[Emperor Smeat]

The Sheets (Observer Newsletter edition)

The WWE's ability to license and merchandise Brock Lesnar ended this past week, which comes months after the end of the actual contract. Lesnar had been a free agent since WrestleMania but that news never broke and at the time considered largely a formality given it made no sense for WWE to use him during the pandemic and the belief was that he was out of everyone else's price range. The belief was that, at 43, he was not going to do UFC once he pulled himself again out of the USADA testing pool and that AEW would not be able to afford to make a comparable offer to what WWE could in his case, and he's purely a money guy ... For AEW it would be a statement move, but ultimately in this environment such a move, given the price tag we are talking about and the schedule he's looking at doing, it wouldn't appear to make any economic sense. Plus a key part of his WWE act, Paul Heyman, is still under contract to WWE ... The contract gives the WWE rights to continue to sell merchandise for a length of time, in this case around five months, after the deal expires. That period is what just expired this past week. One person in the company noted that it makes no sense to sign Lesnar to a new deal at the moment, as it would only be to keep him from AEW. The belief is Lesnar could, and probably would try to use AEW as leverage, but that at the end of the day, the belief is Lesnar's value to AEW would be nowhere near his price tag and a deal with Lesnar makes no sense for a company basically trying to just break even during the pandemic. It was said that for Lesnar, like for Tyson Fury (who issued a challenge to Drew McIntyre this past week for a match), that it's at this point Saudi Arabia and WrestleMania as the only shows that make sense right now and the belief right now is Saudi Arabia won't happen this year. Lesnar’s name had been talked about in WWE in reference to a Drew McIntyre rematch for this coming WrestleMania, but that was if McIntyre was to retain the title, which has also been considered to go to Randy Orton, who in theory would be earmarked for Edge and not Lesnar. But nothing in that direction is close to being decided. Lesnar and WWE was described as the exact same thing that UFC is doing with Conor McGregor, in the sense that his pay is so high for a show that it doesn't make sense to use him until you have a big money event. His contract expiring isn't a new thing but in the past he's always signed a new deal before the time frame where the WWE's ability to merchandise him ends. When that time frame ended, they had to remove all merchandise from the web site. Mike Johnson at PW Insider reported that there were talks for a new deal, which would have allowed them to continue selling his merchandise, that had an impasse. Lesnar usually has his deal expire by design, and teases going to UFC, which would give him a big offer. It is believed Lesnar received $8 million for his UFC 200 fight with Mark Hunt and would have been able to get a similar if not larger deal for a fight with Daniel Cormier, which he shot an angle for before UFC had the deal in place. This gave him a ton of leverage in his last set of negotiations. Lesnar also always tries to sign short-term contracts, which has worked in his favor, but would work against him if Vince McMahon decides they’ve gotten what they need out of him, such as the quick loss to McIntyre to try and establish a new top guy, and that his huge paycheck and working few dates no longer made sense. It is always possible AEW could make him an offer, which no doubt would be what he would be counting on. Lesnar now is actually more valuable to one party than for anyone else, including WWE, which is ESPN ... The reality is that if Lesnar had any interest in UFC, and he knows he can make more money for one fight there than he can earn in a year or perhaps multiple years in WWE, and at his age, the idea that he’s never even talked to White, if true because White is often not honest, would seem to indicate zero interest in fighting. Another key is that Lesnar is not a big spender and doesn’t need money. He likely has enough to not just live the rest of his life, but also to insure a great life for his children after he’s gone.

