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Post by "Evil Brood" Jackson Vanik on Dec 30, 2019 21:18:36 GMT -5
I was looking up WCW PPV buyrates and saw this and it really shows just how quickly things shifted in a year's time (far more than the ratings would suggest):
- Superbrawl 1999: 485,000 (which did more than St. Valentine Day's Massacre that same month) - Superbrawl 2000: 70,000
There was also only one more PPV in their history after that Superbrawl that drew over 300,000 (Uncensored the next month). That's insane.
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Jake, The Jake, Jake
Dennis Stamp
Will never EVER get a personal title. Ever. Nope. Never. Not a chance. No way, no how.
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Post by Jake, The Jake, Jake on Dec 30, 2019 22:28:34 GMT -5
I’m very surprised that Superbrawl 99 drew more buys than Austin/McMahon in a cage.
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chazraps
Wade Wilson
Better have my money when I come-a collect!
Posts: 27,959
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Post by chazraps on Dec 30, 2019 22:39:09 GMT -5
I was looking up WCW PPV buyrates and saw this and it really shows just how quickly things shifted in a year's time (far more than the ratings would suggest): - Superbrawl 1999: 485,000 (which did more than St. Valentine Day's Massacre that same month) - Superbrawl 2000: 70,000 There was also only one more PPV in their history after that Superbrawl that drew over 300,000 (Uncensored the next month). That's insane. For clarity, was that Uncensored 99 or 2000?
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Post by "Evil Brood" Jackson Vanik on Dec 30, 2019 23:18:53 GMT -5
I was looking up WCW PPV buyrates and saw this and it really shows just how quickly things shifted in a year's time (far more than the ratings would suggest): - Superbrawl 1999: 485,000 (which did more than St. Valentine Day's Massacre that same month) - Superbrawl 2000: 70,000 There was also only one more PPV in their history after that Superbrawl that drew over 300,000 (Uncensored the next month). That's insane. For clarity, was that Uncensored 99 or 2000? Uncensored 99 drew 325,000. Uncensored 2000 drew 60,000.
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Post by Oh Cry Me a Screwball on Dec 30, 2019 23:20:38 GMT -5
I’m very surprised that Superbrawl 99 drew more buys than Austin/McMahon in a cage. Hogan vs. Flair was still a really big money match at that point. The downturn of WCW doesn't really correlate to the Fingerpoke, but it does to when the the story kind of vanishes, and it starts with the double turn the next month at Uncensored, and all the top guys turning heel in the next month.
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Post by cabbageboy on Dec 30, 2019 23:47:47 GMT -5
Where are you getting these numbers? I'd like to check that out. I saw St. Valentine's did a 1.21 buyrate which I think translates to roughly that same 485,000 or so buys. But really if you think about it why would Austin vs. Vince do a better buyrate than Hogan vs. Flair? It really shouldn't be a competitive match. I think that's why WM 19 didn't do that well. Are we really supposed to think Hogan couldn't just stomp Vince with relative ease?
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Post by "Evil Brood" Jackson Vanik on Dec 31, 2019 2:07:03 GMT -5
Where are you getting these numbers? I'd like to check that out. I saw St. Valentine's did a 1.21 buyrate which I think translates to roughly that same 485,000 or so buys. But really if you think about it why would Austin vs. Vince do a better buyrate than Hogan vs. Flair? It really shouldn't be a competitive match. I think that's why WM 19 didn't do that well. Are we really supposed to think Hogan couldn't just stomp Vince with relative ease? They're numbers I've found from old Observers. The 1.21 translated to about 450,000. In hindsight, you can definitely see why Hogan/Flair outdrew them. It just goes against a lot of narratives people have abou WCW, namely that business cratered right after the Fingerpoke of Doom. It did a few months after, but they still had some momentum coming off of it.
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Mozenrath
FANatic
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Post by Mozenrath on Dec 31, 2019 3:04:10 GMT -5
Doesn't shock me given how f***ing lazy WCW got about promoting PPVs and booking decent stuff for them, TV became the priority.
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Cranjis McBasketball
Crow T. Robot
Knew what the hell that thing was supposed to be
Peace Love and Nothing But
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Post by Cranjis McBasketball on Dec 31, 2019 4:19:39 GMT -5
Would be interesting to see how WWE calculates what it would consider a buyrate now. Since one of the reasons Punk walked was getting "I dunno" when he asked that question, I doubt we ever will, but you'd think WWE has more metric by which to judge how many people are watching.
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Post by Jedi-El of Tomorrow on Dec 31, 2019 7:22:39 GMT -5
I’m very surprised that Superbrawl 99 drew more buys than Austin/McMahon in a cage. Hogan vs. Flair was still a really big money match at that point. The downturn of WCW doesn't really correlate to the Fingerpoke, but it does to when the the story kind of vanishes, and it starts with the double turn the next month at Uncensored, and all the top guys turning heel in the next month. There was also still somewhat of a hope that it was leading to Goldberg just killing everybody in his path to get the title back, and destroying the nWo. Then it became clear that wasn't the plan. The villains were gonna win, again.
