When did the quality of WWE programming go down for you?

[riseofsetian1981]

I wouldn't even say the match quality has improved. Sure, the wrestlers are more athletic and agile, but as far as match quality? There's still little to no selling, no storytelling, the same matches every week, and the overly scripted nature has dampened the organic feel that wrestling used to have at point with its promos and matches. For me as I said in a previous post the quality went down when Guerrero and Benoit passed away, along with Edge and HBK retiring, as well as Punk leaving.

With the tragedies of Benoit and Guerrero it left a huge void as far as characters were concerned. Now there are no interesting looking wrestlers anymore. They all look and act the same. There's no cool costumes that establish a clear dichotomy of allegiances and the attitudes are too realistic. I miss when wrestlers acted like wrestlers and the only ones who are their characters essentially are Enzo, Ambrose, and that's about it really.

[Hit Girl]

2001 onwards.

[Deleted]

Roman Reigns. Reign of Terror, Super Cena, 3 hour Raw and Guest Host era don't have shit on the Make Roman Look Strong Era.

[the2ndevil]

I’ll let you know when it happens.

There’s the odd storyline here and there that doesn’t exactly thrill me and the like, but on the whole everything I’ve ever liked about WWE is still there.

[Deleted]

I was bored with the product starting around 2007, but then the era of CM Punk and Daniel Bryan from around 2012-2013 got me excited again. I thought Wrestlemania 30 was one of the best wrestling shows ever, and then suddenly everything went down the toilet pretty quick.

So yeah, I've pretty much hated WWE (at least Raw and Smackdown) for about 4 years or so. I'm an NJPW/ROH guy now.

[Germansuplex]

Smackdown was awesome in 2016/2017, so I'm still in a good place even if the product bores me right now.

[CMPunkyBrewster]

I stopped watching when Benoit happened.

I watched the PPV the night before, and the Benoit tribute Raw, and I never watched an entire episode of Raw or Smackdown again.

I was watching out of habit by then anyway, but it had gotten so depressing between all the deaths and the shows themselves just treading water at that point. Benoit just pushed me over the edge.

I would still watch PPVs up until a few months ago, but the product is so bad now that I refuse to give them my money or attention. I cancelled my Network subscription in October, signed up for Highspots Network, and haven't regretted it for a moment.

[Kevin Dunn]

23 January 1984

[Vince's Torn Quads]

I’d say I stopped enjoying it after Punk was red hot and they did the whole Nash/HHH thing. Pretty much lost faith in WWE and Vince as a creative force after that.

Things have never really seemed right since Cole replaced JR on RAW as well. Seemed to be the start of the formulaic approach to every show, the buzzword nonsense (Universe, each and every one if you etc).

Edited for my potty mouth

[mizerable]

Honest to God, when Bischoff was removed as a onscreen character.

By definition, I felt Eric was the perfect on screen authority character. Yeah, he was slimy and a lot of times he favored heels, but I thought every person they put in the role afterwards was either a weak imitation or someone who just wasn't worthy of being there.

This was also during the middle of the big Cena push. We also lost Christian and Jericho as ring performers and Eddie died. The entire focus of the product seemed to become about how to get Cena more attention. Smackdown suffered because it truly felt like an afterthought, what helped propel the show I felt was the WWE title. Batista did okay at first, but he faced a lot of stale acts. That's essentially what Smackdown became, the place to build up stale acts or to build the very beginning of fresh acts that eventually went to Raw. Essentially an onscreen farm league.

WWE was no longer "must watch" because it became clear what the intention was. They genuinely stopped listening to fans during this period and pushed onward regardless of how bland it became.

So really, the product was already beginning to suffer, but it became even more evident without a central authority who was good in the role.



Suffice to say, I stuck around hoping it would reverse course, but the fallout of SummerSlam 2013 made me give up entirely on the product. Haven't watched since.

[benstudd]

I'm shocked by the responses, I thought I was the only one that hated the product since the early 00s and I only tolerated stuff ever since.

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

it had dips and valleys, but Vince's stubborn refusal to push people the crowd is actually behind in favor of his pet projects and guys who should be retired may have finally broke me.

[horseface]

Invasion 2001. Its never truly recovered from that period and industry shakeup and whatever else happened behind the scenes.