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DECEMBER 2019 WRESTLING CHAT.


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Craig: I'm not going to quote you, because it's an eloquent and accurate response. If I must point out boogeymen that caused the NJPW failure in the US, I'm going to start with ROH. ROH has always been perceived by other companies as far bigger and more successful than they really were, the true fact is that they are ECW without Paul Heyman's genius and have never been more than an eastcoast fed that got a lot of ink in the sheets because there was nothing else to talk about. NJPW hooking their wagon to ROH was a huge mistake, ROH is nothing but a money pit on a national scale.

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6 minutes ago, OSJ said:

Craig: I'm not going to quote you, because it's an eloquent and accurate response. If I must point out boogeymen that caused the NJPW failure in the US, I'm going to start with ROH. ROH has always been perceived by other companies as far bigger and more successful than they really were, the true fact is that they are ECW without Paul Heyman's genius and have never been more than an eastcoast fed that got a lot of ink in the sheets because there was nothing else to talk about. NJPW hooking their wagon to ROH was a huge mistake, ROH is nothing but a money pit on a national scale.

I think this is pretty spot on although I think I enjoyed ROH way more than I ever enjoyed ECW and the booking highs of ROH are higher than ECW's. 

The best company for NJPW to copromote with would probably be Impact honestly. It makes sense for both companies and it makes sense business wise. I even thought with Harold I'm charge that maybe they would understand Dixie has nothing to do with Impact, but I guess it doesn't matter.

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4 minutes ago, Archibald said:

Who exactly is saying or implying this?

I'm not sure where this comes from as Craig was making some excellent points. I'm going to have to agree that the failure to push the Bullet Club when the iron was the hottest, was central in NJPW's failure in the States. Hell, look at any crowd of wrestling fans and you see dozens of Bullet Club shirts. Could have easily been the new NWO, but they dropped the ball.

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1 minute ago, Craig H said:

I think this is pretty spot on although I think I enjoyed ROH way more than I ever enjoyed ECW and the booking highs of ROH are higher than ECW's. 

The best company for NJPW to copromote with would probably be Impact honestly. It makes sense for both companies and it makes sense business wise. I even thought with Harold I'm charge that maybe they would understand Dixie has nothing to do with Impact, but I guess it doesn't matter.

I think while Gedo and others still harbor resentment over NJPW talent's treatment in old TNA, Harold's currently blocked from getting something going because of the various international deals going on, namely, Impact's deal with AAA while NJPW is working with CMLL, and AAA and CMLL aren't exchanging gifts under the tree anytime soon (which would also prevent other deals as well).  Also, I'm pretty sure NJPW actually has a working contract with RoH (which is why they can still get Cobb, Gresham, and Lee) which would prevent them from going with any other US company, even if the animosity didn't exist.  

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2 minutes ago, Craig H said:

I think this is pretty spot on although I think I enjoyed ROH way more than I ever enjoyed ECW and the booking highs of ROH are higher than ECW's. 

The best company for NJPW to copromote with would probably be Impact honestly. It makes sense for both companies and it makes sense business wise. I even thought with Harold I'm charge that maybe they would understand Dixie has nothing to do with Impact, but I guess it doesn't matter.

This might well be an age thing... Recall just how bad 1990s WWE was. Suddenly, there was this little fed in Philly that was the coolest thing most of us had ever seen... With the benefit of hindsight it's easy to say that ROH delivered a superior wrestling product, but those of us that remember the early days of ECW will never forget how it made us feel. 

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7 minutes ago, OSJ said:

I'm not sure where this comes from as Craig was making some excellent points. I'm going to have to agree that the failure to push the Bullet Club when the iron was the hottest, was central in NJPW's failure in the States. Hell, look at any crowd of wrestling fans and you see dozens of Bullet Club shirts. Could have easily been the new NWO, but they dropped the ball.

Yeah, this is incorrect.  NJPW basically booked the US around Bullet Club/The Elite, at the expense of other angles and even a G1.  They booked the initial US shows around Bullet Club/Elite, and those shows got dumped on as glorified "Road to" shows and "if we wanted white people main eventing, we'd watch RoH."  They were the new nWo, but only in the States and only by a segment of foreign NJPW fans.  Bullet Club and The Elite outside of Kenny didn't move the needle in Japan and were massively outsold there by LIJ.  Once LIJ blew up, Japan stopped giving a shit about Bullet Club overall.  

Edited by Raziel
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1 minute ago, OSJ said:

This might well be an age thing... Recall just how bad 1990s WWE was. Suddenly, there was this little fed in Philly that was the coolest thing most of us had ever seen... With the benefit of hindsight it's easy to say that ROH delivered a superior wrestling product, but those of us that remember the early days of ECW will never forget how it made us feel. 

That just accentuates the parallels between ROH and ECW even more. Both gained their original cult followings during a relative down period during the main U S. players tenure on top (93-96 for WWF and WCW, and then post-Attitude/pre-Cena in the main event for WWE). 

And then as both upstart promotions rise in prominence, the largest player in the game starts to scoop talent up, the house style changes to slowly integrate more and more elements that got the upstarts noticed to begin with, and then the upstarts become less special and husks of their former selves. 

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3 minutes ago, clintthecrippler said:

That just accentuates the parallels between ROH and ECW even more. Both gained their original cult followings during a relative down period during the main U S. players tenure on top (93-96 for WWF and WCW, and then post-Attitude/pre-Cena in the main event for WWE). 

And then as both upstart promotions rise in prominence, the largest player in the game starts to scoop talent up, the house style changes to slowly integrate more and more elements that got the upstarts noticed to begin with, and then the upstarts become less special and husks of their former selves. 