Roman Reigns turned heel and joined up with Paul Heyman, and then won the Universal title in the main event of the 8/30 Payback PPV ... It’s not known whether it was Reigns or McMahon who made the call to put Heyman with Reigns, but Reigns did ask to be turned heel on his return after being out of action since March due to concerns over COVID-19. Reigns probably should have been turned years ago but the company was adamant that he was the only person who could follow John Cena as the top full-time face of the company. The feeling is that you need a guy who has great looks, a muscular body, be at least 6-feet tall, preferably an inch or two taller, and has charisma. A lot of WWE fans rejected that, and really, as shown with New Japan and Tetsuya Naito, had they turned him heel, the fans on their own would have eventually turned him babyface, and he’d be stronger because of that and no longer face the adversarial relationship since the fans believed they had chosen him as opposed to him being forced on them. Essentially this is the same thing, only years later, and Reigns is now 35 instead of 30. As far as Heyman, he has a top tier contract and without Brock Lesnar, they could either pay him a high figure to be a booking consultant after removing him from the guy working under Vince McMahon in charge of Raw, or try and make use of him as talent, so it fell together ... Reigns will next defend the title likely on the 9/27 Clash of the Champions show against the winner of a four-way on the 9/4 Smackdown show with Big E, Matt Riddle, Sheamus and King Corbin. The idea seems to be to save Fiend, his WrestleMania opponent in the original planning that Vince changed, to a later PPV. Sheamus being in is kind of weird since he’s lost to Big E and Jeff Hardy, who isn’t in, but in WWE the secondary title holders almost never challenge for the main title, which really makes no sense. Corbin also lost on the PPV. The PPV main event looks to be Drew McIntyre vs. Randy Orton for the WWE title. Orton also lost on this show to Keith Lee, clean, fast and deceive, to a spirit bomb. Orton had been talked about to face Edge at WrestleMania for the title, so if Orton wins, Lee is set up perfectly as a challenger, although Lee taking the RKO in the three-way where Orton beat Lee and Seth Rollins to get the shot should have never happened if the plan is for a big Orton vs. Lee program.

The Cartoon Network Latin America announced an animated cartoon series called Rey Mysterio. The character of Mysterio will be in a cartoon where a fan of Mysterio has found out secret information where the forces of evil are threatening the world, he calls on Mysterio and the two of them work together to save the world. The release never mentions WWE so this may be an outside project that he was able to work on his own. We’ll have more details on this next week

Levesque talked about the relaunch of NXT U.K., which starts back 9/17 with new shows on the WWE Network. They taped last week at the BT Studios and Levesque said that would be the permanent site. I guess the decision is that taping at arenas with larger crowds isn't cost-effective. "That is the intent and the hope. BT has been, I can't say it enough, an amazing partner," Levesque said in an interview with Metro U.K. "When you look at that studio, it's perfect for what we do, but they are perfect for what we do. They have been a leader in changing the game in sport across all of Europe and, really, globally. They have once of the most technologically advanced studios in the world. It's an amazing facility. The intent is for us to be able to in there long term to be able to create this content, and I think if later down the line, we get to a place where fans can come in, obviously we'd be thrilled and excited." Levesque was also asked out the allegations of sexual misconduct in U.K. pro wrestling. "Part of this is why we started (the company) in the first place, to professionalize and put that system into place where everyone can feel safe and protected, and have a working environment that is inclusive of everyone and the opportunity to do what we do. We take every allegation very seriously, and you can refer back to our policy. It's zero tolerance for things of this manner. We look into everything. We look into it, we go from there to see what is legitimate, what is not, what is real, what isn't, and deal with it accordingly. While a lot of these things happened years ago, we take them very seriously. We also have an open policy with everybody. No one should ever feel like, `I didn't wanna say anything.' That's the exact opposite of what we want. We're trying to make this the safe, inclusive environment for everybody that it should be." A real question coming out of this regards talent that several of the major local promotions have stopped using based on allegations that WWE still has under contract, Jordan Devlin being the biggest name that comes to mind. If the allegations are true and serious, than he should be gone, but if WWE has truly investigated and found the claims to not be valid, then shouldn't the other companies use him? I don't know the answer of what is and isn't true in his case, just that he was working for companies as a top guy what are affiliated with WWE and this is a major contradiction. If nothing else, WWE should share what they've investigated if they have, and the other companies should share with WWE why they won't use him. There are two basic issues here. Either there is something to why other companies dropped using him but WWE feels they are untouchable and he's a good worker and all that, or he was unfairly accused and the other companies are afraid to use someone not guilty for fear of a public backlash. There's in the middle as well but if WWE investigated in situations like this the public and certainly other companies they work with have the right to know. Some people won't believe anything WWE says but that doesn't mean they shouldn't say it. And if what WWE says doesn't actually hold up, and that happens as well, WWE should want to know that if they really do care about the various situations. It's a really ugly, sometimes confusing and often contradictory situation

Ric Flair on WrestlingInc.com said that his daughter may be out of action for a year. She had issues with her implants and needed to get them taken care of. She had worse issues a few years back, and got it taken care of to a degree but with a procedure that allowed her to return relatively quickly.

