MAY 2016 WRESTLING DISCUSSION THREAD

[KidNatural]

It's all about revenue. Slater could work for the 'E for 10 years and not make the company the amount of money that Cena does in 6 months.

[Go2Sleep]

I think a pay gap would be less of an issue if WWE covered things like travel and health insurance. Sure from a corporate standpoint, John Cena is worth a lot more than Heath Slater, but Heath Slater still has to get the same shows and put his body at similar risk.

[RIPPA]

I posted this in the RAW thread but it needs to be here too because there are so many things going on... all of them awesome

 

[JonnyLaw]

1 hour ago, Trocar Slush Weasel said:

Wait, so now fucking Heath Slater should be paid the same amount as John Cena?

First, I'm not saying that is my argument, but the one Ryback seems to be making. That said, playing devil's Ryback's advocate...

Ryback's contention is that the main event guys are main event guys, and thus have value as main event guys, because the company decides they're main event guys.  Ryback's current value was damaged because the company booked him to lose a majority of his matches on PPV and booked him in Pre-Show matches.  Wrestlers' values are impacted by how they're portrayed on TV, so basing their compensation on that (in Ryback's mind a product of the company's whims) and not on how well they do their jobs, doesn't seem to make sense.  Cena should probably be considered an outlier, but Slater (or Ryback) could be just as productive and valuable as guys like Ziggler, Kane, and Ambrose given the right push.

Essentially, if what you're paid is contingent on your value to the company, and the company, through creative, controls your value, there is little room to negotiate contracts and the WWE controls the marketplace.  Ryback presumably wants to be paid closer to what he could be worth to the company; WWE (understandably) wants to pay him based on what he is worth to them now.

 

56 minutes ago, KidNatural said:

It's all about revenue. Slater could work for the 'E for 10 years and not make the company the amount of money that Cena does in 6 months.

Ryback stated that guys should be paid for their merchandise.  It is the base pay that he thinks should more equal.

[SorceressKnight]

14 minutes ago, JonnyLaw said:

First, I'm not saying that is my argument, but the one Ryback seems to be making. That said, playing devil's Ryback's advocate...

Ryback's contention is that the main event guys are main event guys, and thus have value as main event guys, because the company decides they're main event guys.  Ryback's current value was damaged because the company booked him to lose a majority of his matches on PPV and booked him in Pre-Show matches.  Wrestlers' values are impacted by how they're portrayed on TV, so basing their compensation on that (in Ryback's mind a product of the company's whims) and not on how well they do their jobs, doesn't seem to make sense.  Cena should probably be considered an outlier, but Slater (or Ryback) could be just as productive and valuable as guys like Ziggler, Kane, and Ambrose given the right push.

Essentially, if what you're paid is contingent on your value to the company, and the company, through creative, controls your value, there is little room to negotiate contracts and the WWE controls the marketplace.  Ryback presumably wants to be paid closer to what he could be worth to the company; WWE (understandably) wants to pay him based on what he is worth to them now.

In addition, like I said for my argument- it was even bigger than just "Slater could be as productive as guys like Ziggler, Kane, or Ambrose given the right push"- with Heath Slater, we've seen enough of Slater to kind of know he's in his best possible spot right now. He'll probably never be anything more than MAYBE a "feel-good moment" US Champion (a la Zack Ryder's IC Title reign)- but he's a good hand, he's a solid JTTS who can get over. He shouldn't make Cena money (or even making a million dollars a year for it)- but in all likeliness he WOULD be around 400k-500k a year as a reasonable value for that.

Likewise, from the claim- YES, Ryback should be paid more because Creative wasn't creative enough. Again, in 2012, Ryback was a white-hot guy who was absolutely on the verge of being a main eventer (and thus worthy of 'no doubt about it, he's this valuable'), and Creative spent most of 2013 systematically destroying his heat to make him worthless. Then, because he was a very good face, he managed to get over AGAIN and rebuild himself in 2014-15...and Creative turned around and systematically destroyed his heat.

To make matters worse with this news- you can absolutely see the "Ryback randomly loses the airbrushed singlets for plain black trunks, then gets randomly turned heel for no reason by leaving Kane and Big Show in the ring- then has a feud with Kalisto that borders on "these two need something to do, but not enough to give it TV time" as blatantly boiling down to "WWE Creative just nuked Ryback in this current storyline, solely to destroy his value enough so that WWE could pay him less money"- something that is bullshit and should be seen as bullshit.

Maybe Ryback may not have kept being as hot as he was in 2012...but even the people who hate Ryback could at least agree- if Ryback got destroyed in the last few months, and Ryback were to say "No, I don't want to be paid like the low-level mook getting beaten by Kalisto each month because reasons...I at least want to be paid like the upper midcarder I was most of last year"- he's absolutely right to say that, because he SHOULD BE there right now.

[PetrolCB]

Man, this is quite possibly the lengthiest discussion pretaining to Ryback ever on this board. 

#dvdryback

[Ultimo Necro]

Are we sure the fallout isn't because Vince is going slightly blind / senile? He probably sees Ryback doing the Punk 'tribute' and thinks it is actually Punk.

"HAHAHA, Punk might have put on 90lbs of solid muscle, but I'll show him, to the pre-show with him, also, Hunter, why is Jimmy Yang doing a Michael Jackson gimmick in NXT? get him back on Smackdown as a cowboy!'

 

[PetrolCB]

I can totally hear him saying something like this, after having seen Camp WWE.

[ChrisM]

3 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

From the Smackdown Spoilers Re: Backlund

  Reveal hidden contents

– Darren Young approaches Bob Backlund and asks him to be his new life coach. The WWE Hall of Famer says yes, and their new catch phrase is “Make Darren Great Again.”

This was done on a previous Smackdown but they never aired it.

