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The Official UKFF RAW thread (part 2)...


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26 minutes ago, Yakashi said:

I was originally just going to tell you to fuck off but I’ll try and be more civil.

WWE is in the toilet. It is regularly doing record low ratings. As in, the worst of all time. It has never been less popular and has never turned off more people in such a short space of time. If it wasn’t for old people they’d be completely fucked because hardly anyone under 50 can tolerate them. Once those oldies die or move on, they are dead because they aren’t growing an audience and young people won’t watch their show.

And it’s happened because their shows are absolutely shit. Millions of people don’t just stop watching in the space of a few years by accident.

So, if someone says that the shows are terrible then maybe, just maybe, it’s not a gimmick because, you know, there can’t be millions and millions of gimmicks causing their ratings to fall into the shitter.

I find it strange you defend them and get so upset when people criticise, but I’m not going to start calling you names.

I'm not going to disagree that WWE is shit because it is and has been for while and the quality is definitely a part of why it's got record low numbers but Wrestling in general is a complete anomaly when it comes to retaining viewership because it never ends.
Most people start watching and pick a favourite, whether it's Hogan, Warrior, Rock, Austin, Cena, etc, but those stars are only there for so long, so regardless of quality, a lot of fans only tune in for the time their favourites are there and then never attach themselves to anyone new. A good example of this is post Wrestlemania X7, which most agree is the end of the Attitude Era. A load of WCW fans never came across, and a load of WWF fans never stuck around because Rock and Austin were both gone for the most part within the year. 
The same will have happened when Brock left the first time, and Batista, and when Cena faded out. It's the same reason most people come back when they announce these Legend Nights.

It doesn't matter what era you watch in either, the low quality has always been there. Warrior and Shango, Fingerpoke of Doom, Mae Young's Hand, Vince McMahon wearing a do-rag and dropping N-bombs. If it was entirely due to a bad product, you could argue nobody would watch in the first place.

The poor quality is certainly turning people away, but I'd argue the bigger factor is people only watch until their favourites leave, and the ones that stay dislike the product because their favourite is gone. For something that prides itself on not being seasonal, by its very design it has to be; and just as easy as it is to tune in for the first time, it's just as easy to tune in for the last time.

Edited by FelatioLips
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17 minutes ago, FelatioLips said:

I'm not going to disagree that WWE is shit because it is and has been for while and the quality is definitely a part of why it's got record low numbers but Wrestling in general is a complete anomaly when it comes to retaining viewership because it never ends.
Most people start watching and pick a favourite, whether it's Hogan, Warrior, Rock, Austin, Cena, etc, but those stars are only there for so long, so regardless of quality, a lot of fans only tune in for the time their favourites are there and then never attach themselves to anyone new. A good example of this is post Wrestlemania X7, which most agree is the end of the Attitude Era. A load of WCW fans never came across, and a load of WWF fans never stuck around because Rock and Austin were both gone for the most part within the year. 
The same will have happened when Brock left the first time, and Batista, and when Cena faded out. It's the same reason most people come back when they announce these Legend Nights.

It doesn't matter what era you watch in either, the low quality has always been there. Warrior and Shango, Fingerpoke of Doom, Mae Young's Hand, Vince McMahon wearing a do-rag and dropping N-bombs. If it was entirely due to a bad product, you could argue nobody would watch in the first place.

The poor quality is certainly turning people away, but I'd argue the bigger factor is people only watch until their favourites leave, and the ones that stay dislike the product because their favourite is gone. For something that prides itself on not being seasonal, by its very design it has to be; and just as easy as it is to tune in for the first time, it's just as easy to tune in for the last time.

But favourites only exist because of the booking of the product. If Vince kept steve Austin going 50/50 with Steve Blackman, scripted his promos, made him terrified of Stephanie and had IRS lay out all his matches for him do you honestly think he would have meant anything? You can’t have stars/favourites without booking them like a star. And wwe can’t book anyone like a star anymore.

