups who can promote PPVs, can tour effectively and the WWE can continue to run a large number of international events (create more of that sweet revenue). Yeah RAW will always get special treatment, but thats just the way things are. Obvioiusly the fans dont see a huge difference between the products.
The Bradshaw thing is debatable. I dont think he would have got a title program on RAW because they didn't lose any top talent after Mania. But at the same time, if the Germany-MSNBC incident would have happened, I think Bradshaw would have beat Benoit for the World Title. Vince is a mark for mainstream media coverage and thats why Bradshaw got the title.
You contradicted yourself with the Benoit and Big Show examples. Show was a mid card guy and doing nothing on RAW, he went over to SD and won the WWE Title. But the exact same thing happened with Benoit. He was slightly higher on the card on SD, but he never won the title or anything and then he went to RAW and on his first try beat the so-called unstoppable HHH. So it has went both ways. And if we're going to be really picky about it, Big Show only had the belt for a month and then jobbed to Angle and Brock for the rest of his tenure. But on RAW Benoit is still kicking ass. To me that makes SD look like the stronger product (if we're being all marky about it).
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