Brewster's Millions : ROH

[Devon Malcolm]

And when you're not using it for wrestling, it can be a kids play park with slides and a ballpit.

 

Fienstien isn

[Dearly Devoted Dexter]

Presumably it's okay when DearlyDevotedDexter dips his head into a WWE or TNA thread and makes a 'comedy' post before going back into his hole, though?

 

Oooh, you vicious old queen

[Devon Malcolm]

Presumably it's okay when DearlyDevotedDexter dips his head into a WWE or TNA thread and makes a 'comedy' post before going back into his hole, though?

 

Oooh, you vicious old queen

 

Oh, are you off now?

[MoistVaj]

Change the name of the company for a start. Bring in Vader to beat the fuck out of that annoying commentator week after week and replace him with Stan Lane and Jonny Polo. Then bring in Gigalo Jimmy Del Ray, The Dr of Style Tom Prichard and Mantaur to work the Main Events and have Cornette slap around the ROH regulars, fans included before he loses his mind again on one of his rants and this time goes too far and whips out a Spas 12 shotgun and massacres the entire building. The rest of the budget would be spent on the upcoming court cases. Wouldn't work but it would get some press and people talking about it.

[CleetusVanDamme]

Change the name of the company for a start. Bring in Vader to beat the fuck out of that annoying commentator week after week and replace him with Stan Lane and Jonny Polo. Then bring in Gigalo Jimmy Del Ray, The Dr of Style Tom Prichard and Mantaur to work the Main Events and have Cornette slap around the ROH regulars, fans included before he loses his mind again on one of his rants and this time goes too far and whips out a Spas 12 shotgun and massacres the entire building. The rest of the budget would be spent on the upcoming court cases. Wouldn't work but it would get some press and people talking about it.

 

 

Stop being silly, or dribbling spastics who can't spell, but still plan on writing a book will have a go at you.

 

 

 

Not aimed at anyone in particular.

[neil's bitch]

[Vamp]

Would try and run commercials in between MMA. I would definitely target legit sports fans as market ROH as basically pro wrestling without the stupid shit.

 

I've seen this idea banded about before and I'm not sure where it comes from.

Meltzer, ultimately. It is a mental idea, though.

 

Ah, that explains it then. I don't keep up with old Dave much, isn't he supposedly more into MMA than wrestling now anyway?

[King Pitcos]

Ah, that explains it then. I don't keep up with old Dave much, isn't he supposedly more into MMA than wrestling now anyway?

Yes, the idea comes from his MMA fandom, I think.

[reychampion]

Buy a decent time slots so there's more exposure and advertise it madly all over the place

 

I'd also try and get the current ROH talent more knows to the general public, pushing the stars all over TV.

 

Finally I'd bring in some former NFL (or other sports) superstars and train them to wrestle.

 

With well known names, ROH has lots more appeal to the general public.

 

Also get some A or B list celebraties sitting ringside.

[IANdrewDiceClay]

Ok. Will try and keep this short(ish)

 

Below is the order in which i would spend the cash.

 

10. Hire Paul heyman as booker . 500,000k. I think this is long winded enough without my expanding too much on this one.

You would hire the person you would intend to run the company last? Wouldnt you want him to be the first thing on your list, so he can iron out his own direction and the roster he wants to assemble? For example, what if his vision of this promotion doesnt include Kurt Angle or Randy Orton or if he thinks your wasting money on certain aspects of the promotion, where you should be hiring it in others? I'd have thought the figurehead responsable for the onscreen and talent operations would the first thing you'd do. This is basically the problem TNA has. They have a shit TV show and great house shows, because there's about 10 different people in charge of different things. Carter promoters the television and has no say on the TV content, Bischoff fucks about with TV executives and doesnt have much say when it comes to PPV and TV, Hogan can do whatever he wants which fucks up the plans, Jarrett runs the house shows, Borash promotes the house shows. You need to let the person incharge of TV have the final say on how his characters are portayed. So he should be the main man whoever you bring in.

 

And if it was easy enough to hire Heyman for $500,000 a year just to book your company, TNA would have done this years ago. No way is working the 7 day week and running the company for that amount of money a year.

[RancidPunx]

Fair cop on the appointing the booker last. Although I'm sure if Heyman was half as intelligent as claimed then he could still do an awful lot with what i had laid out.

 

 

I thought the general consensus was that a percentage of the UFC audience that started following in 2005/2006 was made up of ex-wrestling fans. At least they fit the same demographic.

 

If you were going to run commercials on TV to attract an audience that fits your demo, then during what tv program would you run them King Pitcos/Vamp?