When Tetsuya Naito was growing up, his favorite baseball team was the Yakult Swallows, and during the season he would go to about one home game a week at their home Meiji Jingu Stadium. When he was 17, he was sitting in the left field bleachers when New Japan booked a show at the stadium headlined by the Great Muta vs. the Great Nita (Atsushi Onita). 21 years later he was on the field as the main star of the show as he became the 11th person to win the IWGP championship at least three times with a win over Evil in the main event of Summer Struggle in Jingu Stadium on 8/29. Naito joins Kazuchika Okada, Hiroshi Tanahashi, Keiji Muto, Shinya Hashimoto, Tatsumi Fujinami, Kensuke Sasaki, Kazuyuki Fujita, Shinsuke Nakamura, Riki Choshu and Hiroyoshi Tenzan ... Naito also regained the IC title, his record setting sixth reign (he and Nakamura previously were tied with five) of a belt that dates back to 2011 and that he first won on September 25, 2016, in Kobe, from Michael Elgin.

G-1 kicks off on 9/19 and they have not announced participants at this point. For foreigners to be able to be brought in, they'd have to arrive by 9/5 and quarantine in a hotel room for two weeks. With the exception of the 9/3 show in Saitama and 9/8 in Mito, all the rest of the shows will air live on New Japan World. The jr. tag title tour will have only Japanese commentary live. It's not clear what will be done regarding English commentary for G-1, but the belief is that the bigger shows will have live English commentary like the stadium show did.

Tony Khan said that while he and Billy Corgan negotiated the deal and he approved it, the idea of bringing in Thunder Rosa to face Hikaru Shida came from Kenny Omega He also said that the second AEW show on TNT would debut over the next year. It was delayed by COVID. We had heard as of a few weeks ago that while there was no date, it was targeted for before the end of 2020 but in TV things can change ... He also noted in regard to this past week’s show that his philosophy on PPV go-home shows is different from a regular show, and laid it out with the idea of good matches early and lots of promos late, which is not the usual way he puts shows together

Tony Khan invited a number of guests to attend the 9/2 tapings who were fans who had been laid off in the Orlando/DeLand area as well as those who had been affected by the recent tornado. When he found out about a group of Orlando area NXT fans helping the clean up efforts from the tornado and a family that were fans who had been affected by the tornado, he invited them all to come to the show this week

Regarding Matt & Jeff Hardy and them splitting up, they likely would have stayed together in the same company, or at least there was a good chance of it, but the contract situation played a part. Both signed on the same day, but Jeff had shoulder and knee surgery and other issues and WWE decreed that he owed them 20 more months and tacked that on. So he couldn't leave. If Matt didn't leave when he did, he likely would have been asked to sign for five years and while he did entertain the thought of staying, he opted for more creative control. Matt did an interview with Chris Van Vliet where he felt the Broken character would have gotten over better with live crowds. I believe that's the case as well, because fans would have done the big chants and stuff for him and that would make it appear to be a hot character, and with no fans, you are missing that. He sensed that and toned that down, but gave the impression when fans are back that he'd give the broken character another strong shot. The fact he's doing a broken match on the PPV and doing multiple characters on TV makes it clear the character isn't being dropped

Pentagon Jr. is now Penta Cero M. That's the name he owns merchandising rights to. AEW was allowed to call him Pentagon Jr. because they work with AAA, which owns the Pentagon Jr. name. It was AEW that pushed for it because for a variety of potential projects AEW wanted to push them with a name they could market them as, and Rey Fenix owns that name but not just Fenix, which AAA owns, but he's been Rey Fenix in AEW from the start. Basically once they started merchandising them they didn't want to use an AAA-owned name and at some point they were going to switch it to a name he owns and it was just a question of when. It also coincides with the Masked Republic deal getting Penta Cero Miedo merchandise into Hot Topic

Melissa Cervantes (Thunder Rosa) noted that she was invited to a WWE tryout last September, but she was training for her Combate Americas MMA debut and passed on it. The key is that they were not interested in her as a wrestler, but told her they were interested in her as a referee

