A_K

Kenny is dating Shida? Lucky guy. Good to get Fish out. Another 30 or so releases and they’ll be cooking.

Carny Dave will do Carny Dave. Snake oil salesman.

Garcia beats Danielson. Swerve/Lee takes titles from Bucks. Moxley squashes Punk. Etc. Creating “unpredictable” shock tv results is not and never has been the problem.

Darby was a demonstrable draw for them. They've dropped the ball there big time but he's recoverable: he's magnetic. Jack Perry can't speak: they are going to kill him putting the spotlight on him like they are currently ("I hit him with my fist .. I hit him with a chair.." ?). Perry tops out at novelty but over tag team level (think Too Cool) or low/mid card loveable non speaking cruiserweight. Guevara they've killed with WCW 2000 level booking - I mean they've really fucked his booking up. Of the 3 Darby is probably most salvageable with most upside, Guevara is variable .. Perry is just not going to work whatsoever with what they're attempting for him.

Hmm ok. So the quality diminished as the roster became more bloated .. that number also includes enhancement / part time talent (e.g. pay exceeding 10k in a year), so yes the core permanent contract regulars was probably flexing at the 50-80 mark. The AEW roster would be even larger if part-time Dark/Elevation talent were included (for example, Bear Country are not included in the 120 named roster on the site .. but I would assume they've cracked 10k in salary for AEW for example?). Interesting stats/viewpoint any way ? Edit: Pretty wild that the full-time AEW roster right now is larger than WCWs ever was, even admitting for a 3 hour Nitro and 2 hour Thunder.

Not to labour the point but .. source on this? Quick google check across a couple of different sites suggests 50 - 80 flexing dependent on time of year. I picked 98/99 WWE because it preceded 3 hour RAW, so most closely fits AEW TV time although is still an hour extra a week just on the 2 flagship shows, and also preceded the influx of WCW/ECW 'invasion' talent. There is no precedent for a roster the size of AEWs being employed for 3 hours of TV time a week that I can find.

AEW could easily, easily pull together 8 signature main-eventer top of the card talents, then 12 upper card of whom 1/2 could rotate upwards into the top of the card 8, then 12 mid/lower card comprised of veterans and young(ish) high prospect talents to feud with each other + go over vets. Separately have 6 tag teams and 10 women. That gives you 44 .. add in a half dozen managers / trainers and you reach your 50. A roster size that can give you lots of fresh match ups while bringing in unpredictability as to who cycles up/down the roster. You then have 3 hours of television of week which you can fill with quality in-ring/vignette action. I actually think Khan's biggest negligence by a huge distance has been the roster mismanagement .. it was a mad dopamine rush of adding more and more and more without ever slowing down and considering the detrimental impact.

It's a really, really easy booking situation to sort out. 98/99 WWF (choosing this as a period of key commercial success in single-brand format prior to big WCW/ECW influx) had a roster of around 35-40 names across the male/female roster who would comprise Raw/Smackdown/Heat (5 hours national television). A casual look at the AEW website roster shows they're topping 120 names across the male/female roster before you get to commentary/trainers with 3 hours of national television. It's simply obscene. You cannot build a compelling, soundly-footed narration with this many names clouding the product. They would be far, far better if they cut literally half the roster, cut the Youtube product and focused very, very deeply on the national television output. Rampage ratings would be better for it. Dynamite would be much sounder in focus. Once you have those 40 or so names that you can build lower/mid/upper card around, then you can make the storytelling compelling. Right now they're onto a highway to nowhere as it is impossible to funnel a singular vision for where the company is at and where it is going. Absolute key first step. Then you come back down to 4 titles at maximum ever shown on television, and never let another title come on screen again. Build the value of the titles you have and start to attribute uniqueness again to the talent that are privileged to hold titles. Right now no title has any merit on AEW Television as there are simply far too many shown. EDIT: They have one of the strongest rosters in any promotion in history, and the deep-value of the great talent they do have is lost by having far too large a pack around them. The hardest problem to ever solve in any company is talent-finding. They are in this grossly fortunate (almost unique) position of having great talent .. now just cut the chaff around them.

Thanks all. I wouldn’t take much from that .. 10k attendance is still an OK number. It can’t be underestimated the financial strain on the public at the moment (there are some ridiculous stats out there, like credit card usage month-on-month increases being the highest in 25 years). There is going to be an impact on event attendances, there has to be. Tickets will go but not as easily as in 2021 when everyone was flush with cash. I’d also be less concerned about “momentum being lost” now .. in reality momentum was lost 6-9 months ago, it’s just dwindled bit-by-bit until it’s become a noticeable public issue. More important is that they get the big picture booking back on track .. the PPV will tell a lot about that. Less easily addressable is that they have way, way, way too many titles. It’s really bad and I don’t know what they do about that readily.

I’d like to understand this so help me out. Tickets were released 24 hours ago? Only 700 tickets for the event? This can’t be right. Please can you clarify exactly what you mean in terms of venue capacity & supposed sales to date?

In all seriousness, the guy looked ludicrous coming on national television with those cupping marks. Absolutely ludicrous. He should be kept off until that’s addressed (whether he needs a shirt or whatever they do to address it)

Shida is great (in every way): more TV please. You are right. Women division was barren during Britt run

You haven’t met Sammy before. Loves a work. Even worked Pam into thinking he was marrying her. He’s a pro.

