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OCT WRESTLING DISCUSSION THREAD


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Dropping the commitment destroys any business case for stacking Mania though.

 

But commitment is a two-way street - this paves the way for them to fiddle with the basic product offering. Have they been adding much content recently?

 

Offering free network for a month now is terrible though, it effectively chumps out people who are paying. Where's my free fucking month?

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I had a dream last night about WWE. 

 

Eric Rowan became Corporate Kane's assistant, and followed him around and did things for Kane.  He made copies, worked on PowerPoints, and filed paperwork, all while still wearing his sheep mask.   He'd follow Kane to the ring and chokeslam people for Kane.  Kane eventually taught him how to make fire come from the ring posts, and then Rowan got possessed by the Demon Kane mask and became Kane. 

 

Luke Harper was really nervous about his first day in WWE without Bray Wyatt and would go around asking people for help with basic things and he turned into this Mick Foley-type babyface and everyone liked him and they held him on their shoulders when he won the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. 

 

Cesaro was on a losing streak and was really upset about it backstage and crying and Meep Moop Bray Wyatt showed up with a motivational speech and the next week Cesaro was in the garbageman outfit and oh my god it's fat Chris Hero in a garbageman outfit and the Kings of Wrestling were the new Wyatt Family and it didn't matter that Chris Hero was fat because he's supposed to be he's the new Eric Rowan.

 

And Curtis Axel became Bray Wyatt's mini-me somehow.

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I watched the bit on the Performance Center.  So cool to see someone that I work with on a weekly basis look better than everyone else there.

 

You work with Dusty Rhodes on a weekly basis?

 

Ok, people who don't work for the company.

 

 

It's awesome that you so badly had to post about this without just saying who it is.

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Yeah, 30,000 international is shocking to me.  

Well, it probably didn't help that the UK launch was delayed by a month...

 

 

That's true, but their international market is so strong and they ended up going to more than 170 different countries and only getting  about as many people as attend two strong houses.

 

WWE has long been good at controlling expenses.  They are fortunate that when business is down they can cut slack and it won't show up in their product.  Unfortunately, they tend to go to personnel first when cutting, but it does make sense.

 

I'm looking forward to the conference call this morning.  The last one had some surprisingly upbeat analysts.  I hope somebody gets on the call today and is strongly disappointed in the subscriber number.  I want to hear their response.  

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I watched the bit on the Performance Center.  So cool to see someone that I work with on a weekly basis look better than everyone else there.

 

You work with Dusty Rhodes on a weekly basis?

 

Ok, people who don't work for the company.

 

 

It's awesome that you so badly had to post about this without just saying who it is.

 

I try not to be a name dropper, that's not my style, but I do like to express when I'm proud of one of my boys. Sorry if that doesn't fly for you.

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What does WWE need more to get those Network numbers up: more fresh content that is Network-only or more compelling television on the creative end?

I'd say both would help. None of the network content really jumped out at me save the post Mania and Summerslam specials. They need to be doing that all the time. And, well, the TV right now is hit or miss at best to me with no real direction outside of about 6 guys. Hard to be invested in the current program,

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What does WWE need more to get those Network numbers up: more fresh content that is Network-only or more compelling television on the creative end?

 

My take is that with the goal of diversifying and maximizing profits, WWE has completely oversaturated the market.  Everywhere you look is WWE pushing content (tv, dvd, netflix, youtube).

 

Between Raw, Smackdown and Total Divas (if you want to count it) there is six hours of free programming each week. That's more than enough for a huge chunk of the fanbase.

 

On a good week I watch 10 hours of tv. How much time can the average person devote to wrestling?

 

The fanbase is not clamoring for more content. They are overwhelmed by it. 

 

To get the numbers up, WWE needs to find something a large number of people would pay money to see which is not already on free tv. 

 

WWE thought they had that with giving away the ppvs and they were right. Getting 700k people to sign up for an over the tv streaming service is a monumental achievement.

 

The problem is WWE doesn't have a second act. There is not a second carrot they can wave in front of prospective subscribers.

 

The type of fan who would be excited about a great rivalries series, or adding additional old content, either already subscribes or has no interest in subscribing.

 

So, the only thing WWE can really do is generate more interest in their ppvs. 

 

.  

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What does WWE need more to get those Network numbers up: more fresh content that is Network-only or more compelling television on the creative end?

I'd say both would help. None of the network content really jumped out at me save the post Mania and Summerslam specials. They need to be doing that all the time. And, well, the TV right now is hit or miss at best to me with no real direction outside of about 6 guys. Hard to be invested in the current program,

 

Here's the biggest thing they have to do. They have to make things feel important and can't miss. It's a problem with the start-stop nature of pushes and the amount of TV they have to fill an the even-stevens win-trading, but that's the biggest thing. People watch TV shows when they feel like they can't miss them. People buy the comics that feel like they "count" even if they're a dollar more than the rest of the line. if that means do a title change on Main Event 6 times a year and then only show still shots on Raw and Smackdown, so be it. If that means have major story angles drop on Superstars, there you go. 

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What does WWE need more to get those Network numbers up: more fresh content that is Network-only or more compelling television on the creative end?

 

My take is that with the goal of diversifying and maximizing profits, WWE has completely oversaturated the market.  Everywhere you look is WWE pushing content (tv, dvd, netflix, youtube).

 

Between Raw, Smackdown and Total Divas (if you want to count it) there is six hours of free programming each week. That's more than enough for a huge chunk of the fanbase.

 

On a good week I watch 10 hours of tv. How much time can the average person devote to wrestling?

 

The type of fan who would be excited about a great rivalries series, or adding additional old content, either already subscribes or has no interest in subscribing.

 

So, the only thing WWE can really do is generate more interest in their ppvs. 

 

Not necessaily so. I am only one person, but if they added weekly Watts/Crockett/Flordia TV, i would subscribe. I have no great desire to now, apart from NXT.

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