Wrestling 2021: The Big Thread Machine

[Spiteface]

God, this Cody angle is fucking terrible.

Haven't seen this week's show yet, but I'm waiting for him to start a HHH/Jeff Jarrett Reign Of Terror. Yeah yeah, in storyline he's not supposed to be challenging for the world title again, but there's always an excuse.

[BeardFaceMan]

As long as Cody keeps his bland, uninspired, generic, 'Merican bullshit in the mid-card where he belongs, it should be fine. "Oh no, he's a foreigner" is the most boring, worn-out trope in wrestling, they do realise people outside of America watch the show, right?

Also disappointed they recycled the Beer Bath segment. The Pinnacle and The Inner Circle just had a fucking war, Jericho has a fucked arm after being pushed from the top of a cage, and his revenge is to get the oppostion wet? They do seem to be missing the mark more more lately, are they getting overconfident since they saw off NXT and thinking that their shit doesn't stink?

[MrMrs]

Yeah, babyface Inner Circle sucks. Cody fucking sucks too.

[petril]

As long as Cody keeps his bland, uninspired, generic, 'Merican bullshit in the mid-card where he belongs, it should be fine. "Oh no, he's a foreigner" is the most boring, worn-out trope in wrestling, they do realise people outside of America watch the show, right?

Also disappointed they recycled the Beer Bath segment. The Pinnacle and The Inner Circle just had a fucking war, Jericho has a fucked arm after being pushed from the top of a cage, and his revenge is to get the oppostion wet? They do seem to be missing the mark more more lately, are they getting overconfident since they saw off NXT and thinking that their shit doesn't stink?

hoping this gets brought up as part of the eventual Jericho heel turn where his gimmick is that he's living his gimmick because he can't face being over the hill. doing 90s Jericho as a has-been in denial about retirement. rather than a young not-yet upstart. eventually goes out to a Lance Storm armbar.

[Ja'moke]

Showbuzz Daily is having issues so the full Wednesday ratings chart isn't out yet, but here are the quarters for Dynamite.

Q1: The show opened with 938,000 viewers and 357,000 in 18-49 for Jon Moxley vs. Yuji Nagata.

Q2: With promos with Cody Rhodes and a Christopher Daniels video interview did 945,000 viewers and 373,000 in 18-49.

Q3: Young Bucks vs. Daniels & Frankie Kazarian for the tag team titles did 972,000viewers and 394,000 in 18-49. This did the peak numbers in 18-34.

Q4: With a Christian Cage and Matt Sydal interview and the beginning of Pac vs. Orange Cassidy did 925,000 viewers and 382,000 in 18-49.

Q5: The second part of Cassidy vs. Pac, the Kenny Omega & Don Callis promo the Young Bucks, Doc Gallows & Karl Anderson promo from their dressing room and the Adam Page & Dark Order promo did 928,000 viewers and 398,000 in 18-49.

Q6: The Pinnacle/Inner Circle promo and angle did 956,000 viewers and 446,000 in 18-49.

Q7: A Britt Baker interview, Thunder Rosa vs. Jazmin Allure and a Darby Allin video did 857,000 viewers and 389,000 in 18-49.

Q8: Allin vs. Miro for the TNT title did 969,000 viewers and 448,000 in 18-49. It topped the show in 18-49 and 35-49.

Darby once again proving to be a draw. I'm happy that Miro won the title, but I'm wondering if they should have kept this Darby run going a bit longer. Also, that Cody promo didn't turn away viewers despite how shite it was, it added more, haha.

[Spiteface]

I watched Dynamite this morning.

I do wonder what the plan is for Darby after this. Numbers indicate he's a draw, so is he going to be chasing Miro for a while (that should be a fun feud a la Jeff Hardy vs Umaga), or are they maybe going to set him up to eventually challenge Kenny Omega for the world title? I feel like it should be a "Homegrown" talent that beats him, and Darby could fit that bill.

Mox vs Nagata was great, but should have been a bit longer. I was slightly worried they might use that match as a backdrop for the angle with The Elite, but thankfully they didn't do that.

[BeardFaceMan]

He's popular and over, still too early to call Darby a draw though. Numbers on a free tv show that people are watching anyway don't really matter (and as has been discussed, it's not as simple as saying 'oh he had the highest rated segment by a few thousand, that means he's a draw', that's ignoring a lot of extra information), those are the wrong numbers to look at. He's not one of the top merch sellers and he isn't headlining and selling PPVs, so as popular and over as he is I'd say he's still an unproven draw. Kenny Omega went to do that Impact PPV and they did 9 times their normal buyrate, now that is someone who is a draw. When fans are putting their hands in their pockets, that's when you're a draw, not because you do well on something people get for free.

