Only two questions this time. Must be a slow week, but that's OK, because I can catch up easier. And since blockquotes apparently don't work on Insidepulse, I can try new and fun formatting of the letters today.
First actual question! At least I think there's a question in it. And it feels purple to me for some reason.
Do you really think this million dollar contest is really going to bring back old fans? I personally doubt it, and I dont really want WWE fans to come back just for greed. They will leave as soon as the contest is over, and then it will be back to low numbers.
I recently did a blog on the WWE Fan Nation about the reason why the fans left after the 1990's. There are an awful lot of reasons, but I focused on one in particular, the change of the name of the company from The World Wrestling Federation to World Wrestling Entertainment. Changing the name was not their choice, but they sort of tried to save face by acting like it was with the Get the F out campaign. I think that was horrible mistake, I mean they pretty much were saying it's time to get rid of the history of the company. To the fans, to the people who have been watching since the 80s and before that, its not just the history of the company, its a history of our lives. We all remember where we were when Chris Benoit and Eddie Guerrero embraced in the ring, even though it's really painful now. Sure all of the deaths have ruined alot of the memories, but not always. What ruined our memories was the fact that the WWE.com website said something like "Watch this video of Wrestlemania VII where Hulk Hogan won the WWE title against Sgt. Slaughter." That really pissed me off, and its been a hard time for me to accept WWE. For years I would only refer to it as the WWF, in hopes that somehow the Wildlife fund would change their greedy minds.
I think WWE really need to mount a legal battle to get the name back, but I also have a question. Why does WWE programming from the past always have World Wrestling Federation unedited, but is almost always referred to as WW-, or sometimes disgustingly as WWE. This is a bigger problem to me then the lack of theme songs, I have all the ones that I need. If they can use the words World Wrestling Federation, why don't they use that now? They could refer to the company initials as WWE, but keep the powerful name World Wrestling Federation. I think the changing name was the number one reason that the WWF's bubble bust at around same time it did the same for the first generation of dot com businesses. Though I think it was poetic that Hulk Hogan was the last offical World Wrestling Federation Champion love him or hate him, I don't think anybody can deny that he deserved it.
I always wanted to know why the trial was in England, and what you think is the reason the fans left the company
In fact the ratings are in and they lost viewers for this week's show, if I'm not mistaken, so scratch another stupid desperation plan. I'm kind of amused by Vince getting Rickrolled (a reader actually sent me that link and asked "Was this deliberate and is Brian Gewirtz that big of a dork in the first place?" and my answer was "No, but yes") but it would be just like the WWE to get zinged by an internet meme that's already considered passe by the online culture.
Anyway, the main crux of the letter here is that one of the main reasons for the departure of much of their fanbase from the 90s is the change from WWF to WWE, and I have to vehemently disagree. Considering how little most wrestling fans care about history and how quickly the transition from WWF to WWE occurred with a minimum of fan protest, I'd say the change was more of a hilarious capper to their downfall from the glory years, rather than the direct cause of anything in itself. There's really a more simple explanation for the loss of fanbase: They were marketing to fickle college students, who then grew up and found something else to watch instead. Wrestling traditionally has a seven-year turnover rate and as long as you can weather the storm in the lean years, fans will probably get on a nostalgia kick and come back. Or, you can do like they're trying now and market to children with guys like John Cena and the Hardy Boyz, thus hooking them young enough to form good memories of our so-called sport in their minds and making them bitter and cynical fans later on, like myself. Given that they already whined about spending millions on rebranding from WWF to WWE as it is, spending more millions to buy the name back would be pretty idiotic and irresponsible to the shareholders to boot.
But just to come back to the original point again, it's silly to say that fans left the company, because they're making more money now than they ever have, even at the peak of the company in 2000. Ratings suck and domestic interest is down, sure, but they can spend the next two years as a purely international touring company and still make enough money to buy and sell the rest of the wrestling world 100 times over, even if they never aired another episode of RAW again. So to clarify, the problem is not gaining old viewers back, it's figuring out how to squeeze a new international audience for the same amount of money that the old audience was giving up. Vince is panicking about the ratings for reasons entirely separate from lost fanbases -- he's worried about lost ad revenues, which is a far bigger problem. North American sponsors can't easily shill to, say German fans, which is why winning back the apathetic American audience seems so much important than it really is.
