Ratings Discussion Thread - Mod Warning #271 (26th June)

I know the cameras are but it must feel so stupid for wrestlers doing promos to that view when the seats are like that.

I enjoy these debates when I’m recording a show because it gets me fine-tuned, so this conversation ended up inspiring me to do a John Oliver style feature on the topic. If anyone is interested, it’s about 30 mins in and pretty much puts the ratings into full perspective and why this isn’t a catastrophe: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2n2LMpb3XfpJ0Kvehyxv2J?context=spotify%3Ashow%3A7Iy24AtOzFhIKq98hAgNO5&si=WRBcPnJLSb6Dt2CNhcYuMg

Some may enjoy it, others may be allergic to hearing anything that contradicts the world view they want so that’s okay too! :pac:

The good news for the E is the juicy tv contracts and blood money from the saudis is keeping the money coming in.

However I think they need to be a little concerned. Ratings slump every year and hit constant lows. I know the defense is normally
" it just's the era we live in,,,and ratings don't matter"

Firstly I am not comparing the current ratings to ten years ago, I am comparing them to last year and its best flat across the board. Also ratings don't matter?

Tell that to Fox:pac:

House show numbers are poor and represent what is limited enthusiasm for the product.

WWE is cold right now and you do wonder where they will be in a few years when the tv deals are up for review. No new stars emerging and from what I can see they have not really gained many new fans over last few years, instead are content to bleed the hardcore especially when it comes to house shows.

The day will come when even they gave up.

For years those oddballs who take pride in defending WWE no matter how bad they got used to taunt critics with the standard "don't like it don't watch it LOL"

Looks like a lot of people have taken that advise.

Still some ridiculous hyperbole being spread here. Comparing one company's Mania-show to that of a first-time PPV for a company who's running their fourth PPV in six weeks. All-Out's sales are hugely impressive, it's no slight on them whatsoever, but it's a lot easier to sell one show when all of your company's resources are directed at that one objective than it is to sell one of several shows WWE is running in that particular week. For a start, WWE rely solely on local markets to sell that, while AEW need people to travel for their big shows to get their numbers.

The two aren't comparable. It's like me randomly saying, "Yeah well NJPW sold more tickets for Wrestle Kingdom in a stadium, AEW can't do that!" You're just randomly moving the goalposts to suit the argument you want to make rather than actually having any interest in making accurate comparisons. There is no war here. AEW is doing well, but they're not something WWE have to be directly concerned with. You can't slate WWE's ratings and praise AEW in the same post until AEW have a show that's getting better ratings and actually running a company that's directly comparable. And, sorry, but they're not going to right away. When they debut on TNT and have average ratings you're going to come on here and double back like "Well that's good for them, they're just starting out." And I'm going to point to the posts where you said them selling out All-Out while WWE couldn't sell out Stomping Grounds was significant.

WWE aren't dying and the more you try make these arguments, the more I'm going to laugh at you in a few years when you look like the delusional TNA-fanboys who used to say the same thing in the mid-00's. Remember TNA moved to Monday's and so many got excited at the 'new Monday Night War' and, like an hour into the show, it was clear the whole thing was a really bad idea and the months/years of excitement and hyperbole had been for nothing because competing directly was such a bad idea? :pac:

Wanna compare the two accurately? This week's Being The Elite has 271,000 views on YouTube in 4 days, it's the one video released on the channel all week. Here is a list of videos WWE released on the same day that have more views:

The Funniest Mr McMahon Impressions (464k)
Miz, Strowman & Ricochet vs Joe, Cesaro & Lashley (812k)
Baron Corbin announcing there'll be a special ref at Stomping Grounds (353k)
Lars Sullivan vs Lucha House Party (388k)
Becky & Bayley vs Alexa & Lacey (541k)
Paul Heyman promo on Seth (715k)
A Reigns backstage interview (382k)
Miz TV (436k)
Firefly Fun House (778k)
Shane & Drew promo (839k)
Rollins vs KO (976k)
The 24/7 Elevator skit (2.9million, that's over 10 times the amount)

Just enjoy AEW if that's what's ticking your wrestling box. There is a way you get to do that and not look like an absolute dope in the future too, but this isn't it.

You just don't like the stuff I'm saying because it doesn't make the point you want made. But I'm giving you posts filled with facts and stats to back up everything I'm saying. You guys want to believe this narrative and 2019 has made people allergic to hearing anything that contradicts what they want to believe, even if it's clearly the truth, but there's cold, hard facts that can tell the truth of these things.

