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The 2021 WWE Forever Purge - Part 3 of ?


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7 hours ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

Eventually NBC Universal is gonna be like wait a second... WWE's next competitor has a 70% share of WWE's audience but at 15% the price?

I think this eventually does less to lower WWE's price but elevate what AEW is going to ask for in their next tv deal.

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4 hours ago, username said:

I think this eventually does less to lower WWE's price but elevate what AEW is going to ask for in their next tv deal.

Which would be a huge win for everyone involved, aside from the networks that end up airing WWE.

Also, referring to Flip's "70% audience at 15% price", sometimes, although not very often, that one meme goes:

- Mom, can we have WWE?

- We have WWE at home.

- The WWE at home: AEW

Edited by Shartnado
That one meme
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On 12/10/2021 at 2:46 PM, odessasteps said:

I still subscribe to the theory that Vince only won the war because he was the promoter that was based in the Northeast and had all the advantages that comes with it. 

I disagree with this. Mr. McMahon had the NE advantage to be sure, but it was his foresight to understand the cable revolution (with the help of Joe Cohen), both as technology and how it eventually removed TV's regional character in place of a heterogeneous, nationwide and ma$$ive mono-identity. Accompanying this was the PPV cash cow. Even Ted Turner and certainly not the AWA, NWA, Crockett, Watts, et al, were not savvy enough to be the first (or as effective) in harnessing this new style of the medium.

On 12/10/2021 at 1:37 PM, Dog said:

We don't like what the current product is, just like oldheads probably hated VKM for turning wrasslin' into cartoons.

My question (and I have discussed this in the past with several workers) is: was the "change" in wrestling, as Mr. McMahon chose to do, necessary for the WWE's eventual domination or were the innovations proposed above (assuming it's truth) enough for that success? Meaning, could a WWWF or NWA style, brought up to speed for the times and new monetary streams, produce had the eventual dominating outcome? The available media (newsstand mags, the WON and lesser zines & sheets, really) were quite aflutter to put mildly (you hadda be there) - "clowns" and "circus" were frequently used words. Pro wrestling was not truly marketed towards children and families previous to this for the most part. It worked, but was the change to the product an evolution or was it so drastic as to alter the nature of the thing to make it something else now (sports entertainment?).

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Not Just foresight in cable, but he had to understanding to put a professional infrastructure in place when it comes to things like TV production, Licensing and Merchandising ect. He ran the "business" like a business not just a carny sideshow. You always hear the stories about how WWF was a well oiled machine compared to the shit show of WCW 

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5 hours ago, thee Reverend Axl Future said:

I disagree with this. Mr. McMahon had the NE advantage to be sure, but it was his foresight to understand the cable revolution (with the help of Joe Cohen), both as technology and how it eventually removed TV's regional character in place of a heterogeneous, nationwide and ma$$ive mono-identity. Accompanying this was the PPV cash cow. Even Ted Turner and certainly not the AWA, NWA, Crockett, Watts, et al, were not savvy enough to be the first (or as effective) in harnessing this new style of the medium.

My question (and I have discussed this in the past with several workers) is: was the "change" in wrestling, as Mr. McMahon chose to do, necessary for the WWE's eventual domination or were the innovations proposed above (assuming it's truth) enough for that success? Meaning, could a WWWF or NWA style, brought up to speed for the times and new monetary streams, produce had the eventual dominating outcome? The available media (newsstand mags, the WON and lesser zines & sheets, really) were quite aflutter to put mildly (you hadda be there) - "clowns" and "circus" were frequently used words. Pro wrestling was not truly marketed towards children and families previous to this for the most part. It worked, but was the change to the product an evolution or was it so drastic as to alter the nature of the thing to make it something else now (sports entertainment?).

Great post, but I have one quibble: Ted Turner did understand how to leverage cable, but he was focused on doing so with the baseball club he owned rather than with pro wrestling. Putting the Braves on national television made major waves. I feel like people forget how innovative Turner was re: cable television. 

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While cable tv was part of the WWF’s national expansion, syndicated tv was the main tool Vince used. Stations had been giving away tv time to wrestling promotions based on handshake deals, then you had Vince show up with a briefcase full of cash and a cut of house show money in that market, those station managers jumped at that deal. That syndication network enabled Vince to sell commercial time, sponsorships and so on. 

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8 hours ago, SirSmellingtonofCascadia said:

Great post, but I have one quibble: Ted Turner did understand how to leverage cable, but he was focused on doing so with the baseball club he owned rather than with pro wrestling. Putting the Braves on national television made major waves. I feel like people forget how innovative Turner was re: cable television. 

You are right, I was in my 'rassling bubble. I think the WWF was a better product, however, to take nation(world)-wide, merchandising- & brand name-wise.

7 hours ago, Mister TV said:

While cable tv was part of the WWF’s national expansion, syndicated tv was the main tool Vince used. Stations had been giving away tv time to wrestling promotions based on handshake deals, then you had Vince show up with a briefcase full of cash and a cut of house show money in that market, those station managers jumped at that deal. That syndication network enabled Vince to sell commercial time, sponsorships and so on. 

I see it that the syndicated TV was a means to an end, to thee Big Takeover, if you will. It hurt the territories and help drive them down but it was the cable exposure that gave the WWF product the big time shine, and the ability to do the magazine, the merch in stores and the nationwide roadshow. The syndicated shows worked, but some were loss leaders. That market* was a short term deal that became secondary quickly.

       * The closed circuit market ended right quick, and eventually the PPV market became superfluous (Network) and even now the venerable house show market (Saudis and NBC and such).

p.s. - I know we are veering off the Purge thread theme, but I really dig talking the details of this pivotal era. If anybody says that Mr. McMahon is/was not a genius at least once, their fanboy hatred has overtaken their reason. Is he a nice fellow? Well...

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I can only speak from experience on the "syndicated vs cable" thing, but I can tell you I became a fan shortly before Mania 1 (so I would have been 10) and I didn't have cable until my late teens.  So my whole fandom (WWE and Crockett) was created and built on syndication, house shows promoted by syndication, and those glorious every-few-month drops (like manna from heaven) of new videos I could rent (Beta at first, VHS later).

Edited by Technico Support
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Remember cable as we know it really didn't roll out in big cities until 1983-1984ish and didn't hit peak viewership until the mid-90's when the Monday Night Wars started. Having the WWF on USA, regional sports networks like MSG, PRISM and NESN along with Super Stations like WTBS and WWOR, at first filled the gaps in markets(usually smaller ones) that Vince didn't have syndicated tv in yet, along with gaining a monopoly on pro wrestling on cable tv, since everyone with a brain knew at some point it was going to be a money maker.

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Is there a definitive book on the life (and impending death) of cable television out there that anyone in this thread would suggest? I know quite a bit of the story simply from reading books about the early players in the industry, but I am always on the lookout for a good book on this topic.

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