Edited by Yakashi
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2 minutes ago, Yakashi said:

But favourites only exist because of the booking of the product. If Vince kept steve Austin going 50/50 with Steve Blackman, scripted his promos, made him terrified of Stephanie and had IRS lay out all his matches for him do you honestly think he would have meant anything? You can’t have stars/favourites without booking them like a star. And wwe can’t book anyone like a star anymore.

I used those examples because they were likely the favourites but you don’t have to be a star for someone to like you. The last time I enjoyed WWE was when Braun Strowman was chucking Roman about, there’ll be kids now love Rollins or Reigns or The Fiend regardless of booking, but when they’re gone what are the odds these now teenagers/adults will stick around?

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Wrestling's a strange thing isn't it. You'd think the pre-determined nature would allow for them to create stars and moments. Yet that ability to control is often completely detrimental to the product. So many successes over the years have actually been happy accidents or driven by audience rather than initial plans.

There's really no perfect formula but I do think WWE need to be more willing to change and listen. Not just SAY they will. And no, not just give in to every stupid Internet demand but at least consider when things don't work. AEW seem to do that and adapt as they go on and I really like that.

As much as people hate Vince and WWE as a company I think a lot of the anger is out of pure frustration from seeing what they SHOULD be able to deliver with the talent, and knowing how great it CAN be when they get it right. Hence why so many of us keep an interest.

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Just now, FelatioLips said:

I used those examples because they were likely the favourites but you don’t have to be a star for someone to like you. The last time I enjoyed WWE was when Braun Strowman was chucking Roman about, there’ll be kids now love Rollins or Reigns or The Fiend regardless of booking, but when they’re gone what are the odds these now teenagers/adults will stick around?

But it’s a star driven business. It always has been and always will be. You have to keep creating new stars as no one will stay around forever. Raw was drawing 4.5m viewers 3 years ago. 3 million people didn’t leave because their favourites left. It is a combination of things sure. The tv industry is down. But wwe is down so, so much more than everything else. It’s not a coincidence that their product is at an all time putrid level as viewership continues deeper into the mud.

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3 minutes ago, FelatioLips said:

I used those examples because they were likely the favourites but you don’t have to be a star for someone to like you. The last time I enjoyed WWE was when Braun Strowman was chucking Roman about, there’ll be kids now love Rollins or Reigns or The Fiend regardless of booking, but when they’re gone what are the odds these now teenagers/adults will stick around?

There aren't, that's the scariest thing about their current situation. There'll always be some, obviously but as a trend, they just aren't there. As dreadful as their overall numbers are, the lack of new fans should terrify them.

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14 minutes ago, tiger_rick said:

There aren't, that's the scariest thing about their current situation. There'll always be some, obviously but as a trend, they just aren't there. As dreadful as their overall numbers are, the lack of new fans should terrify them.

It would be better if they weren’t creating new fans but the average age was in the 30s and they were doing great in the 18-34 demo. But the average age is in the 50s. When these people stop watching/die then they have no one. That’s the scary thing and that’s actually a bigger story than just their terrible ratings. The future looks even grimmer than the present. 
 

If they keep this trend going, I can honestly see AEW taking over from them in the demos and causing waves within the tv industry. If they both end up at a 0.5 in the demo (or even AEW at 0.4 and raw at 0.5) then USA will be thinking why am I paying these guys $265m a year for a 0.5 when TNT are getting the same for $40m.

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17 minutes ago, Yakashi said:

It would be better if they weren’t creating new fans but the average age was in the 30s and they were doing great in the 18-34 demo. But the average age is in the 50s. When these people stop watching/die then they have no one. That’s the scary thing and that’s actually a bigger story than just their terrible ratings. The future looks even grimmer than the present. 
 

If they keep this trend going, I can honestly see AEW taking over from them in the demos and causing waves within the tv industry. If they both end up at a 0.5 in the demo (or even AEW at 0.4 and raw at 0.5) then USA will be thinking why am I paying these guys $265m a year for a 0.5 when TNT are getting the same for $40m.