Call me arrogant if you want for pointing out these facts but I'm not interested in narratives and bad analysis that have no basis in reality.

Be more secure in yourselves and your opinion and just settle on, "I enjoy this, I don't enjoy this." But needing to have those views validated and say "...and others feel the same, I'm not alone!!" leads to people making bad points. All I'm doing is pointing out those bad points. You're still totally entitled to like what you like.

The White Wolf wrote: »

I'm sure people would let opinions be opinions if they weren't being insulted by being called fanboys and dopes. Again, you're preaching a message that you're not adhering to yourself.

I'm not having a go at you just pointing out that no one provoked you into making it personal.

I said there were TNA fanboys in the 00’s who said similar and that people could look like absolute dopes in the future if they carry on like that, I never personally insulted one person here, while I’m directly being called “arrogant” and not saying a word about that.

Can we not be so sensitive and go looking for insults where there are none? Never mind the fact it’s clearly to deflect from the actual facts that people don’t want to deal with.

So back on topic...does anyone want to address the fact that a meaningless Lars Sullivan match got 50% more views than AEW’s flagship video when both were released on the same day? Or how the 24/7 skit got 10x the views? Or are we going to continue to live in this delusional narrative that All Out selling out while Stomping Ground doesn’t means WWE are in trouble and people are flocking to AEW?

lawlolawl wrote: »

You can buy Youtube views.

:pac:

But only WWE can. AEW’s are all legit. #Toosweetwoopwoop.

lawlolawl wrote: »

I'm more inclined to think that the hypocritical Saudi blood money company with the dismal ratings and free-falling event attendance is the one who will be dishonest about how popular they are.

Not one of those things have a single thing to do with YouTube hits. You literally have to do mental somersaults and believe conspiracy theories to accept your reading of the situation.

Btw Meltzer claimed that All Out had a bigger demand than any WrestleMania ever. Ask yourselves honestly: does that sound like you’re getting reliable information from a source who appears in this company’s promotional videos? If we’re going to talk about reliable sources.

leggo wrote: »

You’re acting like Trump supporters lads

It's type of sh*te that makes people not wanna engage

Just so happens I picked up the latest FSM and the news in brief section had this report;

There were a number of interesting details in WWE's first quarter financial repprt, published on April 25. The company lost $8.396 million for the quarter whereas in the same quarter last year, it pocketed $14.835 million in profit.

The Network subscriber number had been published on April 8, the day after WresteMania, breaking down to 1.767 million paid subscribers plus 233,000 on free trial. The paid number is down 2% year-on-year but, bizarrely, the free trial number was down 26%. Clearly, fewer people were interested in WrestleMania, even for free, than in years gone by.

It went on to say that house show revenue was down $4.6 year-on-year and that resulted in average attendance being down by around 11%.


That above is all facts and figures. No opinion. All pretty damning stats.

WWE will never die. It's too big and well known. What's happening is that the creative bankruptcy they're showing is driving away a good amount of viewers who have stuck by them throughout the years. Kids will always go. People will always check out the Rumble and Mania. The point is that staunch loyalists are starting to become apathetic. If you take this forum as a small microcosm, we used to have a new Raw thread live every week with lots of interaction and commentary and opinions. Nowadays, you'd be lucky to get three or four posts in a superthread, most of which just complain about what's on.

leggo wrote: »

To be fair, boards is a bad gauge to use for interest in anything, I remember a couple months back (maybe even last year) the sitewide discussion was “Is boards dying?” because of the rise in the likes of Reddit, Twitter etc. Message boards in general are dying out because younger people go to the above sources instead and don’t need to find a place like this like maybe people my age did years ago, so like with TV wrestling is just following the trend there. You don’t see threads popping up and old posters returning for big AEW/NJPW shows either like, it’s just the board is slowly dying. You still get live threads of all of the above on Reddit and Twitter does be hopping.

Twitter and Reddit is a better gauge of the general feeling about the product than boards, that's a given due to how far around the world both of them reach. Still.....go visit the Squared Circle sub Reddit and you'll see a similar exhaustion and indifference towards the WWE product that you're seeing here.

So your musings about this forum being a bad gauge do not make sense given the opinions here are generally shared across social media. In fact I can't really see the point of your post at all other than making a veiled dig about the people posting here being irrelevant.