[Emperor Smeat]

The Sheets (Observer Newsletter Edition):

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter The word out of Oklahoma is that Gov. Kevin Stitt is trying to bring in pro wrestling, MMA and boxing as well as a way to generate revenue. The only way to generate revenue from those events is with live attendance and people traveling to shows. The idea seems to be from a political perspective is that there will be far less scrutiny bringing sports that the media won’t care about, and moreso, that have no unions so there won’t be the same level of pressure from the outside on safety standards. The idea is that the states that ope up arenas to fans first will be able to get everyone running to run shows there before the rest of the country opens up. Of course there is a flip side to this as well, because the earlier things are opened up, he riskier they are. And the rush to avoid listening to what doctors and scientists are saying is quest of short-term revenue and dice rolling on the health of not just those involved, but those they would later come in contact with is something to watch from afar.

Smackdown on 4/24 did its lowest numbers on FOX to date in almost every key category with a 1.24 rating and 2,005,000 viewers (1.34 viewers per home, which was normal levels), a drop of 10.8 percent in homes watching, an 8.3 percent drop in viewers and a 13.7 percent drop in 18-49. The 18-49 number was an 0.5 rating and 661,000 total viewers. What makes that number more concerning than the typical weekly ratings drops is that this show had been promoted for a few weeks around the HHH 25th anniversary special, and that the second hour, with the celebration, which included Shawn Michaels and Vince McMahon, was the first time Smackdown on FOX ever fell below 2 million viewers. Smackdown went from finishing first most weeks in 18-49 this season to finishing in last place in the key demo. The only show it beat in Males 18-49, the demo it previously owned, was Dateline. It was also last, as it usually is, in women 18-49 and 50+ ... Still, last year, on the same Friday, with rerun programming FOX did 2,103,000 viewers and 0.4 in the demo, so they are still okay in that comparison, but then again, it’s with programming that costs very little.

Just to explain how WWE talent gets paid. When you sign a deal, it is for a guaranteed money figure. Let’s just use Braun Strowman as an example. His guarantee per year is believed to be $1.2 million. But talent is also paid based on percentages from house shows, PPVs, bonuses for the big shows on the network (mostly to the headliners of PPVs, big network shows aren’t bonused for NXT talent) and a percentage of merchandise sales. Generally speaking, for top talent, the latter figure will be higher than the guarantee. For talent not being used, or talent that may have signed over the last year plus when they started increasing guarantees to keep people from leaving to AEW, the guarantee number could be higher. Talent is paid every two weeks. The talent has the choice to get paid based on downside guarantee, meaning, if you’re Strowman, you can get $46,000 every paycheck. If your other figure ends up more, so let’s just say by regular standards he’d have made $1.8 million instead of $1.2 million, at the end of the contract year he would get $600,000. Or you can get paid based on what you would normally make on the old deal. So in his case, the check would vary based on the size of the markets and the merchandise sales. If, for some reason, his total would be less than $1.2 million, at the end of the year, he would get a check for what was due. When talent chooses which one they take, it’s not set for life in the sense they are allowed to change their minds. For people who opted for getting the check based on gate and merchandise every week, this hurt them because there are no live gates, although I’m sure there are per appearance numbers for the tapings. In the sense guys do get paid for the tapings even though the live gate is $0. Keep in mind this is somewhat archaic because this system was created when live gates, PPV revenue and merchandise were the primary revenue streams. Today, the main revenue stream is television money and the talent isn’t getting paid a percentage of that. The second major stream is WWE Network money and no residuals from being on those shows other than those on the PPV are paid on that either. Main roster talent is bonused based when appearing on PPV shows in a manner consistent with what those shows did in the pre-network era. However, guarantees are much higher across the board due to the TV revenue, although they have not increased anywhere close to the percentage TV revenue has increased. Right now it makes no sense to get anything but being paid on your base so one would think everyone would be switching to this. Where The Revival story comes from is those guys were being paid based on the gates and merchandise and because their downside wasn’t that high, had exceeded it when they were taken off the road. Since they had exceeded it, that meant no money at all until the contracts expired. Others in that same boat would be getting something, since they’d be paid if they were used at the TVs and based on merchandise sales each paycheck, but that would be way down now. Aside from the biggest merchandise sellers, and keep in mind merch numbers are going to be cut way way down with no house shows, or if lower guaranteed guys get good spots on PPV shows, we are moving to where most guys are going to be getting exactly their contract amounts. The negative is if somebody does get hot, unless they can get a contract restructured because they are a bigger star (and that is not unheard of, but you’d be surprised at how low guarantees of some super hot talent was when they skyrocketed have been in the past), they are going to be paid based on that contract instead of how in the past they’d be way above based on headlining house shows, PPV shows and increasing merch numbers. And if you look at total merchandise sales between arenas and web site, the drop is $11.4 million to $9.2 million in the first quarter. But with no house shows, that second quarter drop will be from $13.7 million to maybe $6 million, or more than in half

