pegasuswarrior
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Post by pegasuswarrior on Sept 13, 2016 19:13:03 GMT -5
The problem is a perpetual one, one that has been brewing for a while. It's not Reigns' fault. It's not new stars. It's not lack of old stars. It's not Monday Night Football.
Vince is so afraid to let wrestling be wrestling. He has shot himself in the foot. The ratings are fail because there is no reason to care about the product. When you have "promotional" (ha, it's so laughable it's painful to use that adjective) gigs whose whole intent is to snuggle up to the "cool kids" on talk shows and such and explain everything away to make your profession out to be nothing more than a sham, then it doesn't take a brain surgeon for the mobs to treat it like that too.
There is no reason for fans to care because they're too busy trying to be cool and dumping all over their own product and stars. Theyve made themselves the butt of their own jokes.
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Ryushinku
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Post by Ryushinku on Sept 14, 2016 2:47:54 GMT -5
If Reigns was the champ, though, I doubt they'd be quite so much sang-froid about it.
USA won't be happy, but really there's hardly a single show on their network that they're happy about either and won't also need to read the riot act to. WWE is in a very crowded house there.
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wisdomwizard
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Post by wisdomwizard on Sept 14, 2016 4:56:39 GMT -5
Wasn't Mr. Robot a hit for them? They keep playing up its critical accolades if nothing else. I'm not a fan of it, but I don't remember hearing about it bombing in the ratings.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2016 5:09:17 GMT -5
Wasn't Mr. Robot a hit for them? They keep playing up its critical accolades if nothing else. I'm not a fan of it, but I don't remember hearing about it bombing in the ratings. More critically than commercially, and ratings have been way down for season two. About the strongest thing they have besides Raw and SmackDown is Chrisley. Yeah.
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wisdomwizard
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Post by wisdomwizard on Sept 14, 2016 5:22:27 GMT -5
Can't say I'm too surprised, as I've seen some fans of the show not liking whatever's going on in its current season.
I like Queen of the South, but I think USA's big problem is they moved too far away from comedy-dramas and towards straight schlocky dramas. Almost all of them have the same sort of bad cinematography that gives a dull air. Heck, the only one I can think of out of the more current stuff that didn't is Graceland which I liked but I think even that ended up canceled.
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Post by Jedi-El of Tomorrow on Sept 14, 2016 5:32:51 GMT -5
Wasn't Mr. Robot a hit for them? They keep playing up its critical accolades if nothing else. I'm not a fan of it, but I don't remember hearing about it bombing in the ratings. More critically than commercially, and ratings have been way down for season two. About the strongest thing they have besides Raw and SmackDown is Chrisley. Yeah. Suits gets around 1.8 million an episode, but that's down from the 3 to 4 million it would get in the first couple of seasons. A big drop for USA, when at one point Burn Notice at it's worst would get around 3 million viewers. It would generally be from 4 to 6 million viewer average in a season. USA's fallen off, they're also hurt by the amount of money they spent on Modern Family. They spent a lot to get the syndication rights, expecting Big Bang Theory numbers (seriously Big Bang Theory has been a ratings juggernaut for TBS), and it's fallen short.
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Post by Texas Tornado on Sept 14, 2016 5:39:16 GMT -5
It says something about Raw that even with falling ratings they still find a way to have a big drop off from hour one to hour 3. Somewhere along the way people are tuning out because the show can't keep their attention AS THEY'RE WATCHING IT!
Raw shouldn't be 3 hours, but whatever, it is. That means that the people in charge of writing for it need to do a better job and somehow make an entertaining 3 hour wrestling show. I get the feeling that they get so intimidated by the 3 hour number that they write every segment with the full length of the show in mind (and ignore the fact that some segments shouldn't fill 20 minutes). They need to stop doing that. If you look at Raw's list of segments top to bottom you can see that everything is stretched out to fit a 3 hour show. They have twice the roster of Smackdown specifically because of Raw's show length and they don't. use. them.
I used to think that Raw's problem was that it was 3 hours, but no, the problem is that it's a 2 hour show stretched into a 3 hour one. At this point they've used so many of the same people in the same way that I'm too bored to care. Announcing that Roman Reigns was getting yet another main event opportunity this week probably didn't help their ratings. Roman and Seth being in the main event of the show is played out. They need to try new things. There's no guarantee that the ratings will spring back up because of that, but it's damn sure better than running with guys that have been in the same spot for 2 years straight with no real character progression.