 

MMA seems logical to me although i am open to other suggestions.

[Jambo]

Would try and run commercials in between MMA. I would definitely target legit sports fans as market ROH as basically pro wrestling without the stupid shit.

 

I've seen this idea banded about before and I'm not sure where it comes from.

Meltzer, ultimately. It is a mental idea, though.

 

Dave, if anyone would know how to merge the crossover. I think that while the large majority of MMA fans prefer it as it is a legitimate sport, their is a decent percentage who are lapsed wrestling fans or are interested for other reasons, those are a fair group. Even if it is just 1%, 1% of the 1 MILLION PPV buys that UFC sometimes get, that's still 10,000 people you can catch.

 

To run with Rancids style of post, here's my run down:

 

TV

 

This is something ROH need. Having lost HDNet, it would need a platform. This would take a few months, so in the rest period, I'd work with TV execs, consultants and brand advisers, we'll get to that later. I think that you'd clearly need to pay for the slot on a decent network, or else, you are spunking this away in a stupid way. I'd go as far to spend $7M on this, looking for 2 years from this money, ideally in exchange for some sort of advertising push from the network too. I'd overlook intentional TV for now, until we reached the stage of doing the standard 1/2 UK tours per annum.

 

Talent

 

What makes ROH stand out? The exceptional talent they have, this is second on the list to address. I'd look to tie up the following:

Eddie Edwards, Jay Briscoe, Mark Briscoe, Roderick Strong, Davey Richards, Colt Cabana, El Generico, Chris Daniels (TNA status depending), Chris Hero, Claudio Castagnoli, Homicide, Michael Elgin, Rhett Titus, Kenny King, Adam Cole, Kyle O'Reilly, Mike Bennett, Grizzly Redwood, Sara Del Ray, Daizee Haze. Other staff would include Todd Sinclair, Paul Turner, Dave Prazak (with rotating wrestlers as commentators) Bobby Cruise (Ring announcer) and finally Jim Cornette as head of talent co-ordination. With an average wage of $1500 per week, this equates to $1.95M, a very fair budget, leaving room for rare workers such as WGTT and any international talent.

 

Staging

 

If you've seen any ROH on HDNet you'll agree that the staging used (and arenas) are just too small if you are going to make a run at it. I'd invest in the necessities here, including Large trans vehicles (X2), new 20X20 ring with professional aprons (my pet hate) and corner pads. The Canvas would be white, to make the talent stand out, as opposed to blending in to the dark, as mentioned else where. You need a decent sized stage (30X10ft), a good sized screen, new lighting / audio equipment and production hardware, this will hit your pocket for what you see, it will add overall though. I'd say this should come to a wink over $1M with everything ready to go.

 

Advertising

 

I LOVE the idea from Rancid of trying to catch the legitimate sports fans attentions. This take you away from the sports entertainment area and home, in to WRESTLING territory, which ROH is. Really push home the impactful (no pun intended) style that ROH has, and re-introduce the code of honour to it's fullest as the newer 3 ruled version, and emphasize it. I'd run with ads during WWE, TNA, MLS, NBA, NFL and NHL in all of the key ROH markets, something we'll hit next. On top of this, use of the internet is huge, seen as we'll continue the iPPVs. Facebook ads, Twitter promotion, YouTube partnering, allowing us to post the weekly TV show in full on YouTube, and a good SEO supporting the online side of the companies site. I agree with the pricing that Rancid runs to here, I'd say circa $2.5M.

 

Markets to run.

 

ROH as originally an east coast company, and I'd like to see this rid of. iPPV / full PPV will run out of the following cities: Philly, New York, Louisville, Dayton, Detroit, Toronto, Chicago, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Portland and Los Angeles. These (Vegas aside) are well respected "wrestling cities" with plenty of venue choices, of varying sizes. They also mostly have professional sports (Vegas and Louisville aside again) teams to cross-brand with. Getting recognized in these markets is the goal, so focused local advertisement, such as signings, local TV, paper press and meet and greets will go ahead. Small cost, likely in the $50k region. TV will run from these cities also, aswell as the smaller local towns lesser so.

 

Production

 

Going from HDNet where ratings don't matter to a real network is a huge jump, so we'll go the whole hog, including a group of 3D recording cameras, full-time video editing staff, TV production room and staff and cameramen. Likely also involving 2/3 full time hands for the erection / stripping of the arena on show days. $3.5M

 

Merchandising

 

ROH and the workers there have some great shirts out there, such as the KOW, and with stronger investment, this would turn in to cash cow for the company. I'd go for the WWE idea of a shirt for EVERY roster member, no matter who. I'd continue the DVD production of live events, likely culminating in a "Best of January" DVD etc. Getting in to stores such as Walmart is vital in getting the brand out there too, looking for extensive pushes in the stores also. Decent sized $1.5M budget too.