The most-watched shows on the WWE Network for the past week were: 1. Payback; 2. Day of SummerSlam 2015; 3. Payback kickoff show; 4. SummerSlam; 5. Steve Austin’s Broken Skull Sessions: Undertaker; 6. WWE Timeline: Rock & Nation of Domination; 7. WWE Chronicle: Braun Strowman; 8. Raw Talk for 8/31; 9. Broken Skull Sessions with Goldberg; 10. The Bump for 8/30. NXT was 18th for the week. Of all the indie stuff that was introduced last week, only an ICW show at No. 23 remained in the top 25

The indies stuff charting poorly is a bit surprising considering that originally was meant to be the basis for a new expensive Network sub tier. WWE probably would be looking at some abysmal new sub numbers for that new tier had they gone through with their plans.

WWE, NXT, & AEW ratings:

SPOILER: show

Raw on 9/1, for the second Thunderdome show, averaged 1,896,000 viewers and 0.58 in 18-49, on a night with very serious sports competition. It did come the day after the Payback show and had an usually strong first hour, but faded with a 19.1 percent first-to-third hour drop, which is among the larger numbers of all-time. It’s not exactly fair to judge the ratings drop yet if the key was the Performance Center location or the booking, although it obviously is a combination of both. The question is how much. If we go with the pre-pandemic average and the last show before moving into Thunderdome, it looks like of the 28 percent drop in viewers, about 17 percent is related to the product itself and 11 percent to the location. But that’s just based on second week numbers that are both hurt by strong competition and helped by the PPV the night before. Next week would be a much better gauge. Similarly, the 18-49 drop of 35.1 percent during the pandemic looks to be in that age group, 22 percent product and 13 percent location. As compared to week one in Thunderdome, which was also the day after SummerSlam, the show was down 6.5 percent in viewers, 13.4 percent in 18-49 but in good news, it stayed even in 18-34, so the drops were largely in the 35-49 age group, the same age group that was up huge last week ... As compared to the same week last year, the show was down 24.4 percent in viewers, 30.1 percent in 18-49 and 40.0 percent in 18-34. The big third hour drop says that whatever it was in hour three being pushed the hardest, whether it was the three-way match after already seeing all three wrestling earlier, or the Raw Underground, it didn’t resonate at usual levels. The drops were 17.8 percent with women 18-49, 14.6 percent with men 18-49, a 21.8 percent increase with teenage girls and a 27.2 percent decrease with teenage boys and a 20.2 percent drop over 50. The first hour did 2,104,000 viewers. The second hour did 1,882,000 viewers. The third hour did 1,703,000 viewers.

Smackdown on 8/28 did a 1.34 rating, 2,144,000 viewers and 0.57 (738,000 viewers) in 18-49, not only winning the night in the key demo but actually beating three other shows overall instead of what has been its usual last place among big four network shows ... The number was expected to be good largely as the return of Roman Reigns with a show long angle before you saw him. It was down 2.9 percent in households, 2.5 percent in viewers and 2.0 percent in 18-49 from last week. But last week was the first Thunderdome show and far higher than the show has done in months, so staying even is a good sign. Smackdown was down 25.0 percent in 18-34 but still beat everything on television in that demo, 18-34, 25-54, tied with many shows for first in women 18-49 and won male 18-49 by a significant margin. In the segments, the first half hour did 2.24 million viewers with Vince McMahon & Adam Pearce, Jeff Hardy & A.J. Styles and Hardy vs. Shinsuke Nakamura for the IC title. The second half hour did 2.09 million viewers for The Firefly Fun House, Matt Riddle vs. Shorty G and more stuff with King Corbin. The third half hour did 2.16 million viewers with Bayley & Sasha Banks, Nia Jax & Shayna Baszler, Braun Strowman vs. Drew Gulak and Kalisto vs. Cesaro. The final quarter did 2.06 million viewers for Big E & Heavy Machinery vs. Miz & Morrison & Sheamus, all the promo around it, and the attempting to sign Roman Reigns segments. FOX last year on the same Friday only did half of the audience with rerun programming, doing 1,043,000 viewers and 0.3 in 18-49, up 105.6 percent in viewers and 100.0 percent in 18-49.

