Wrestling Thread 5: FKA The Viking Experience • Page 509

Bayley liking that tweet makes it even better.

 

Taz will be one of the AEW commentators next week.

 

They're just gonna get all the old beloved commentators huh? Why not, I guess

 

Hmmmm

 

The Smackdown audience dropped a lot more than AEW didn't it? Also might be because Smackdown was terrible while AEW was quite enjoyable.

 

they both dropped about 25%. smackdown lost almost as many viewers as AEW has in total

 

Ah percentage wise makes sense. Eh its still early to make a judgement on anything in my opinion. But somehow I see AEW holding that million number as a constant if they keep up with the momentum which would be good for them. Smackdown I feel like is going to continue to fall unless WWE changes things up drastically. Friday is just a shitty night for TV in general.

 

sum total vs. overall % drop in audience is a thing and you're comparing an established brand vs one that isn't. smackdown was also hyped up with a draft while it was a standard episode of dynamite. the latter was also going up against nxt and two deciding playoff games that spanned four big markets while smackdown was up against a single game one. smackdown also airs on one of the biggest networks in the country.

 

Smackdown was also legitimately fucking terrible

 

also the people who get annoyed about AEW and WWE getting compared are more annoying than most people making the comparisons, yall had months to get ready for this, it's not gonna stop

 

can't complain about the comparisons after years of begging for an alternative

 

Meltz daddy said the original plan was for Fiend to take a bump off the top of the cage and then they call the match due to him being out of commission and then afterwards he would raise and no sell it (I'm guessing) then give Rollins the mandible claw. That would of still been a bit of a bummer but more in line with Hell In A Cell for the most part

 

Smackdown on fox isn't an established brand. If anything, you'd expect it to have *more* curious people tune in to watch it and then decide its not for them than something like AEW where anyone watching it knows what they are getting into.

The first playoff game was basically over before Smackdown started... also wasn't it a ratings lead in?

Being up against NXT and the size of FOX can account for the numbers, but not the size of the drop as those factors stayed the same.

If people wanna compare the various brands they should actually compare the brands, instead of trying to put bullshit spin where a 25% drop for AEW is "AEW keeps up strong numbers, still beats NXT!" and a 25% drop for Smackdown is "Smackdown loses almost a million viewers!!!". But people don't actually want to compare the brands they just wanna go "AEW GOOD WWE BAD" and spin whatever numbers come out to fit their narrative.

 

Something like this is how I expected the match to end and I think would've been fine.

Did they change it on the fly during the match? Or was Bray hurt going in? Really seems like if they could'n't have done the match the way they wanted, canceling the match would've been better.

If he got hurt during the match, idk... it is a bit of a tricky bind. Don't want either competitor to just run away because they look like cowards. Don't want the fiend to take the pin. And title change clearly wasn't in the cards...

Probably its a good sign you shouldn't book a super protected character in a no-DQ title match that you don't want them to win but don't want them to lose. That really paints yourself into a corner.

 

Shotzi Blackheart just got signed to NXT at Evolve

Edit: Actually that may have been a replay from another show. idk lol

 

I mean, The Rock severely helped those week one numbers. He’s still the biggest draw in wrestling (in pretty much anything at this point)

there was always going to be a steep drop off after that

 

@Henry is gonna be stoked

 

Yeah I'm not sure it sounds like they changed it before the match I'm not sure why

 

lol yeah, no shit

 

Yes, that was the point. Smackdown has advantages(an established product, a widely viewed network, and no direct competition) that give it a built-in high floor. It means much of their viewership is baked in and less susceptible to fluctuation week-to-week; it's a harder number. Despite that(and having a gimmick episode that likely inflated the number a bit, up against minimal competition), they lost a large sum of people who bothered to give them a chance the week before.

You mean Dynamite? Effectively the first game was over in the first inning, so it wasn't much of a lead-in. And it tends to be the case that people who watch the first game are likely to then watch the second.

Most people can process context.

I don't know what you're looking to compare. The quality of the shows? Are we pretending Raw and Smackdown aren't consistently awful?

 

The advantages you mentioned are why Smackdown's numbers, despite being higher than AEW's, are still less impressive. Because given the network they are on and the history behind the show they should be doing a lot better.

But none of those advantages really have an effect on the week vs week comparisons. You can't compare the viewer totals for Smackdown vs AEW, but you can compare how they change from week to week. I'm not sure why you think Smackdown is less likely to fluctuate... given the time slot and the huge increase in viewers from the last USA Smackdown fluctuation seems to be expected.

At the end of the day, a 25% drop for AEW means pretty much the same thing as a 25% drop for Smackdown. So seems to be very silly to act like its very bad news for Smackdown but good news for AEW.

 

PCO vs Rush at Final Battle lmao

 

I could totally see them doing a CD type send off and giving him the belt.