[Gurke and Hare]

He isn't headlining PPVs - by definition, the number of people who can do that is small - but he's absolutely a fixture in them. It's a long time since an AEW PPV hasn't had him on, and it's hard to imagine a PPV card now  without him on it.

[BeardFaceMan]

He isn't headlining PPVs - by definition, the number of people who can do that is small - but he's absolutely a fixture in them.

Like i said, hes popular and over, i like him. Hes an unproven draw though, that's something different, that's next level stuff, he's not at the level of people like Omega yet.

It's a long time since an AEW PPV hasn't had him on, and it's hard to imagine a PPV card now  without him on it.

Which you can also say about a dozen other guys on the roster. Again, not trying to put him down, he just hasn't been proven to draw money yet, not in merch sales or PPV sales. The only other real way to tell is live shows but he's not packing them into the venues because of the pandemic restrictions so it's too early to say he can draw money.

[amateur]

Just watching Dynamite on ITV4.

One thing I wasn't expecting was an absolute nostalgia rush for watching WWF in the late nineties, brought on by the huge gaps in commentary where they're plugging other shit on TNT or whatever else wouldn't apply to a UK audience like ticket sales in Hicksville, Tennessee.

Took me right back to a Big Bossman match while eating my cereal.

[madhair60]

New Jack is dead.

[BeardFaceMan]

Now that was unexpected. Or maybe not, considering how much partying he did. A strange one, he's a bit of a guilty pleasure for me, he's pretty indefensible as a person but by christ he was funny and charasmatic as fuck, couldn't not watch him when he was on the screen. And when he was in ECW and Natural Born Killaz kept playing during his whole match, whoever thought of that gimmick was a genius, it worked so well.

[petril]

Just watching Dynamite on ITV4.

One thing I wasn't expecting was an absolute nostalgia rush for watching WWF in the late nineties, brought on by the huge gaps in commentary where they're plugging other shit on TNT or whatever else wouldn't apply to a UK audience like ticket sales in Hicksville, Tennessee.

Took me right back to a Big Bossman match while eating my cereal.

the bit of Smackdown where they'd dub in Michael Cole excitedly talking about GLASSCO

that and when they'd cover for the different ad breaks by having a segment with Michael Hayes surrounded by t-shirts

[BeardFaceMan]

the bit of Smackdown where they'd dub in Michael Cole excitedly talking about GLASSCO

that and when they'd cover for the different ad breaks by having a segment with Michael Hayes Handsome Doc Hendrix surrounded by t-shirts

[Custard]

Amazing that New Jack was just two years off 60. But yeah, it's not very surprising, unfortunately. He appeared to be into everything, drink drugs forking fat boys

He seemed to be a horrible man, but he was certainly a character and had oodles of charisma. A true ECW original, as they'd say

RIP, and don't be stabbing people up there sweet angle

[Gurke and Hare]

Just watching Dynamite on ITV4.

One thing I wasn't expecting was an absolute nostalgia rush for watching WWF in the late nineties, brought on by the huge gaps in commentary where they're plugging other shit on TNT or whatever else wouldn't apply to a UK audience like ticket sales in Hicksville, Tennessee.

Took me right back to a Big Bossman match while eating my cereal.

There was an episode a few weeks ago with a great final match and probably some good shenanigans afterwards, that ended with Tony excitedly shouting "Next on TNT - THE ACCOUNTANT!" which made me laugh,

[Ja'moke]

He's popular and over, still too early to call Darby a draw though. Numbers on a free tv show that people are watching anyway don't really matter (and as has been discussed, it's not as simple as saying 'oh he had the highest rated segment by a few thousand, that means he's a draw', that's ignoring a lot of extra information), those are the wrong numbers to look at. He's not one of the top merch sellers and he isn't headlining and selling PPVs, so as popular and over as he is I'd say he's still an unproven draw. Kenny Omega went to do that Impact PPV and they did 9 times their normal buyrate, now that is someone who is a draw. When fans are putting their hands in their pockets, that's when you're a draw, not because you do well on something people get for free.

When I say draw, I mean ratings draw. He consistently does good numbers for TNT, and in this day and age, TV is where all the big money is coming from for wrestling.

[BeardFaceMan]

When I say draw, I mean ratings draw. He consistently does good numbers for TNT, and in this day and age, TV is where all the big money is coming from for wrestling.

He consistently does good numbers on a show that was/is already consistently doing good numbers that people get for free.

[Ja'moke]

He consistently does good numbers on a show that was/is already consistently doing good numbers that people get for free.

Yep. Therefore keeping TNT happy, appeasing advertisers, and putting AEW in a position to negotiate a bigger contract next time around.

[BeardFaceMan]

Yep. Therefore keeping TNT happy, appeasing advertisers, and putting AEW in a position to negotiate a bigger contract next time around.