Finally, the WWF trial took place in England because that's where the original contract between the WWF and the Fund was breached. By the WWF I might add. A contract that Vince himself offered to the Fund, and without which there probably would have been no legal basis for the Fund to sue in the first place, ironically enough. Basically Vince gave them a legal document saying that he could legally use the WWF initials in the US only so long as he never altered the logo or toured internationally as "The WWF" (because the Fund was considered more well known by that name abroad, but it was decided that US audiences knew the wrestling promotion better by that name, I suppose). Starting in 1998, Vince proceeded to violate both portions of the agreement quite blatantly, and thus got sued over it. And lost, badly. I mean, really, even by Jerry McDevitt's low standards they really got boned by the Fund but good.
And now, a list. Yay. Feels gold to me.
Since you seem to love lists so much..
What incident(or incidents if you prefer) in wrestling do you think have
been blown out of all proportion? Where people make out is was a majorly
significant event, when it wasn't? Some of mine would be...
1)Pillman's Got a Gun: RAW never really got "Attitude" until a year later,
and this actually made USA come down on "risque" stuff.
2)DX "invades" WCW in a tank: Sure, it was a cool visual, but so what?
3)Chris Jericho "unifies" the WWF/E and WCW/World Titles: Nobody cared
about the Big Gold Belt at this point, and they were split/brand extended
again anyway
4)Daniel Puder "shoots" on Kurt Angle: People STILL talk about this crap.
Why? Some idiot tried to get himself over by "shooting" on Angle, and
where's Puder today?
5)The Fingerpoke of Doom: WCW's REAl stupidity came later that year, and
made the Fingerpoke look like Shakespeare by comparison...
The Puder one I actually do get, because it was pretty symbolic of the growing dominance of MMA and how clueless the WWE was (and still is) about what they were facing with it. That Puder didn't amount to anything is beside the point.
I actually don't think anyone was making that big of a deal out of the Jericho thing at the time, either. The "WCW" belt was considered a lame duck title anyway long before he unified them.
Definitely agree about DX's invasion of WCW. Sean Waltman joining the group was a much bigger moment.
I think for me the ones that bug the most are the cool bump visuals that are endlessly replayed for weeks and then forgotten the next month. I mean, yeah, Jeff Hardy coming off a cage onto a guy is great for a bit, or Big Show chokeslamming Undertaker through a ring or taking a superplex and breaking the ring is neat in the short-term, but a few people still talk about those moments like they were somehow defining moments for the promotion, when really Foley's dive off the cell already set the bar higher than anyone could follow. A minor gripe, sure, but it's my column. Interesting idea for discussion, though.
And we're out...
Tags: Stupid lists
I don’t think anyone really makes a big deal out of Jericho unifying the two titles apart from Jericho himself. Which makes sense given his character.
Also agree that DX invading wasn’t that big of a deal. What would’ve made it huge was if WCW let them in and they let their best talkers go face to face with DX. I say “best talkers” because I’m including guys like Jericho, not just the obvious candidates like Nash and Hall.
I think the big deal about Jericho unifying the titles, is that he finally broke through the glass ceiling, and he beat the two biggest stars of his generation on the same night.
Don’t you think it’s the WWE’s fault that some of the bigger “bumps” are forgotten? They have shown the ability, through video packages and whatnot, to make an event or match seem much greater in retrospect. The Triple H/Rocky 2 out of 3 falls match from Fully Loaded 1998 springs to mind because the package made it seem like a **** classic…so I rushed out to see it after missing the PPV and it was boring.
For example, Jeff Hardy’s win over Umaga before the Rumble on Raw had him pulling of a sweet Whisper in the Wind off the top rope. Incredible visual, good match and really out Jeff Hardy over (I remember seeing a link to it on ESPN.com) but then it was just ignored. They could have made Hardy a main eventer based on that one match/move alone and they didn’t because it was time for Hunter & Cena again.
I think Vince Russo going to WCW is overblown. While alot of his ideas there were crap, WCW was already in a freefall when he got there and I believe there wasn’t anything he could to make it stop. He did not cause WCW’s death.