1.2 mil viewers by end of year should be in play

To give him his dues Khan really did turn Fulham around. They went from being a carnival outfit to be a well-run, competitive side with a clever manager handed the reins after some very dubious exec decisions previously. Gives one a lot of hope that he can get this horse back on track too

Not at all - have always been extremely happy to have dialogue, and have never initiated a personal attack (I "like" a lot of posts, there are some interesting viewpoints). As memory has it however, there was a certain crowd of posters who were happy to quote my posts around the forum (which pre-empted the path of the past 9 months -- from the Danielson/Punk signing momentum-then-fumble-period, to the unanticipated tv network travails as we move into inflationary-environment & end of free-money-VC period that has dominated past decade, to the switch ups that would eventually be needed) in a derisory manner. Well, there you have it. The inevitable mismanagement played out, now hopefully its behind them and they build back some momentum and positivity around the roadmap. The "talent meeting" (need to be careful I don't get worked myself there, brother) is hopefully a segue into cutting the enormous amount of chaff that has allowed to gather under that roof. He has needed to get a grip on that company for almost a year now; time to stop letting the manipulative lunatics rule the asylum and get some big picture thinking back in place. Danielson + Moxley (+ Regal as manager) vs. Punk + MJF. Fuck everything else. 4 bonafide superstars. No entourages. No gimmicks. No town halls. No silly spotfest 12 man matches or versions thereof. The "two man Power Trip" angle done right. There is your 3-6 month angle to reel the viewers back in. Hunker down, cut the carnival shit and circus acts and get some consistency going again. And get the tag titles on Acclaimed yesterday. And stop having seemingly every-other-act walk around TV with a belt of some sort (AEW/TNA/NJPW/ROH/ECW .. whatever the hell else is being worn on shoulders)

Don't be sour: not my fault if you are taken in by performance-artists, actors and stuntsmen. If the company finally starts making the clever moves to get themselves out of the 6-9 month creative rut, good for them.

Don't get worked too much, brother

If you have all been worked by a storyline CM Punk injury I demand every restitution in the book, and Khan can send me the check in the mail for having nailed where AEW'd be at & what they need to do 6 months ago. Khan, get that big company-wide marquee angle rolling brother.

Was a good season until the last couple of episodes, then nosedived real quick. Utter garbage.

This will flop hard. Matt Smith cast as "the most experienced warrior of his time"?. Good to see they've maintained the immaculate decision making process that informed the final few seasons of GoT

The above was back in April. Trust me, I'm aware of the TV financial squeeze + plus white elephant that was the "streaming content value" .. I called it way before it was even on the radar of anyone else here. When you have narrative content like ROH you utilise it narratively. There was value to drain from it in the context / mythology it granted to some sizeable talent they signed. Instead, they squandered the momentum of Punk / Danielson etc.; they have not used the IP at their finger tips in an intelligent or elegant way. ROH only has value as legacy-mythos: it has 0 value as 'start up' intellectual capital, it never ever did and never ever will. They had all those legacy story points to explore in a modern context .. and instead created convoluted (and inelegantly named) needless story points like "Blackpool Combat Club". They needed to strip back all the added bullshit shows / Youtube nonsense etc. they had going on and create a smooth, single arc to get behind that could amplify the qualities of the young talent they already had. Instead, they are in a narrative-mire. Talent like Jericho (who have precisely 0 upside for the long term future) are still being devoted priceless minutes while others like Jungle Boy are being put in situations that amplify their weaknesses. Again, this isn't hindsight talking or 50/50 vision .. called this all out literally 6-9 months ago ..its going exactly as expected.

Have you seen Rampage’s ratings? They can’t juggle 2 shows, never mind 3. ROH will be an absolute bomb if it ever gets near network TV (which it won’t, by the way — quote me)

ROH angle leveraging the older superstars who didn’t get enough mainstream credit in their day for innovating & were forced to take over the world under a different sports entertainment umbrella vs the young AEW stars (pillars) who have had it easy with beautiful production off the bat and Khan’s $$$ guiding the way for them. Writes itself, gives angles to get the young AEW stars over with meaningful stakes, creates an overall narrative arc to the show that has been completely missing. AEW young stars go over because they haven’t succeeded where ROH couldn’t just because of the $$$, But because they’re that damn good. You buy the ROH product, you contract the biggest names ROH ever had .. then the only real throw back you have is Punk coming out to Miseria Cantare. Bizarrely underwhelming use of the mythology & context

Called the AEW decline pretty clearly earlier in the year to the chagrin of a few -- seems more & more voices are coming around. As I said at the time, I didn't do it for the larks. Despite running unopposed, I think they have possibly (maybe?) hit 1 m. once since March. A lot of very bad decision making began to compound on itself. The clear way to go with ROH was obviously to leverage that IP into an invasion angle, considering the number of historic ROH 'greats' they have on the roster. ROH as a standalone has 0 value above that which AEW had already accomplished, and will continue to prove that it has 0 additional value above that which AEW has accomplished. It has always been a very ADD-booked product veering wildly between angles being way too short or way too long. However there was always a new dopamine rush waiting around the corner so long as they had the NXT free-agents to plough through and with the Japanese/American indy product to continue to leverage. They've essentially introduced everything "new" that they can at this point, which means the time comes to actually build the foundations. Based on what they've done with talent over the past 12 months, nothing suggests the correct strategic thinking is in place, and given ratings have lost all upward momentum (when was the last time they had a weekly-YOY increase?) it seems to be showing. EDIT: This Jungle Boy/Christian angle is also the absolute worse they could have done for JB. It is shining a light on how embarrassing his mic work is, esp when placed next to arguably an all-time-great mic worker on the other side