NXT on 8/26 unopposed did 305,000 viewers in 18-49, down 1.6 percent from the prior week. It broke down as 63,000 in men 18-34 (up 67.8 percent from the prior week), 22,000 in women 18-34 (same as the prior week), 130,000 in men 35-49 (down 22.6 percent) and 90,000 in women 35-49 (up 9.8 percent). So that week, unlike the first week, with no NBA competition, the male 18-34 audience of NBA and AEW did watch NXT in larger numbers, unlike the prior week with no AEW but NBA ... For NXT on 8/26, in 18-49, the high point was the William Regal interview and beginning of Santos Escobar vs. Isaiah Scott. The low point was the second half of Breezango vs. Imperium. In 18-34, the high point was Tommaso Ciampa vs. Jake Atlas and low point was Io Shirai & Rhea Ripley vs. Raquel Gonzalez & Dakota Kai. It opened at 866,000 viewers and 311,000 in 18-49 for Karrion Kross' speech vacating the title and the beginning of Breezango vs. Imperium. The rest of the tag title match fell to 779,000 viewers and 287,000 in 18-49. Ciampa vs. Atlas grew to 819,000 viewers and 299,000 in 18-49, which also included the post-match and a Candice LeRae interview. The fourth quarter with Bronson Reed and Austin Theory, plus Mia Yim vs. Shotzi Blackheart did 820,000 viewers and 302,000 in 18-49 The fifth quarter, with the Regal interview and the beginning of Escobar vs. Scott grew to 853,000 viewers and 323,000 in 18-49. The rest of Escobar vs Scott and a Johnny Gargano interview fell to 804,000 viewers and 301,000 in 18-49. Kyle O'Reilly vs. Drake Maverick and a post-match plus interviews with Rhea Ripley and Adam Cole did 823,000 viewers and 308,000 in 18-49. And the Shirai & Ripley vs. Gonzalez & Kai main event did 832,000 viewers and 311,000 in 18-49.

NXT on 9/2, featuring the four-way Iron Man match with Finn Balor vs. Johnny Gargano vs. Tommaso Ciampa vs. Adam Cole, did 849,000 viewers and 0.26 in 18-49 (336,000 viewers). It was the second highest viewership of the year (the highest numbers, shockingly, have all come in unopposed weeks) and the highest 18-49 number of the year. Because of the number, it has led to a lot of talk about NXT perhaps going unopposed by moving from Wednesday to either Tuesday or Thursday, more likely the former. There was an internal discussion a few months ago weighing the pros and cons of asking USA to move. WWE at the time realized the NXT audience would be larger and there wouldn’t be the perception that they were losing to AEW if they weren’t head-to-head. Vince McMahon decided against it at the time because he didn’t want to give the impressions that they had backed down in the fight publicly, and privately, there was the issue of whether AEW going unopposed would do numbers in certain younger demos that would come close to Raw & Smackdown. The discussion was before the period AEW started winning a few weeks in women 18-34 and the week AEW won 18-34 overall even with opposition. The numbers were in line with what the show did unopposed the past two Wednesdays, but the 18-49 number was higher. The key is the main event, as the show was the biggest the brand had since the Cole vs. Keith Lee show, but unlike that show, this was unopposed. In the different demos, it did 48,000 in males 18-34 (down 23.8 percent from last week), 48,000 in women 18-34 (up 118.2 percent from last week), 166,000 in males 35-49 (up 27.7 percent) and 74,000 in women 35-49 (down 17.8 percent). In the quarters, NXT opened at 831,000 viewers and 334,000 in 18-49 for the Legado del Fantasma vs. Tyler Breeze & Fandango & Isaiah Scott street fight. The second quarter did 836,000 viewers and 331,000 in 18-49 for the end of the street fight and Candice LeRae vs. Kacy Catanzaro. The third quarter did 855,000 viewers and 343,000 in 18-49 for Bronson Reed vs. Timothy Thatcher. The fourth quarter was the ring intros for Finn Balor, Adam Cole, Tommaso Ciampa and Johnny Gargano, which did 804,000 viewers and 313,000 in 18-49. The first 15:00 of the Iron Man match did 869,000 viewers and 344,000 in 18-49. The next 15:00 did 864,000 and 347,000 in 18-49. The 30-45 minute mark did 839,000 and 332,000 in 18-49. And the final 15 minutes did 895,000 and 349,000 in 18-49. Interestingly in 35-49, the show peaked with 251,000 viewers for the final 15 minutes of the Iron man and 98,000 in 18-34. The 18-34 peak of 103,000 was minutes 30-45. NXT was No. 10 for the night in 18-49 on cable, trailing only an NBA playoff game, two NHL playoff games, five news shows and Teen Mom II on MTV. The show was No. 7 in Males 18-49, behind only the NHL, NBA and three news shows on Fox News, No. 11 in 18-34 (a demo the show usually doesn’t do well in so that’s the main event) and No. 7 in Males 12-34, again a demo the show usually doesn’t place highly with ... It was up 3.0 percent overall and 8.3 percent in 18-49, and would have been even higher if it was unopposed on the normal day.