It's not like AEW have stolen all of NXT's viewers though. Or even convinced everyone who switched off Raw over the years to jump on board with them either. They've got a solid footing where they need to be right now but it still opens the question about what's happened to the vast amounts of wrestling fans that just switched off and never jumped to something else.

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I wonder how Matt Riddle is feeling after that ghost stomp on his foott by Lashley.

Whahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhaha

The absolute worst bullshit I’ve ever seen on a wrestling show. Lashley didn’t even touch him.

I am watching a freakin YouTube replay and I cannot understand why they didn’t bother to edit it out. Lazy. They should be so ashamed.

 

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30 minutes ago, DavidB6937 said:

It's not like AEW have stolen all of NXT's viewers though. Or even convinced everyone who switched off Raw over the years to jump on board with them either. They've got a solid footing where they need to be right now but it still opens the question about what's happened to the vast amounts of wrestling fans that just switched off and never jumped to something else.

AEW have their own audience of young people. NXT is even worse than raw when it comes to average ages. Their 18-49 is beyond embarrassing.

I'd be interested to see AEW go head to head with raw to see what the cross over viewers are. 

I actually believe AEWs audience IS made up of mostly people that quit wwe and we wouldn't see much correlation. And I'd imagine if there were fans that watched both then thr majority would choose to watch AEW head to head over raw. I just think their audience are far more invested. Ita not just a habit.

Edited by Yakashi
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1 hour ago, Yakashi said:

I actually believe AEWs audience IS made up of mostly people that quit wwe and we wouldn't see much correlation. And I'd imagine if there were fans that watched both then thr majority would choose to watch AEW head to head over raw. I just think their audience are far more invested. Ita not just a habit.

I just can't see anything about a modern episode of Raw that would attract a lapsed casual fan. No amount of 'legend specials' can change that.

I don't watch anywhere near enough WWE (hardly any) to pass comment on anything but the most superficial of elements, but the whole production of a modern episode of Raw just looks nothing like what most people would consider to be a standard wrestling show.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that you shouldn't evolve, but the litany of screens all over the arena (pre-Covid) and crazy camera cuts. Really necessary? The voices on commentary are completely different and even speak nothing like what most would be accustomed to, just buzz words.

Just an overly sanitised look and overproduced show with nothing feeling spontaneous any more, which just leads to poor acting and cringe segments written by people who have no idea what their audience is.

On the flipside, AEW looks more like a late 90's episode of Nitro. That's no bad thing in my book, it still comes across as a big time show in a big arena but without losing en element of gritiness and an 'anything can happen' feel (once the staple of Raw).

The commentary features the two main voices of the WCW and WWF respective heydays while there's a sprinkling of 90's faces either managing or sometimes in the ring, but not at the expense of its mainly young-ish wrestling roster.

Now the longer matches and flippy wrestling on both shows will be unfamiliar either way. But if I were a fan from the 90's and stumbling across either while flicking through the channels, I know which one would pique my interest for the longest.

Edited by garynysmon
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It's really bizarre how much Raw is tanking in both show quality and ratings, yet the same company has two good to great shows later in the week. I mentioned not long back that the third hour seems to be a killer weekly for Raw but even at 2 hours I don't think it'll get much better. The feuds on Raw are all over the place, Charlotte and Asuka are supposed to be the tag champions yet neither appeared with each other for their respective singles matches, Jeff Hardy is still lumbered with Elias over something that happened months ago when they were still at the PC, Retribution are still more miss than hit but are at least starting to get wins and turning attention from Ricochet to New Day, and more specifically Kofi hawking back to the Kofimania angle from nearly 2 years ago and Drew has been put in a filler feud with a beyond past it Goldberg and an overly stale Miz

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7 minutes ago, LaGoosh said:

What happened to that Shane McMahon fight club thing? Is it finished? Did they just stop doing it with no explanation or was there a storyline conclusion?

I already know the answer to that don't I...

It vanished with no explanation. I believe it was just reported by Dave this week actually that the reason, in real life,  that they binned it was that they didn’t want all the rosters mixing together during the pandemic.

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