Quoted for 100% spot on accuracy!

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25 minutes ago, clintthecrippler said:

That just accentuates the parallels between ROH and ECW even more. Both gained their original cult followings during a relative down period during the main U S. players tenure on top (93-96 for WWF and WCW, and then post-Attitude/pre-Cena in the main event for WWE). 

And then as both upstart promotions rise in prominence, the largest player in the game starts to scoop talent up, the house style changes to slowly integrate more and more elements that got the upstarts noticed to begin with, and then the upstarts become less special and husks of their former selves. 

Whoa, that's one helluva comparison that I think we can all agree on.  And to tie it together you have Bully Ray working there in some capacity with them doing some shows at the 2300 Arena.  But I would argue that the lowest of lows for ECW while still bad were still not as bad as it is for ROH.

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1 hour ago, OSJ said:

A survey! Kewl! Here are some of my favorite survey questions (which have been retired do to Caller ID):

1. Do you have Prince Albert in a can? No.

2. Is your refrigerator running? Yes.

3. Have you stopped beating your wife? Need to get married to find out first.

4. Is that a pencil in your pocket or are you happy I called? I'm happy.

5. And my favorite for calling meat markets: "Do you have leg of salmon?" Hilarity ensues. Yes, we do.

 

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The other thing that may have sunk NJPW conquering the US is that while there are undoubtedly a contingent of real fans, a lot the "New Japan fans" in the States are actually "the last half of WrestleKingdom" fans. What I mean is, having a big show in the states or putting big matches on someone else's show is a what most people want. They want Okada/Omega or Tanahashi/Ibushi or Ospreay/Takahashi. Some fans want the G1, but most fans just want the finals. An actual touring promotion with all the meaningless 6 and 8-man tags is way harder to sell without more developed TV (or online) presence. Even with the Elite on the roster, that's still only maximum two matches a card they could carry as names and I'm not convinced NJPW would have got them as over as AEW did to support that anyway.

That being said, a full on NJPW:USA with a dedicated roster and team may have been another story and if that's the thing that AEW kiboshed I'd be pissed too. I wouldn't blame anyone though. Everyone saw the hole in the market, it was just a matter of who got there and New Japan tried but didn't quite get there in time. That's business, baby.

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2 minutes ago, Godfrey said:

The other thing that may have sunk NJPW conquering the US is that while there are undoubtedly a contingent of real fans, a lot the "New Japan fans" in the States are actually "the last half of WrestleKingdom" fans. What I mean is, having a big show in the states or putting big matches on someone else's show is a what most people want. They want Okada/Omega or Tanahashi/Ibushi or Ospreay/Takahashi. Some fans want the G1, but most fans just want the finals. An actual touring promotion with all the meaningless 6 and 8-man tags is way harder to sell without more developed TV (or online) presence. Even with the Elite on the roster, that's still only maximum two matches a card they could carry as names and I'm not convinced NJPW would have got them as over as AEW did to support that anyway.

That being said, a full on NJPW:USA with a dedicated roster and team may have been another story and if that's the thing that AEW kiboshed I'd be pissed too. I wouldn't blame anyone though. Everyone saw the hole in the market, it was just a matter of who got there and New Japan tried but didn't quite get there in time. That's business, baby.

Pretty much, I think we can agree that NJPW half-assed it at best and for reasons unknown thought that ROH would carry them to greatness. Like I said earlier, ROH was always great at making other promotions think they were a far bigger deal than they actually were.

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20 minutes ago, OSJ said:

 and for reasons unknown thought that ROH would carry them to greatness.

I'm curious as to what other National promotion they should've partnered with when the groundwork for expansion was laid.

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3 minutes ago, Casey said:

Ring Of Honor was the best option at the time, but there is a better option now.

That's assuming there's no contract keeping them tied to RoH, and that changing to a company working with another partner's direct competition doesn't screw that contract up.  It might not just be as simple as "we're walking and going somewhere else".

 

Also, the creation of the USA office seems to indicate they really don't care to work with anyone else.

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Just now, Raziel said:

That's assuming there's no contract keeping them tied to RoH, and that changing to a company working with another partner's direct competition doesn't screw that contract up.  It might not just be as simple as "we're walking and going somewhere else".

Yeah, I realize all of that (and I'm fine with it never happening). I've got no real desire to see Tanahashi on AEW TV, or Okada, etc.

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2 minutes ago, Casey said:

Ring Of Honor was the best option at the time, but there is a better option now.

So if AEW flatlines, we gone switch to NXT so on and so forth until we've exhausted all of our options? They don't even do that in boxing where promoters can actually do that. 

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16 minutes ago, Raziel said:

I'm curious as to what other National promotion they should've partnered with when the groundwork for expansion was laid.

ROH is a national promotion? You don't say? Amazing what I can learn on this board.

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I'm trying to picture that NJPW-Impact cross-promotion situation that Craig suggested, and it's weird. Rich Swann or Ace Austin mixing it up with some of the juniors would be okay. But at the main event level, it's not like Impact is even big enough to merit a visit from the tippy-top dogs. So what does that leave us with? Sanada vs Rhino? EVIL vs Moose? I doubt there's any combination that's likely to be a huge shot in the arm for anyone's business. It'd probably be as flat as the ROH relationship unless they wanted to do something crazy like feed Suzuki to Tessa, but nobody's ever going to agree to that and I should definitely stop thinking about it and wanting it. 

Edited by West Newbury Bad Boy
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