AEW on 8/27 airing on Thursday unopposed but going against the Republican convention that did its biggest numbers of the week, did 813,000 viewers and a 0.29 (376,000 viewers) in 18-49 ... As compared to Saturday, where the show was out of prime time, not against the convention, but against the NBA but also had the benefit of a stronger than usual lead-in, it was up 7.7 percent in viewers and down 7.6 percent in 18-49 ... Really because of the variables, the comparisons don't mean a lot. However, the show did 77,000 in male 18-34 (down 19.8 percent which is the lack of NBA lead-in), 58,000 in women 18-34 (up 5.5 percent), 172,000 in male 35-49 (down 7.5 percent, probably due to lack of NBA lead-in) and 69,000 in women 35-49 (down 1.4 percent). While they were on different days, NXT did beat AEW in women 35-49 by 90,000 to 69,000 but Wednesday is the familiar day. AEW greatly more than doubled even on an off night in both men and women 18-34 and outdid NXT 172,000 to 130,000 in men 35-49. It opened at 759,000 viewers and 332,000 in 18-49 for Young Bucks vs. Dustin Rhodes & QT Marshall and the beginning of Young Bucks vs. Best Friends. It grew huge, to 853,000 viewers and 373,000 in 18-49 for the bulk of Young Bucks vs. Best Friends and Best Friends vs. FTR. Viewers fell to 806,000 and 18-49 grew to 385,000 for a Darby Allin skit, Lance Archer vs. Sean Maluta and the beginning of an Archer & Jake Roberts promo. Next was big growth to 869,000 viewers and 410,000 in 18-49, both show peaks for the Archer, Roberts, Taz, Brian Cage and Ricky Starks confrontation and most of the MJF/Jon Moxley contract signing. The end of the Moxley/MJF contract signing, a Santana & Ortiz interview and beginning of Pentagon & Rey Fenix & Butcher & Blade vs. Griff Garrison & Brian Pillman Jr. & Joey Janela & Sonny Kiss match did 841,000 viewers and 404,000 in 18-49. Most of the eight-man tag and beginning of the Dark Order segment fell to 781,000 viewers and 375,000 in 18-49. The end of the Dark Order segment plus Big Swole vs. Rebel & Penelope Ford did 796,000 viewers and 370,000 in 18-49. Matt Hardy vs. Sammy Guevara in a tables match did 796,000 viewers and 361,000 in 18-49. In 18-34, the peak was the Moxley/MJF contract signing and the low point was Hardy vs. Guevara. AEW did a 0.20 in 12-17 (up 17.6 percent and its best mark in months), 0.19 in 18-34 (down 10.6 percent), 0.39 in 35-49 (down 5.9 percent) and 0.30 in 50+ (up 20.0 percent). The audience was 67.2 percent male in 18-49 and 61.0 percent male in 12-17.