Apparently, this was Darren Young's idea, and they went with it.

 

RE:Ryback- When you're best known for people chanting a long-retired wrestler's name during your matches, maybe it's time to seek out another profession. 

[zev]

"Expensive, unlike your own wedding."

And that little dig is just one of the umpteen great things in that Rusev clip.

[evilwaldo]

http://www.cagesideseats.com/wwe/2014/8/29/6082507/merchandise-sales-no-alternatives-keeps-John-Cena-top-WWE-babyface

 

He has a point although he is making it in a different manner.  Should a heel be compensated with a higher base salary to make up for lost merchandise sales?  He laces up his boots the same as everyone else and does the job for the company like a good employee.

The main event guys should get more but should guys who turn heel get compensated for lost merchandise sales?

This is the reason why people do not like the heel label.  They would prefer the anti-hero or tweener.  Being a full-blown heel today hurts merchandise sales.

Creative is essentially writing you into a position where your income will take a hit.

[nate]

1 hour ago, ChrisM said:

Apparently, this was Darren Young's idea, and they went with it.

 

RE:Ryback- When you're best known for people chanting a long-retired wrestler's name during your matches, maybe it's time to seek out another profession. 

So now Ryback is to be shorted because fans are fucking idiots?

[JohnnyJ]

 

Isn't the underlying problem that compensation in WWE is a little wacky? It's a worked sport that pays its talents based on position on the card and purse of the events as if it were the UFC or boxing.

This might have worked in the past but over the last few years the talent level in the WWE has really shot up and you end up with a upper-midcard logjam. Cena is the franchise and deserves every penny he gets. But when you start going down the line of your Ortons, Cesaros, Big Shows, Zigglers, Owens, Rusevs, etc.  it's hard to come up with a compelling reason why one is worth more than the others. Nobody is moving the needle or drawing in any measurable sense.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Niners Fan in CT]

I had thought WWE could offer the performers whatever and if the performers don't like the deal then they can refuse it. It's like modeling or acting. Well, this model COULD be as popular as Kendall Jenner but she's not, she didn't receive the industry "push" so it is what it is.  Does Sam Worthington deserve the industry push he received?  No, he sucks. There are a billion actors better than him. Can an actor argue "well I wasn't given the roles!"

[Niners Fan in CT]

4 hours ago, KidNatural said:

It's all about revenue. Slater could work for the 'E for 10 years and not make the company the amount of money that Cena does in 6 months.

I guess the argument for Ryback is "Hey, I could have been Goldberg 2.0 but you guys fucked it up" but that's a strange argument to try to make. The industry has never been about fair and equal pay. There's no way to calculate how much Ryback would be worth if he beat Punk for the title five years ago.

[evilwaldo]

In acting there are very few people who can play a bad guy and do it well.  Those people will get more roles being the bad guy.  Javier Bardem can write his ticket almost anywhere in the villain role but can you see him as a hero?  He gets compensated appropriately due to the fact that he can play the villain and do it very well.  Character actors may not make as much but they do get more roles because of their ability even if it never means winning major awards.

Batista gets his roles because he is malleable enough to play almost any type of character yet never outshine the movie, a rarity in Hollywood.

Merchandising makes this a very tricky area.  Everyone on the roster is very acutely aware of how much they sell, percentages, and roles on television which directly affect merchandising.

A good villain or character actor may not get the points but they do get an increased amount of roles.  

When you think about the ramifications of being a face vs. heel vs. spot on the card the discussion is very interesting.

New Day made their gimmick work.  I don't think anyone expected them to blow up this big.  Same thing can be said for the BWO in ECW.  I remember Joey Styles saying that this gimmick never deserved to be this big but it did blow up beyond everyone's expectations.

There are points to be made on both sides.

[Dolfan in NYC]

2 hours ago, ChrisM said:

Apparently, this was Darren Young's idea, and they went with it.

I'm really, REALLY hoping the gimmick is going to be that Darren is going to keep winning because his opponent is too distracted by the woman standing outside of the ring. 

[RIPPA]

If you think wrestling politics is bad now just imagine a locker room where everyone made the same wage

[PetrolCB]

http://www.aux.tv/2016/05/99-items-found-in-princes-secret-vault/ 

Bockwinkel — Unreleased hard rock project with Bob Mould.

Morris Day-narrated Koko B. Ware documentary film.

[HumanChessgame]

Ryback got a world title program and several other upper midcard pushes despite being a mediocre at best wrestler and having to have his catchphrase chant piped in to try and cover the "you can't wrestler" jeers he was getting.  I'd say he got a better deal than a lot of more talented wrestlers.  As far as how fair his actual salary was, I can't speak on that because I don't know how much he made or how he went about negotiating.

Not saying that WWE pay disparities and how they figure into booking policies are not worth discussing.

[Cristobal]

1 hour ago, evilwaldo said:

Batista gets his roles because he is malleable enough to play almost any type of character yet never outshine the movie, a rarity in Hollywood.

lolwut

[DTTW]

Let us remember Austin had to practically beg for merch, ditto for the New Day. The company can creatively prevent anyone from making money simply by not putting out merch.

[jstout]

Here's what you do with Ryback: Have the announcers start talking about how his name is Bill Ryback, start pumping in massive Ryyyyy-Bacccccckk! chants, have him snort and spit smoke, and start talking after every win over jobbers that this is his 792nd win in a row. People will play along, he'll be a hyooge star and sell tons of merch. Problem solved.

[Spritenaut 32]

I kinda want the company to go all in on Ryback's suggestions, just to see how a socialist version of the WWE would actually work.

[Ziggy]

So Prince had a Rock Album titled Bockwinkle and a Morris Day-narrated documentary about Koko B. Ware in his Vault?