When WWE makes very bad mistakes, does Vince know?

[RIHT]

I'm talking about things like rushing the CM Punk storyline where he won at MITB, booking 4 horrible PPVs in a row after an amazing Summerslam, not letting Ryback win the title and ruining his main event career, etc. I feel like he knew he screwed up with the Montreal Screwjob, getting Stone Cold to walk out, losing Brock Lesnar, etc., but it seems like these days, WWE never learns anymore.

In 2011, a new star won the title and was about to have a summer of awesome storylines with build that would slowly develop over time. WWE rushed CM Punk's return. In 2013, same thing happened. WWE rushed Bryan to win the title back, then did screwy finishes for 3 months, ending with BIG SHOW getting a title shot.

Meanwhile, WWE's was very careful with their talent since Montreal and they stayed faithful, avoiding any troubles with WCW, and in the end, helping them win the Monday Night War. Now a days, WWE treats veteran talent very well to avoid them leaving like Lesnar and Austin did before.

WWE's ratings are going down. PPVs are going down. Yeah, there's the mentality that "if you don't like it, don't watch it" and all that, but I was just wondering: does Vince know these errors? Does he just try to forget them? Or does he just try to overcompensate for them with merchandise money and cheap promotions? What do you guys think? Go for it in the comments.

[Baldobomb-22-OH-MAN!!!]

only when they aren't his. which they usually are.

[RIHT]

Dec 22, 2013 23:48:29 GMT -5 Baldobomb-22-OH-MAN!!! said:

only when they aren't his. which they usually are.

So no, right?

[Dat Dude]

Vince only cares about the amount of confidence his shareholders has in his company. And considering they only care about profit and not necessary how it's achieved, these creative/booking errors are of little consequence to Vince.

[rnrk supports BLM]

Look at the Survivor Series buyrate, then look at how much Big Show has been involved in the Authority angle since then.

[Sparkybob]

I think Vince knows when something isn't going to be popular with the crowd/internet. I do believe though that he still has the mindset that whatever he wants can get over with the crowd so we still see angles/wrestlers who aren't over, still get plenty of screen time.

[Lancers]

I genuinely believe that Vince doesn't have any regrets over any of what's occurred.

Booking wise, the common belief is that hindsight is 20/20. It's easy to say a particular idea would have worked if they had done X instead of Y, but there's no proof that it's true. It's guesswork. We can't take a time machine and re-do it all.

Armchair booking can be fun and frustrating at the same time. Everybody's got great ideas. The problem is most ideas have to go through several filters in the WWE. And Vince is the last filter and probably the toughest filter for ideas to pass through.

His victory over WCW likely cemented his belief in his methods. Obviously, looking back in the mid to late 90s, he did shift gears and put more faith in guys like Russo to redirect the content more to an older demographic. But it seems that now without a threat of any competition, he's gone back to his old ways of trusting his (and likely his inner circle's) intuition over who to push, storyline advancement, etc.

It's why I've always wanted TNA to succeed to keep Vince on his toes. The fact that they are a very profitable business is all the reason Vince needs to rationalize his choices. And, to be frank, I don't fault him at all for thinking that way.

[Deleted]

Vince seems like the spontaneous no regret live in the moment risk taker type.


I bet he wouldn't change a thing

[molson5]

Just to be clear, it's considered an objectively bad thing that Ryback didn't dethrone Punk (and I guess either lose the title right back to Punk on TV, or face the Rock himself at the Royal Rumble). More Ryback PPV main events is something we missed out on? I mean, the rest of these being "mistakes" is just opinion also, but that one kind of stood out.

[BigBadZ]

Dec 22, 2013 23:59:05 GMT -5 Lancers said:

I genuinely believe that Vince doesn't have any regrets over any of what's occurred.

Booking wise, the common belief is that hindsight is 20/20. It's easy to say a particular idea would have worked if they had done X instead of Y, but there's no proof that it's true. It's guesswork. We can't take a time machine and re-do it all.

Armchair booking can be fun and frustrating at the same time. Everybody's got great ideas. The problem is most ideas have to go through several filters in the WWE. And Vince is the last filter and probably the toughest filter for ideas to pass through.

While I agree with this about the main story lines, I can't see Vince giving much thought to the under card. In CM Punk's dvd, he said he wrote weeks of story for the straight edge thing and Vince let them do it and didn't care as long as it's good. Now I know it wasn't as easy as Punk throwing down a stack of papers and Vince signing off, but I just don't see him taking a whole lot of time figuring out what to do with the Brodus Clay heel turn or Fandango these days. For all I know, Vince never had much to do with the mid to lower card, but things like Miz and Kofi feud make me wonder who has the influence in that. The biggest reason I cannot justify an odd ppv here and there is the fact I cannot pay that much money to see 1-2 matches but with a stronger card, I might buy the occasional TLC or Hell in a Cell.