While the number itself, by going largely unopposed, doesn’t really say a lot due to a number of variables, there are different things to learn from the AEW show on 9/3, which did 928,000 viewers and 0.36 in 18-49 (469,000 viewers). On the surface, the number would indicate an unopposed show doing 1 million or more viewers a week and probably in the 0.4 range in 18-49. This week’s show was coming back to the time slot after two weeks off, and while men did well, women, which had been AEW’s most impressive audience before being bounced around, did not. That audience also didn’t move with AEW as much to the new nights. The show did have NXT competition, although minimal, as the replay of the show the night before did 183,000 viewers and 0.04 in 18-49. But the key factors which likely kept it well under 1 million and 0.4 were a less than marquee show with no big matches announced and really one of the weaker shows of the year, bigger NBA ratings than have gone against wrestling so far, and the two weeks off hurting the women’s audience ... Based on everything, on a non-NBA night for a regular marquee show IF women come back and if the show is regularly in its time slot as opposed to being bounced around, AEW looks to be able to do a steady 0.41 in 18-49 if we go with the idea it would do an 0.30 regularly with competition (a little lower than it’s been averaging on Wednesday in recent weeks) and if we go with a normal 750,000 on a Wednesday opposed, and women come back at their 8/12 levels, we’re looking at a 1,095,000 range in total viewers most weeks and 1,214,000 and 0.48 for a blow away night (a show that would have done 900,000 and 0.36 under the current competitive umbrella). So regarding a decision by USA/WWE to move NXT, those are the key numbers on the other side to consider. In 18-49, which is the only figure that really matters, AEW unopposed will not beat Raw or Smackdown right now ... As far a the future goes, that’s the key. That’s harder to predict. WWE has a multi-hear history of major declines in the key demo. If we say Raw and Smackdown are at 0.55 right now (Raw did 0.58, Smackdown did 0.57 this past week but it’s still early in the Thunderdome phase) and WWE declines over the course of the next year by 25.5 percent and AEW stays steady, they would be in a flat-footed tie with Raw and Smackdown next year at this time. That doesn’t mean WWE can’t reverse the trend, as they can. That doesn’t mean AEW can stay even, since TV in general is falling. WWE’s y-o-y decline in 18-49 has been closer to 40 percent most weeks of late, this past week was a good week and was still at 30 percent. Some (but the minority, not the majority) is the pandemic and running the PC as we’ve seen. If NXT stays in that spot, WWE has to decline about 43.6 percent y-o-y and AEW stays even to catch up, and that is very unlikely to happen in one year. So that’s the key factor here. Overall, AEW was No.8 for the night in 18-49, trailing three NBA related telecasts on ESPN, three FOX News shows and Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. It tied AEW’s best 18-49 number of 2020 ... In the different demos, AEW did 122,000 in males 18-34 (up 58.4 percent from last week), 41,000 in women 18-34 (down 29.3 percent), 208,000 in males 35-49 (up 15.1 percent) and 98,000 in women 35-49 (up 42.0 percent). The show opened with 883,000 viewers and 445,000 in 18-49 for Santana & Ortiz vs. Best Friends. The second quarter did 832,000 viewers and 430,000 in 18-49 for the beginning of Young Bucks & Luchasaurus & Jungle Boy vs. Private Party & Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian. The third quarter, with the finish of that match and Kenny Omega interview did 860,000 viewers and 434,000 in 18-49. The fourth quarter, with the Omega interview plus FTR, Tully Blanchard and Adam Page, Chris Jericho interview and Jericho vs. Joey Janela did 899,000 viewers and 445,000 in 18-49. The Jericho-Janela post-match angle with Jake Hager and Orange Cassidy and Sonny Kiss, a video piece of Matt Hardy and Sammy Guevara and the verbal stuff with Taz, Jake Roberts and Eddie Kingston did 1,008,000 viewers and 508,000 in 18-49. The brawl with half the world in the ring, Brodie Lee and Dustin Rhodes interview and most of Serena Deeb vs. Thunder Rosa did 972,000 viewers and 482,000 in 18-49. The ending of Deeb vs. Rosa Jon Moxley promo and the Big Swole, Reba and Britt Baker angle did 974,000 viewers and 501,000 in 18-49. And Jon Moxley vs. Mark Sterling and the post-match with MJF and Wardlow did 999,000 viewers and 505,000 in 18-49. In 18-34, the peak was the Deeb vs. Rosa, Moxley promo and Baker angle at 190,000 viewers. In 35-49, the peak was the Jericho-Cassidy angle, Hardy & Guevara video and Taz & Jake & Kingston promo at 343,000. As compared to last week when it was unopposed by another wrestling show completely but on a Thursday and with a better show and lower rated sports competition, AEW did a 0.15 in 12-17 (down 25.0 percent due to the female drop), 0.23 in 18-34 (up 20.7 percent), 0.49 in 35-49 (up 27.0 percent) and 0.35 in 50+ (up 16.7 percent).