 

The Heyman Factor

 

If you ask 100 fans what TNA is lacking, a fair percentage will go with Paul Heyman...I am one of these people. He is capable of bringing everything that ROH lacks. He has mainstream credibility due to his friendship with Brock, he has a knowledge of booking some of the best angles of the last 20 years, he knows what it takes to run a company and take it from this level to the next one, provided you supply financial advice and restrictions. I'd run with an opening offer of $1M and 25% of the company, going up to $1.5M and 40% top end.

 

Celebrity Endorsements

 

I'm not talking of diddies that play in some small time Nashville band, but of people in the Charlie Sheen category, the Rhianna category and the level of Gaga. If you can pull in people worth something, at usually fair prices ($50K - $100k an appearance) you can get twice as much in advertisement through sites like TMZ. If you wish to get someone involved physically, it'll cost you a fair amount of the $1M we have left, however it'll get you so much recognition, it would work.

 

There we go kids, I've spunked away my $20M, seen as it's a Brewsters Millions, and I've done the deed, how much am I getting as a gift from my dead uncle now?

[PunkStep]

Funnily enough, I started an EWR game set in Feb 2011 with RoH. I hate the promotion, I just wanted to se how quickly I could peg WWE & TNA down and become top promotion. By September 2011, it seems. Piece of piss. Here's how I done it:

 

1) I brought in Brock Lesnar

2) I sacked off everyone with a Jap commitment

3) Tied everyone with an 80+ rating in any category to a written contract

4) Everyone else, sent to development

5) Those that didn't want to remain in development were also fucked off

6) Brought in Heyman as on-screen character

7) Brought in Fedor, Muta, Kojima, Tenzan, KENTA, Big Zeke, Husky Harris, MICHAEL TARVER (last 3 released by WWE), Low-Ki,

8) I created/signed a load of tags. As well as Brisco Brothers and Kings of Wrestling, I had Havana Pitbulls, Nexus (Tarver/Harris), TenKoji, The Kartel and a couple of others. Fead with each other lots.

9) Started running monthly PPVs

10) Got the leftover staff sacked by WWE/TNA with decent rating

11) Booked lots of feuds over and over and over

12) Upped production values over time and brought in another TV show, eventually replaced existing tv show with one on a better network too

13) Go decent sponsors

14) Eventually tempted some WWE/TNA guys to join- such as Regal, Bryan, Doug, Swagger, Desmond Wolfe.

 

That was easy. I destroyed WWE on PPV head-to-head. SHIMMER for some reason took over the WWE Board of Directors as their owner, as a result Rock, Orton & Punk walked out on WWE. I hoovered those free agents up like Danielle Westbrook did with spacedust.

 

Of course, in reality, I would just hire Haku to beat the frappers to death with their own kickpadzzzz

[RancidPunx]

Good stuff Jambo.

 

Good read and some great suggestions.

 

 

I dig what you are saying about the apron and dark canvas. It might seem very trivial but my god, when half of your roster wears black, when your arena is dimly lit and when half your canvas is black it doesn't exactly create the most best image on TV.

 

I did like the Charlie Sheen thing also. Spend the cash, bring him in. Have him sat ringside and have him and a "bodyguard" get in a skirmish with a wrestler. The bodyguard can be some new talent and bang you've gotten exposure and a ready to go angle all done.

[Jambo]

Good stuff Jambo.

 

Good read and some great suggestions.

 

 

I dig what you are saying about the apron and dark canvas. It might seem very trivial but my god, when half of your roster wears black, when your arena is dimly lit and when half your canvas is black it doesn't exactly create the most best image on TV.

 

I did like the Charlie Sheen thing also. Spend the cash, bring him in. Have him sat ringside and have him and a "bodyguard" get in a skirmish with a wrestler. The bodyguard can be some new talent and bang you've gotten exposure and a ready to go angle all done.

 

The white canvas deal is McMahons thing. He likes tanned workers, and the canvas accentuates what he wants, a key principle of wrestling.

 

The great thing of the ultra famous people is that they will enjoy the opportunity to do something new and exciting. Due to wrestlings physicality, their is so many things you can do, from Sheen getting a sly hook on one of your heels to SDR for example cutting off Rihanna as she is giving the company the company praise. So many options!