Personally, I watched NItro religiously, even over the Austin-fueled Attitude era, until the “Powers that Be” were introduced. I had no idea what a smark was, or who Vince Russo and Ed Ferrera were. I just started to notice that my favorite show wasn’t the same any more. I didn’t know why. It just seemed the crash-tv stuff that I thought was so stupid was now on WCW, and I didn’t know why. So, to a mark at the time (me), it really did have an impact, and not a smarky-nose-in-the-air type effect, but rather a “Why does this show suck all of a sudden” type effect. And *THAT* is when I finally started watching Raw (late 1999) and fell in love with the product, particualrly The Rock, who I don’t care for as a person now-a-days (he’s a BIGOT~!!!), but I can’t deny that he led the way for me to return to WWF television.
So, my point is Russo, yes Russo, drove ME personally away from WCW, with the Harris brothers, and Chavo selling real estate, etc. It’s a shame, because Goldberg had us at “Hello”… er, “Who’s Next?”
Why is Rock a bigot?
Well yeah, and he failed one of those pesky drug tests.
That was supposed to be a reply to bignasty’s argument that the cage bump should have resulted in a Jeff Hardy main event push.
The drug test happened about two months after (you could credit WWE I guess for seeing that would happen) and they could have used that cage bump to give Hardy the title at the Royal Rumble. I think Cena/Hardy or HHH/Hardy at WrestleMania would have been more interesting than the 3-way with the usual suspects.
And if Hardy has the title…I bet that pesky drug test wouldn’t be an issue. Just a hunch.
For the sake of argument, the drug test itself was only about a month or six week max after the cage bump, and he was still the IC champ till his suspension. Maybe he wasn’t being used to his full potential in those weeks in between, but he certainly wasn’t being under-used. If he had beaten Orton at RR and held both belts, given that he’s still JEFF HARDY, imagine the collective shit that every fan over the age of 16 would take at the sight of him on RAW with so much gold.
And as for the ‘pesky drug test’ stuff, you have reason for your cynicism, but my hunch is they are more selective in their actual testing than in their reporting.
At least Hardy is different and he was putting on some good matches on Raw with Umaga and one with HBK.
That’s sort of what I meant about testing…he wouldn’t be tested if he was champ. Maybe that’s the cynic in me but I find it extremely hard to believe someone like Triple H or even the Undertaker at his age looking like that are totally clean.
I think Waltman joining DX after Wrestlemania DOESN”T get the credit it deserves. It’s all people were talking about–and it gave the “cool nWo” rub to HHH and the outlaws.
I know this won’t happen, but I still would like to ask: I’m so curious on what Vince Russo would do with WWE right now. I know it’s a different playing field now (HHH, Big Steph., Gerwirtz etc.), but with the ratings STILL not going up (who woulda’ thought, million dollar idea, lol), I can see McMahon looking for someone to shake things up. Without going the easy route and mocking Russo, i’d love to hear who (and what) the site thinks Russo would push. What would Russo do with WWE now?
Honestly I don’t think there’d be much of a difference. We might be able to get london and kendrick on tv as superheroes but I think the ones being pushed now would be the same under Russo.
Now if Russo was giving total creative control, then it becomes a proverbial sh*t show. We’d definitely be getting a full blown incest angle with the burchills. Trevor Murdoch would still be teaming with Cade but there’d be some homosexual overtones, or they’d use that angle for jesse and festus. HHH and Cena would be tag champs. Armando Estrada and Colin Delaney would be fighting in “contract on a pole” matches each week. CM Punk would be shoe horned into a sandman-like character and teamed with a returning steve austin but then it would be a swerve cuz Punk would never break edge. Mr. Kennedy would have a heart attack on screen to mimic sen. ted kennedy’s recent health problems. William Regal might even come back and get pushed off the titan tron if we’re lucky.
Basically I wouldn’t have any faith in Russo bringing anything new, positive, or good if he were brought back the WWE.
Gimmick matches, lots of backstage segments, and stupid “events”. Not that much different than what we’re getting now, because the writing staff was raised on Russo-isms. If not for HHH & Michael Hayes in office, I think we might not be getting any wrestling at all, period.
I think the biggest problem the WWE has right now is that they seem to be afraid to tell a compelling story, and with good reason. Everytime they seem to get one going that is compelling, real life interferes and destroys it (McMahon’s “death” story getting interrupted by the Benoit stuff, or the interesting Kennedy/Regal feud getting sidetracked by Regal getting suspended.)