Which he isn't doing on his own.

[Ja'moke]

Which he isn't doing on his own.

Never said he was. Just that he's consistently one of their highest ratings draws, therefore a reliable and valuable talent.

[BeardFaceMan]

Never said he was. Just that he's consistently one of their highest ratings draws, therefore a reliable and valuable talent.

Which you could probably say about a dozen other guys on the roster so I'm not sure why you're singling him out. And when he is in the highest rating quarter segment, it isn't by a lot, it's not like people turn on in their droves when he's on tv and switch off again when his segment is done. And that's still ignoring things like who he is wrestling against, other things happening on the show, events on other tv shows etc.  It's the show that's drawing, not Darby.

[Ja'moke]

Which you could probably say about a dozen other guys on the roster so I'm not sure why you're singling him out. And when he is in the highest rating quarter segment, it isn't by a lot, it's not like people turn on in their droves when he's on tv and switch off again when his segment is done. And that's still ignoring things like who he is wrestling against, other things happening on the show, events on other tv shows etc.  It's the show that's drawing, not Darby.

It's significant because Darby is a "homegrown" talent and his segments/matches have consistently rated as high or in many cases higher than what you would consider the established/top draws: Jericho, Mox, Cody, Omega, The Bucks. Darby is someone that 90% of the audience had never heard of before AEW started and he has gotten over and become a legit ratings draw... and it's not just me saying this, firstly, the numbers have backed it up for months and months now (regardless of who he is in the ring with), and Tony Khan, Jim Ross, and Chris Jericho have said the same thing about Darby. No other homegrown talent has had that consistency.

Yes, AEW itself is a draw, but you can't completely ignore people's individual contributions. Because if people were solely tuning in just because it's AEW then the numbers would be more consistent across the board, you wouldn't have certain segments losing a couple of hundred thousand viewers. Those viewers tune back in when Darby wrestles.

I dunno, I just think it's cool that there is a non-ex-WWE / non-The Elite wrestler that is now established enough that he can comfortably main event Dynamite consistently and bump the ratings up.

[BeardFaceMan]

Loving the new season of Dark Side Of The ring, that Nick Gage episode was a tough watch though.

[up_the_hampipe]

Loving the new season of Dark Side Of The ring, that Nick Gage episode was a tough watch though.

That guy is a fucking idiot and deathmatches are truly the dregs of wrestling. Still, great episode.

[BeardFaceMan]

That guy is a fucking idiot and deathmatches are truly the dregs of wrestling. Still, great episode.

Yeah I watched a bit of that stuff in my twenties but grew tired of it pretty quickly, I can't stomach it any more. The more sanitized deathmatches AEW have been doing are enjoyable, but that's as gruesome and frequent as I want to get. Those CZW deathmatches are just torture porn. There's just something so insecure about those guys, constantly having to prove to people how tough they are when it's themselves they're trying to prove it too. And when you hear guys like Mox talking about how he doesn't do this for money or fame, he does it for the feeling he gets when someone is cutting his mouth open with a pizza slicer, that's fucking scary, he'd be doing that deathmatch shit every week if AEW let him. There is no life after wrestling for these guys so they're happy to give up their health and/or life for it, it's all a bit sad, really.

[up_the_hampipe]

Seems like an outlet for damaged people or psychopaths, for the enjoyment of the same. I don't mean to sound callous, but I cannot fathom anyone watching it purely as entertainment. Out of perverse curiosity I've seen clips, but going to the shows or watching them with frequency seems concerning.

There could be some working in the retelling of these stories, similar to the late New Jack. But if this guy is legitimately hurting people in a way they haven't approved beforehand, then he's just a shithead.

[BeardFaceMan]

Seems like an outlet for damaged people or psychopaths, for the enjoyment of the same. I don't mean to sound callous, but I cannot fathom anyone watching it purely as entertainment. Out of perverse curiosity I've seen clips, but going to the shows or watching them with frequency seems concerning.

There could be some working in the retelling of these stories, similar to the late New Jack. But if this guy is legitimately hurting people in a way they haven't approved beforehand, then he's just a shithead.

That's the bit that really pisses me off, they think purposely hurting someone who hasn't agreed to it and is trusting you with their body makes them tough. It's the opposite, it's cowardly as fuck.

Although David Arquette laughing during his intro, "I'm David Arquette, former WCW champion. you can't take that away from me, I'm sorry" might have been the best bit of the episode.

[Deanjam]

If you're not watching Backlash, and why would you, the lumberjacks in the Miz/Priest match are zombies. Actual zombies.

[Deanjam]

The zombies have murdered Miz. RIP Mike.



An all time worst wrestlecrap moment.