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Post by audiencewatching on Sept 14, 2016 6:11:42 GMT -5
Can we kill the third hour yet and get a cohesive 2 hour show like Smackdown please?
If times short then move the cruiserweights to a new show entirely or network only show.
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Post by Confused Mark Wahlberg on Sept 14, 2016 6:31:35 GMT -5
Well, if they get a 1.4, they would technically be breaking a ratings record!
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wisdomwizard
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Post by wisdomwizard on Sept 14, 2016 7:26:10 GMT -5
Can we kill the third hour yet and get a cohesive 2 hour show like Smackdown please? If times short then move the cruiserweights to a new show entirely or network only show. Not happening until USA realizes the extra hour isn't helping anything.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2016 8:00:04 GMT -5
For USA, it also doesn't help that they delayed a show they hyped the hell out in Shooter a few times, which means internal frustration for the network.
Raw's problem is simple; its unwatchable. You can have all the top guys, but if you don't know what you are doing, the end result means nothing. Its not brain surgery.
But when this happens, they will panic & potentially make more mistakes. If Old Day alone was a deterrent, imagine 3 of those on a show.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2016 8:01:46 GMT -5
Can we kill the third hour yet and get a cohesive 2 hour show like Smackdown please? If times short then move the cruiserweights to a new show entirely or network only show. Not happening until USA realizes the extra hour isn't helping anything. It is, though. It still draws better than pretty much any other show on the channel so still technically doing its job, though if it drops too much lower it might not raise the average enough to be worth the lost ad revenue. And honestly I think Raw would still be shit even at two hours, because it'd still be the same people writing it and the crowd's usually checked out at the hour mark for a reason.
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Post by Oh Cry Me a Screwball on Sept 14, 2016 8:26:04 GMT -5
I'll never understand why USA asked for RAW to have a third hour. Even Vince knows 3 hours is too much. He's gone on record as saying his perfect show length would be 90 minutes. 3 hours is just too long for a weekly wrestling show. It's too much. Because RAW brings in more viewers than anything else on USA and that boosts them from, I think the report was, 5 overall to 1 overall. With the failure of everything else USA has tried to launch, WWE's viewership is more important than ever, thus Smackdown on USA now. And WWE doesn't have the pull to say no. USA needs more hours of wrestling to pad their ratings, so they'll enact changes to the show that drastically lower Raw's ratings so that eventually it's not going to result in much effect on those ratings. If Smackdown starts pulling ahead of Raw in the ratings, I fear for the eventual arrival of three-hour Smackdown so we can smack it back to Earth too. Edit: So we are comparing today's Raw ratings to the all time low Raws? Have we already blown past some of the lowest Nitros ever? Hell, there were episodes of Thunder in 2000 that were getting similar ratings.
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Post by cabbageboy on Sept 14, 2016 8:38:48 GMT -5
First off, the show the other night got off to a dubious start when the first 35 minutes was nothing but an extended women's promo with Foley and then that subsequent match. I'm sorry but you put the women out there for the first half hour of Raw and the ratings are going to crater.
Raw's problems are huge right now and I have no idea what they can even do about it. This roster was one that I first guessed the night of the draft. I thought the midcard was decent but the main event scene was truly dreadful (Rollins, Reigns, and who else?). The Balor injury seems to have sapped whatever life was there out of Raw, since it is clear they were going to build around him for a while. Right now Raw is a show that quite literally does not have an over top babyface. I don't think I've EVER seen that in a wrestling company before. Reigns is booed by the crowd and alienating viewers. If Rollins is a face you wouldn't know it from how he's portrayed on TV. Hell, I don't even know how to define the Foley/Steph relationship or who is heel/face there.
It also doesn't help that Raw gives entirely too much promo time to guys that are clearly driving away viewers. The New Day are beyond any level of stale right now and killing the tag division by the week, though I'm not sure The Club are the answer there either. Maybe if they acted like serious wrestlers, but instead of them bringing out a serious side of New Day we're seeing The Club portrayed like a bad vaudeville act.
The framing of the shows at the draft was mind blowing. SD was presented as a fresh alternative where Shane and Bryan would give people a chance and a fair shake. What does that make Raw other than a stale show where guys would get buried or screwed?
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Post by JTG Fan on Sept 14, 2016 8:43:40 GMT -5
Gotta put the strap back on Roman, brother. These indies guys just aren't getting the job done, dude.
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