The reason Zayn wasn’t on Smackdown this past week with Nakamura & Cesaro is that he made the choice not to come which everyone was told they had that option to do. He was originally part of the show

The most-watched shows on the WWE Network this week are: 1. 25 Years of HHH: The Game Changing Matches; 2. Ride Along with Mandy Rose, Otis, and Street Profits; 3. Stone Cold’s Hell Raising Moments;’ 4. Rey Mysterio’s Best 619s; 5. WrestleMania Day Two; 6. A conversation with HHH and Lemmy; 7. WrestleMania Day One. It’s notable that NXT is no longer even on the list, let alone NXT U.K. and 205 Live

Florida has become the new haven for the risk takers in sports who are considered essential services in that state ... For AEW, the 5/6 show will go live. The show that will air on 5/13 will be taped the next day most likely, but it’ll be taped either on 5/6 or 5/7 either way. They will return on 5/20 and then the crew will stay in Jacksonville from 5/20 to 5/27, doing the 5/20 Dynamite, the 5/23 PPV show and the 5/27 Dynamite show. After that, we’ll see what happens. The people who live in Tampa, Orlando and Atlanta, which is a decent amount of people, will likely go home between tapings but the fly-ins are expected to stay from 5/20 to 5/27 in Jacksonville. For the last tapings, anyone who didn’t want to be there had that option, plus people in hard-hit places were not brought in, as well as older people. For 5/6, they asked people in hard-hit places like New York and the state of Washington in particular to quarantine for two weeks, which most started doing last week. A much larger talent pool will be used going forward to build the PPV show. Those who don’t want to be there don’t have to be, and the talent based outside the U.S. won’t be able to be on these shows, most notably most of the Japanese women (Hikaru Shida and I believe Riho live in Florida) and other international stars like Bea Priestley, Jamie Hayter, Pac and Pentagon Jr.

Jim Ross will be returning for the 5/6 show. This one is risky for sure, similar to Jerry Lawler on Raw as both are about the same age (Ross is two years younger) and both have had histories of significant health problems. I think it’s early for this but Ross is essentially going to relocate to Jacksonville at least through 5/27 rather than travel back-and-forth. I just don’t see it as worth the risk. Actually the commentary with Tony Schiavone and Chris Jericho has been hilarious, particularly this week’s show that had all kinds of subtle comedy. Jericho probably won’t be on commentary next week since he’s wrestling and shouldn’t be on the PPV since he should have a match there even though aside from Cody vs. Lance Archer, nothing has really been strongly teased for the PPV For 5/6, it’s Kenny Omega & Matt Hardy vs. Jericho & Sammy Guevara in a street fight, Jon Moxley vs. Frankie Kazarian in a non-title match and Cody vs. Joey Janela. MJF returns next week. The Young Bucks will be involved by remote but are not at this point scheduled to go to Jacksonville

Even though Penelope Ford was wearing a different outfit in the Orange Cassidy vs. Jimmy Havoc match and the Dustin Rhodes vs. Kip Sabian match on last week’s show, they were actually taped the same day. What happened is that originally the matches were laid out top where they were considered to be airing on two different shows, and she knew that, so that’s probably why she changed between matches. Tony Khan moved different matches to different shows from the original format. The idea was taping for eight shows if worst came to worst and they weren’t allowed to tape again, and it was laid out as four shows minimum because of the tournament. When she was wearing a different outfit on the same show after all, nobody stressed over it as Tony Khan felt it’s not implausible she would change between matches since there was enough time in between that she was not on camera. The same thing happened ths week as Brandi Rhodes in the Cody vs. Darby Allin match was wearing one outfit, got speared, and came back later in the match selling the injury. Then she was wearing a different outfit during Lance Archer vs. Dustin Rhodes and not selling. What essentially happened at the last taping they taped with the idea of doing a minimum four weeks, a maximum eight weeks, and ended up doing five weeks. The two matches even though she had different outfits on were taped on the same day as well

Notes from the 4/29 TV show. Cody beat Darby Allin in 20:11 in a semifinal in the TNT tournament. Very good match. Jericho mentioned how Cody beat Austin Watson when both were amateur wrestlers. Austin Watson is Xavier Woods, who was a very good high school wrestler at the same time as Cody. Cody went to Lassiter High and Wood went to Sprayberry High (same school as Buff Bagwell) which are both located in Marietta, GA.