His victory over WCW likely cemented his belief in his methods. Obviously, looking back in the mid to late 90s, he did shift gears and put more faith in guys like Russo to redirect the content more to an older demographic. But it seems that now without a threat of any competition, he's gone back to his old ways of trusting his (and likely his inner circle's) intuition over who to push, storyline advancement, etc.

It's why I've always wanted TNA to succeed to keep Vince on his toes. The fact that they are a very profitable business is all the reason Vince needs to rationalize his choices. And, to be frank, I don't fault him at all for thinking that way.

I have nothing to add, I just wanted this left in because it's 100% true.

[Deleted]

Vince will defend the XFL right now if you asked him.

[Cranjis McBasketball]

If he knows, he doesn't care. There's no real threat to his dominance. So, you get what he damn well likes. Which is why I tune in rarely, usually to Mania because, no matter how shitty, you get at least two guys determined to steal the show and get a decent match.

[CATCH_US IS the Conversation]

Dec 23, 2013 4:07:15 GMT -5 @bootytime said:

Vince will defend the XFL right now if you asked him.

The XFL really wasn't a bad idea. It was never going to be as big as the NFL but it would've made a nice niche product. Really the XFL was like the "Indy wrestling promotion" of pro football.

[Abdullah]

Dec 23, 2013 4:11:00 GMT -5 Cranjis McBasketball said:

If he knows, he doesn't care. There's no real threat to his dominance. So, you get what he damn well likes. Which is why I tune in rarely, usually to Mania because, no matter how shitty, you get at least two guys determined to steal the show and get a decent match.

Not to sound like a dick but the matches WWE have had in the last six months alone beats anything that happened at 'Mania. If match-quality is what you want, there's not a shortage of that throughout the year.

[Reflecto]

I think it's not so much that Vince doesn't know- or even that he knows, but he doesn't care- but in many cases, that Vince actively WANTS to make these mistakes just to screw with the fanbase. Everything we know about Vince is that the guy wants to be mainstream, truly popular- and that Vince is a textbook alpha male. (Witness the aftermath of Cena/Eve/Ryder, where the story went that Vince truly believed the fans would cheer Cena for being cool enough to get Eve and never once thought for a second they'd hate Eve/Cena for it.)

The problem, however, is that WWE has become relatively mainstream. You can no longer say pro wrestling is "white trash entertainment" anymore, which is its blessing- but its curse is that the best way to consider pro wrestling now is "sports for nerds." It makes the most sense for how wrestling's evolved since the Internet came into play- and now, pro wrestling is part of the geek culture. And with how Vince McMahon himself is, we should know by now that even though he's changed wrestling's image to the world, the fact that NERDS like his show and not generic bros MAKES VINCE MCMAHON SICK. So now, he's trying to change the image and clear us out.

[N E O G E O B O Y S]

Honestly, I think that vince doesn't care since the company is still very profitable, and like lancers says, armchair booking is fun and all that but you can't never determine if doing that would had make them more money. At least I think that the WWE has sacrificed some things like PPV in order to get an income from other sources (like the future network or the rumored new lucrative deal that they are negotating with usa)

After all, the wwe is a company who wants to make money, if they think that they could do more money with their way of doing things, well, kudos for then, fans should stop caring about buyrates and things like that, and just enjoy the show. If you don't like it, don't watch, maybe more people will not watch either and the WWE will enter and panic mode and shake things up. But if people doesn't leave or the WWE is still making shitloads of money without catering an specific target, well, maybe the product is just not aimed at you and one should move on instead of getting angry and sad for what in the end of the day is just another form of entertainment

[Sephiroth]

I'm inclined to refer to, of all people, Paul Heyman. There is a story about when ECW did its infamously bad PPV that Heyman proposed a different outcome for the main event, an elimination chamber match; Vince wanted it to come down to Lashley and Big Show, with Lashley winning the title. Heyman argued against that, feeling certain that fans of the original ECW would hate it, and he also said it made no sense for the newly debuted CM Punk, who WWE were trying to groom to move up the ranks fast, should be the first one to be eliminated. Heyman proposed a different outcome in which Big Show would be eliminated first by getting choked out by Punk, and Big Show himself actually thought it was a great idea and was perfectly willing to go along with it. Vince refused, insisting that the ending be Big Show vs Lashley and that the audience would walk away happy with a new hero. Heyman tried to remind Vince of all the fans of the original ECW who had turned out for the previous reunion PPV the previous year, and Vince scoffed that "For all I know those were the LAST ECW fans." The key thing is that Heyman declared that none of this was BS to Vince McMahon-it was all 100% true in his mind; the audience would love Lashley as ECW champion even though he had only debuted several months earlier, and they would love the outcome of the PPV because they were really WWE fans and not ECW fans. So with that story as an example, I think its safe to say that to Vince McMahon there are no mistakes made by WWE-its simply that the fans don't grasp what he was trying to do when things don't turn out as he had expected them do. He's probably a lot like Hogan and Bischoff that way.