People forget that the late 90s WWE wasn’t just about good matches, it was the stories that were good, from McMahon/Austin to Hardys/Dudleys/E&C to Trish/Lita, almost everyone was involved in a good story/feud.
Now, the only interesting feud is Jericho/Michaels. This is because of the story, which has many layers. Compare this to HHH/Cena, who are only feuding because HHH has the title and Cena wants it back. Or Kennedy/Burchill, who are only feuding because Kennedy got the British guy fired. That’s boring. They used to write for everyone. Now they only write for the top people.
1999 was the WWF’s best year in terms of ratings and they didn’t have a lot of good matches at all, it was all the stories. But part of telling the stories comes from a match on Raw that last longer than 3 minutes. The Attitude era was strong thanks to a good midcard and no one can take any of the midcarders seriously because they don’t have enough time to get over.
Hey, that’s what made 2000 so special, the blend of great story telling and great matches.
I tend to disagree with that if you look at Wm 2000 and WM 15 the undercard hardcore holly beating billy gunn, roaddog beating goldust and shamrock, bart gunn and butterbean? Jarret and owen beating test and D-lo? are you kidding me ?that stuff would never got on a PPV now, the reason it was so good back then had not much to do with the writing at all, it had to do with 3 guys, mankind, rock and austin. Plain and simple. Corporate ministry is one of the dumbest angles of all time, it lasted the whole summer, and it was during their hottest period. That was because austin and rock were involved. There is too much talk about this. Austin + Rock is the answer to almost every question like this. Cena and HHH dont even come close to them.
the main part is the brands. There’s no point to them. If they want to do the whole brand thing, the have to get rid of the multi-brand PPVs. Go back to the Brand exclusive PPVS. If you don’t hold a title, you won’t be seen on PPV. It hurts the wrestler a lot.
Another thing is all the titles. There’s 2 world titles, to mid-card titles, and a thousand others. Do we really need 2 tag-titles? It’s just retarded
I guess when you are one promotion, and you can do an entire PPV built around all title matches, then you’ve got too many titles.
I love it when a Super-Smark gets a personal ax to grind and assumes that everyone in the world agrees with him. Yes, people all changed the channel because an F became an E.
That’s just idiotic.
for once in my life i agree with this idiot
I don’t understand the logic behind the $1,000,000 giveaway. While it’s obviously great for the few people that get the cash, for the vast majority of viewers it has absolutely no relevance to them. If they want a ratings boom, they have to deliver something that ALL viewers benefit from – namely good storylines, feuds and matches we want to see.
I’ve lost count how many times i’ve sat through JBL v Cena or Umaga v Jeff Hardy this year. Smackdown is even worse. They literally only have a few guys on the whole roster who are over – Edge, Batista, MVP (sort of) and Matt Hardy (sort of).
When it comes to Million Dollar Mania, the reason for the hate, my theory anyway, is that Vince is saying he’s doing this to reward the loyal WWE fans, but this isn’t for us at all. We’ve been loyal all this time, but then he devises a contest to draw in the people who deserted him all those years back, or even worse, the people who think pro wrestling is a joke. How lame would it be for someone who doesn’t even like wrestling to win a huge cash prize, when the loyal fans were rewarded with three straight PPVs with matching main events?
Personally, I feel that the product is better now than it’s been in YEARS. I mean, I think the shows are genuinely good these days. Not 2000 good, but each show has intriguing/exciting elements (however few or far between they are), for the most part. But I just feel like loyal fans may be getting a raw deal (no pun intended), because while they may stand to benefit from this contest, this is by no means being done “for them.”
It’s basically like when you’re into a really cute girl, but for some reason that girl is down on her self-esteem. You tell her how pretty she is, what a great person she is, and how anyone would be lucky to be with her. But she still has low self-esteem because, while what you said is what she wants to hear, you’re not the person she wants to hear it from. It’s the same deal here. Vince gets ratings in the threes and such (Memorial Day notwithstanding), but it almost feels like we’re not the people he wants watching his show. He wants to pull in the people who think they’re better than watching pro wrestling. Vince wants to draw in the people who “wouldn’t be caught dead watching Raw,” the same way the cute girl ignores every kind word you say to her while she waits for the ignorant jock to flippantly say, “Hey, did you get less ugly?” and respond like he just compared her to the Venus de Milo.