For 4/29, AEW did 693,000 viewers and a 0.27 in 18-49 while NXT did 637,000 viewers and a 0.16 in 18-49. AEW was down 5.2 percent into total viewers, but up 7.7 percent in 18-49 viewers with 350,000. NXT was down 4.2 percent in total viewers, and down 12.0 percent in 18-49 viewers with 206,000. There isn’t much else to pull from these numbers. In the key demos, AEW dominated, with Male 18-34 having a 56,000 to 32,000 edge; Women 18-34 having a 50,000 to 19,000 edge; Males 35-49 having a 155,000 to 96,000 edge and Women 35-49 having a 89,000 to 59,000 edge. AEW was 16th in 18-49. During its time period, it trailed shows on MTV, Bravo, VH1, Fox News, The Food Network, The History Channel and Home & Garden TV. NXT was 51st in the demo. Because NXT wasn’t top 50 we don’t have demo comparisons.

For the 4/22 Wednesday night shows, AEW won handily in 18-49 every quarter but NXT did win the first quarter in total viewers coming off their higher lead-in, but lost every other quarter in both ... AEW opened with 720,000 viewers and 325,000 in 18-49 with a Cody interview plus the beginning of Sammy Guevara vs. Darby Allin. NXT opened with 728,000 viewers and 253,000 in 18-49 with the Velveteen Dream angle where the Undisputed Era attacked and Keith Lee made the save, plus Tegan Nox & Shotzi Blackheart vs. Dakota Kai & Raquel Gonzalez. In the second quarter, AEW lost 3,000 viewers but gained 10,000 in 18-49 for Guevara vs. Allin and a Matt Hardy interview. NXT lost 54,000 viewers and 16,000 in 18-49 for the Drake Maverick promo and Maverick vs. Jake Atlas. In the third quarter, AEW lost 15,000 viewers and 29,000 in 18-49 for Kenny Omega vs. Alan Angels. NXT lost 7,000 viewers and gained 7,000 in 18-49 for a Keith Lee vs. Damien Priest package and the beginning of Kushida vs. Tony Nese. In the fourth quarter, AEW gained 50,000 viewers and 13,000 in 18-49 the Scorpio Sky video package, a Cody promo and the beginning of Orange Cassidy vs. Jimmy Havoc. NXT gained 18,000 viewers and 24,000 in 18-49 with Kushida vs Tony Nese and a Matt Riddle & Timothy Thatcher interview. In the fifth quarter AEW gained 26,000 viewers and 20,000 in 18-49 for Cassidy vs. Havoc, an MJF promo and Wardlow vs. Lee Johnson. It was AEW’s best segment of the show and the peak was the Cassidy match. NXT gained 8,000 viewers but lost 1,000 in 18-49 for The Gargano family dinner and Mia Yim vs. Jessi Kamea. In the sixth quarter, AEW lost 43,000 viewers and 21,000 in 18-49 for the Brodie Lee recruiting Preston Vance and for Lee vs. Justin Law. NXT gained 14,000 viewers and 21,000 in 18-49 for the Charlotte Flair/Yim confrontation, Chelsea Green bikini photo shoot, a Jack Gallagher package and the beginning of Gallagher vs. El Hijo del Fantasma. In the seventh quarter, AEW lost 32,000 viewers but gained 10,000 in 18-49 for The Bubbly Bunch video and the build to Dustin Rhodes vs. Kip Sabian. NXT lost 8,000 viewers and lost 8,000 in 18-49 for Fantasma vs. Gallagher and the kidnapping attempt during the Fantasma interview. In the eighth quarter, AEW gained 36,000 viewers and 7,000 in 81-49 for Goldust vs. Gallagher with Goldust’s career at stake, ending at 739,000 viewers and 335,000 in 18-49. NXT lost 2,000 viewers and 3,000 in 18-49 for Dream & Keith Lee (replaced by Dexter Lumis) vs. Roderick Strong & Adam Cole, ending at 653,000 viewers and 228,000 in 18-49.

Due to the Corona Virus, the Santino Brothers wrestling school in Bell Gardens, CA has closed due to having to pay rent monthly for a school where there is no way for them to make any income. Among the recent students of the school were Ronda Rousey, Jessamyn Duke, Jake Atlas, Brody King, Douglas James, Heather Monroe (Big Swole in AEW), Eli Everfly and it was also the school Brian Kendrick trained classes at.

Some YouTube numbers for different streaming shows have shown AAA’s Lucha Capital in the lead of non-WWE shows, with 258,000 and 264,000 views for the first two shows. The 200th episode of BTE was 243,000. Dark has been 217,000 and 232,000 the last two shows. NWA did 85,000 for Kamille’s first match and 61,000 for the prior week’s Crockett Cup 2019 replay. The Seth Rollins-Drew McIntyre contract signing did 1.1 million views