HumanChessgame Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 Possibly worth its own thread since I know a lot of you are parents, but for those of you who have kids that are interested in wrestling, how old are they and who are their favorites? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niners Fan in CT Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 I have to disagree with that. I know women who now watch wrestling sometimes because of Total Divas and they have young girls who are into Bayley and Sasha. I can't blame the women for any of the ratings problems. The first time Sasha and Charlotte main evented RAW they actually did hold on to viewers for the 3rd hour. The 3rd hour was over 3 million. The very next week Roman Reigns was in the main event and it had way less viewers than the week before. Like anything else, I think a lot of this comes down to poor booking, poor time management and poor card placement. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victator Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 I would say it drew as an oddity. Put Charlotte in main events regularly and I would bet she loses viewers. I can go back to the early eighties and you would see fans saying women were going to be big any day now and it never happens. Its a niche audience and that is fine. The cruiserweights could not could not draw consistently in main events. You could bring back minis and they could not draw in main events every week. You could also say people have saw thru the con with Charlotte. She loses the belt on TV and then wins on PPV. The stupidest fans can see this coming. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niners Fan in CT Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 But there are women's athletes who were proven draws. It's worked in MMA. It works in gymnastics. It works in figure skating. To a lesser degree it's worked with the Williams sisters and U.S. women's soccer. A league is a tough sell, I wouldn't say they should do an all-women's promotion though it's worked in Japan before.. but I would absolutely continue on with pushing Bayley, Sasha, Charlotte and all the women on SDL. We're only about a year into this. It takes time. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Go2Sleep Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 1 hour ago, HumanChessgame said: Possibly worth its own thread since I know a lot of you are parents, but for those of you who have kids that are interested in wrestling, how old are they and who are their favorites? I don't have or want kids, but one of my best friends who I regularly watch ppvs with has a 5yo daughter that's into wrestling. Her faves are Cena, Bray, and Charlotte. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victator Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 24 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said: But there are women's athletes who were proven draws. It's worked in MMA. It works in gymnastics. It works in figure skating. To a lesser degree it's worked with the Williams sisters and U.S. women's soccer. A league is a tough sell, I wouldn't say they should do an all-women's promotion though it's worked in Japan before.. but I would absolutely continue on with pushing Bayley, Sasha, Charlotte and all the women on SDL. We're only about a year into this. It takes time. I think it can be over as a niche but full time it can't. Its also difficult to compare wrestling to other sports. It is its own thing. Trying to do two different brands was a serious mistake and they are still recovering, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burgundy LaRue Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 I think there are numbers that indicate Sasha is the draw among the Raw women. Bayley's numbers lag behind, and Charlotte even more so. Trying to compare women's pro wrestling with women's sports is a bit tricky. The examples most use for comparison aren't the best. Figure skating and gymnastics are popular only during the Olympics and interest is next to impossible to sustain. And unfairly, they're seen as 'girly' sports. Soccer isn't part of the true American sports mainstream, though probably would be if the men's national team was better--and that's a problem. The Williams sisters, particularly Serena, somewhat buck the trend. But why? Partly because no American male tennis players have been good for a decade and the media-anointed tennis princesses (Hingis, Kournikova, Sharapova) weren't up to snuff. Even then, Serena had to annihilate her competition for years to finally be seen as the best and get paid more than Sharapova endorsement wise. In other words, if an American man is dominating a niche sport, he would get more coverage than 90% of the women with similar results in the same sport. No reason to think wrestling would be the exception to that. There are major issues with this mindset, clearly. WWE had a chance to elevate both Charlotte and Sasha at the same time, but all the hot potato action with the belt hurt. It also didn't help to shuffle Sasha off to the side before giving her a truly meaningful title reign. Charlotte was always going to be the focus for the division, for various reasons. But there was room for Sasha to reach the finish line at the same time as Flair regarding popularity. They could still achieve this, but they have to be committed to doing so. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niners Fan in CT Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 There was that WWE shop search graph someone posted that indicated Sasha was probably selling a good amount of merchandise and she has more followers on IG and Twitter but I think the 3 of them all have mainstream crossover potential. I would include Alexa Bliss in that as well. Again, I think it just takes time to build a brand. A few years ago none of us would have believed where the division is now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NintendoLogic Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 Also, figure skating and gymnastics aren't real sports. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John from Cincinnati Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 6 minutes ago, NintendoLogic said: Also, figure skating and gymnastics aren't real sports. It helps that those are legitimate competitions. WWE is likely a very competitive place to work, but a legitimate athletic competition it ain't. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victator Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 3 hours ago, Niners Fan in CT said: A few years ago none of us would have believed where the division is now. I don't think there is that significant a difference. I don't think they have anyone better than Beth Phoenix or even Mickie. I think some could use some basic lessons in selling and story telling. But every generation of women's wrestler holds the previous in contempt for whatever reason. In 2020, you will hear the new flavor of the week talk about how they are not doing bra and panties matches like Bayley and Sasha Banks. Similar to how every prior generation of wrestler was on dope and roided out. Or how the style has evolved so much. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raziel Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 2 hours ago, NintendoLogic said: Also, figure skating and gymnastics aren't real sports. Tell that to my 8 year old kid who spends 16 hours a week in the gym and another 1 hour a day at home practicing so that she can actually physically do those routines. And my bank account to pay for a kid just hitting Level 5 in the USAG system. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SorceressKnight Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 12 hours ago, NintendoLogic said: The teenage audience was much larger, both in absolute numbers and as a percentage of viewers, during the Attitude Era. And most of them managed to watch until the very end. And again, we're talking about an even higher than normal drop-off among teenage girls. If they can manage to stay up to watch Kevin Owens, they can do it for Bayley. Again, it's the whole point. TEENAGE audiences. Bayley's audience wouldn't be teenagers, it'd be CHILDREN. Elementary school-age girls. People who'd be lucky if their parents let them stay up until 9PM for a first-hour main event, let alone to 11PM. ...actually, that does lead to a similar question for this- what will the +3 or +7 DVR stats for Raw this week? IF they had a better +3 or +7, that'd really point to "little girls DO want to see Bayley win, but it's past their bedtime." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John from Cincinnati Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 This conversation brings back fond memories of recording Raw on VHS and getting up extra early to watch part of it the next morning before school. Thanks for the trip down the lane, fellas (and potentially, but probably not, ladies). 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 3 hours ago, Victator said: I don't think they have anyone better than Beth Phoenix or even Mickie. I think some could use some basic lessons in selling and story telling. Just reposting to let that marinate for awhile You need to go hang out with Fallacy. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victator Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 Just now, Curt McGirt said: Just reposting to let that marinate for awhile You need to go hang out with Fallacy. You gonna drink some kool aid while marinating? You can look at any of those matches and see they took lessons on selling from the Young Bucks, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Casey Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 I'm not getting involved in that debate, because we all see it differently, but I'll say this: I really do miss Beth Phoenix and I wish she'd come back and reform the Divas of Doom with Natalya. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victator Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 Let me add something. The issue here is that the same people who were trying to tell me that the current crop are great wrestlers. Were doing the same thing in 2007 with Melina and Victoria and in 2003 with Trish Stratus and Lita. There are some talented women on the roster like Bayley and to a lesser existent Charlotte and Sasha. But after them the roster becomes shallow. I think Alexa Bliss borders on being outright bad and should not be on the main roster. Becky Lynch can be good but she insists on doing mat work that is not her strong suit. Its nothing personal against them. But lionizing them is doing no one any favors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GuerrillaMonsoon Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 Yeah but who ever got a boner watching the Fabulous Moolah? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Go2Sleep Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 I've watched a lot of 2000s WWE women's wrestling over the past year, and I can assure everyone that the product from 2015 NXT on is way better than at any other point since 2000 (and likely ever by extension) both in terms of match quality and audience engagement. People don't appreciate the significance of the shift from "we want puppies" to "this is awesome." 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Casey Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 CNN just ran a story about Corey Graves' brother, Sam Adonis, who wrestles in Mexico doing a pro-Trump gimmick. I'm not sure if he started the gimmick before or after Brian Cage, though. If Cage did do it first, I guess they did it on Sam because he wrestles mainly in Mexico now? I'm not sure. It was under 5 minutes long, and after it they showed Trump tackling Vince McMahon at WrestleMania 23 (but didn't mention that Vince's significant other is now a member of Trump's cabinet - dafuq?). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MADCAP Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 Reports are coming in that Ivan Koloff passed away this morning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwoy2j Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 3 hours ago, RolandTHTG said: Yeah but who ever got a boner watching the Fabulous Moolah? 18 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwoy2j Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 16 hours ago, HumanChessgame said: Possibly worth its own thread since I know a lot of you are parents, but for those of you who have kids that are interested in wrestling, how old are they and who are their favorites? My stepkids were 9-12 when Daniel Bryan and CM Punk were around and those were their favorites. They both lost interest after those two left. They'll still watch WM and Royal Rumble with me but that's about it. They're still sort of interested in Bray Wyatt b/c they like his entrance but they don't really care for the product now. I was watching RAW the other week and my stepson goes, "Stephanie McMahon is still running things? She's been in charge for like 3 years!" Been a lot longer than that kiddo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NTTom Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 16 hours ago, HumanChessgame said: Possibly worth its own thread since I know a lot of you are parents, but for those of you who have kids that are interested in wrestling, how old are they and who are their favorites? My three-year-old son loves wrestling. His favorite is Shinsuke Nakamura right now. Nakamura wears red, red is his favorite color, it works. We sat on the aisle at a NXT house show and Nakamura touched fingertips with my son, who starts crying from the happiness like it's BeatleMania. He really dislikes the guys Nakamura feuds with (every time he sees his Samoa Joe figure, he cuts a promo about Joe pushing Nakamura down on NXT TV). He also likes Sin Cara, Bayley, Cena, New Day, Sami Zayn, Jack Gallagher, and No Way Jose, and is very specifically into Royal Rumble matches. He was super into Kalisto when he first started watching, but it seems to have died down. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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