Since Vince has a million dollars to throw around, I just as soon see him pay for the rights to all the entrance themes they dub out on 24/7. It’s amazing how much it takes away from ECW to hear generic music dubbed over. There is something really silly about seeing Hogan playing air guitar to the “nwo theme” instead of Hendrix too.
I agree with you. I’d even be willing to pay a little extra for that channel just to get the damn songs. Watching the gangstaz or sandman totally loses something with those songs cut out.
I think they should rid themselves of the brand extension. This is why you get the same stale Hardy/Umanga, HHH/Cena/Orton main events. I always watch Raw(mostly on DVR), I never watch Smackdown(the last time was when the Rock was champ). I think what made the Monday Night Wars so successful was never knowing what was going to happen(Luger jumping, Syxx coming to Raw as XPac,etc.) Now we know it will always be the same matches on both shows. If I dont know if HHH is gonna appear against Edge on Smackdown, maybe I would watch it(or DVR it).
The problem with the give-away is that it doesn’t encourage viewership at all. A) They have the same code throughout the night, and it’s revealed at the start of the show, and B) You don’t even need to be watchng RAW to know it; you can just go to wwe.com.
If they really wanted to ensure people were watching, they’d have a different code for each drawing (available only on TV), revealed only as the phone call is being made.
“If they really wanted to ensure people were watching, they’d have a different code for each drawing (available only on TV), revealed only as the phone call is being made.”
Wouldn’t work.
Raw is only live for those who live in the East Time Zone or for those who have a dish and can watch the east-coast airing.
The problem isn’t viewership. Like I said in an early post, nobody truly believes they have a shot at winning. If they did, the highest rated program on TV would be the lottery drawing.
Must only be like that in the States; I’m in Alberta right now and RAW is live every week at 7pm our time.
The only time that it airs different on in the US is the Central Time Zone.
If you’re in the eastern time zone: 9:00PM on the USA Network.
If you’re in the Pacific Time Zone: 9:00PM on the USA Network.
I have a dish so I watch raw at 6:00PM PST, 9:00 EST.
The thing with the Million Dollar gimmick… it’s not that people think it’s fake or anything.
Everyone knows that SOMEMONE will win, just not you.
If people thought they had a chance of winning anything, the highest rated show on TV would be the one minute every week when they draw the winning lottery numbers.
It’s not like the WWE is failing at everything. I think the Michaels/Jericho angle is brilliant, along with the World Tag Title angle they have running right now.
There is no quick-fix to ratings. Just ask Eric Bischoff.
I agree there’s no quick fix to ratings but it’s frustrating to see the same mistakes being made routinely and the incredibly bland booking.
One of the best things the WWE did in recent years was to introduce Brock Lesnar from nowhere and immediately push him as a superstar. Now i know that’s not an easy thing to repeat, but the way talented workers like Punk, Benjamin, London, Kendrick, Matt Hardy, etc are being booked, it’s becoming close to impossible for these guys to be taken seriously as threats.
Therefore, we’re stuck with the same old faces constantly in the main events. Does anyone really want to see another Edge v Batista title match? That feud sucked last year, but due to a lack of main eventers on Smackdown, there’s literally no one else to challenge for the title.
Does anyone want to see Kane v Big Show again? That was a dull feud at Wrestlemania 17, and i don’t see it being any better this time around.
Cena v JBL was tedious when it main evented Wrestlemania a few years ago, and it’s still tedious today. Likewise, the Orton v HHH feud was poor first time around and, but for Randy’s injury, we’d probably still be putting up with it right now.
I just wish they’d take a chance and allow some of the younger, talented guys a decent push and at least give them half a chance of getting over, while at the same time freshen up the product. It worked with Lesnar and John Cena and i don’t see why it can’t happen again.
They should shoot MVP to the moon and see what happens. He’s the only current midcarder (maybe Kennedy) that I see being a superduperstar.
The real problem is that all the new guys are so similar, it’s tough for any of them to stand out. And when someone does break out to a point — Santino, Punk, even Miz & Morrison — they never capitalized on it.