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Post by cabbageboy on Dec 31, 2019 9:21:06 GMT -5
It wasn't even that the villains were going to win again, it was that the villain wasn't going to get a comeuppance because he was going to turn face. I think it was Flair's own idea to do that double turn and Bischoff and Nash should have simply rejected it since it didn't fit any current storyline. Hart/Austin was a double turn where seeds were planted for months leading in to WM 13 (Bret's growing frustration with the fans, Austin's rising popularity, Bret's rising paranoia about being screwed). Hogan/Flair had months of Flair being screwed by Bischoff, Flair's own son turning on him at the previous PPV, and Hogan winning the title back on an all time con where Nash laid down for him. Does this seem like a scenario where Hogan would be a good guy in 1 month? Or that Flair would be booed?
I think that's what killed WCW in April or so. Guys were just turning left and right and there was zero logic to any of it. What's weird is Goldberg's booking for the first few months kinda did make sense, but nothing else around him did. He went over Hall to pay him back, then Bigelow at SuperBrawl, then finally Nash in a rematch at Spring Stampede. But then what? There was no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow since Hogan did the double turn with Flair the previous month and then got hurt at Spring Stampede.
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thecrusherwi
El Dandy
the Financially Responsible Man
Brawl For All
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Post by thecrusherwi on Jan 1, 2020 0:40:27 GMT -5
I’m very surprised that Superbrawl 99 drew more buys than Austin/McMahon in a cage. Hogan vs. Flair was still a really big money match at that point. The downturn of WCW doesn't really correlate to the Fingerpoke, but it does to when the the story kind of vanishes, and it starts with the double turn the next month at Uncensored, and all the top guys turning heel in the next month. Yup. WCW TV from the Fingerpoke through SuperBrawl was actually very good. I have always thought that the heels almost winning a clean sweep at SuperBrawl was far more harmful to WCW than the Fingerpoke.
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Post by Oh Cry Me a Screwball on Jan 1, 2020 0:41:52 GMT -5
It wasn't even that the villains were going to win again, it was that the villain wasn't going to get a comeuppance because he was going to turn face. I think it was Flair's own idea to do that double turn and Bischoff and Nash should have simply rejected it since it didn't fit any current storyline. Hart/Austin was a double turn where seeds were planted for months leading in to WM 13 (Bret's growing frustration with the fans, Austin's rising popularity, Bret's rising paranoia about being screwed). Hogan/Flair had months of Flair being screwed by Bischoff, Flair's own son turning on him at the previous PPV, and Hogan winning the title back on an all time con where Nash laid down for him. Does this seem like a scenario where Hogan would be a good guy in 1 month? Or that Flair would be booed? I think that's what killed WCW in April or so. Guys were just turning left and right and there was zero logic to any of it. What's weird is Goldberg's booking for the first few months kinda did make sense, but nothing else around him did. He went over Hall to pay him back, then Bigelow at SuperBrawl, then finally Nash in a rematch at Spring Stampede. But then what? There was no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow since Hogan did the double turn with Flair the previous month and then got hurt at Spring Stampede. Consider that Goldberg vs. Nash got blown off at Spring Stampede while DDP won the world title as a face, and then next month is headlined by DDP as a heel being challenged by Nash as a face. What the hell kind of booking is that?
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Post by The Dark Order Inferno on Jan 1, 2020 7:24:20 GMT -5
Goes to show what happens when you spend years without sending the fans home happy. People jus give up.
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Post by cabbageboy on Jan 1, 2020 10:32:02 GMT -5
I don't think DDP was a face when he won the title. In fact I'm not sure what he was. Kinda veering towards a heel turn I think? I think the problem with DDP as a heel inherently is that as a heel he just lapsed back into his B list white trash persona that was in no way a main event act.
What's hilarious is that they teased Sting/Goldberg as the main for that Slamboree show on the Nitro where Sting beat DDP, but then DDP won the title back at the end of the night. Nash's booking basically was to have others go over him but at the end of the day he won the title, haha.
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Post by Cry Me a Wiggle on Jan 1, 2020 11:24:07 GMT -5
Yeah, the Fingerpoke itself is not what brought WCW down. It was Uncensored on that really invalidated not only the three months before that, but the entirety of the nWo storyline. All of a sudden the nWo just rapidly phased out, with fewer and fewer guys wearing the shirts and associating with one another. Hogan was inexplicably a face and Flair a heel, and then the primary storyline for the rest of the spring and summer was Flair losing his mind and abusing his power, alongside a face Nash feuding with a heel Savage (both had been tweeners/faces in the Wolfpack, then Nash turned heel with the Fingerpoke, then he turned face to battle a heel DDP... who had been one of the biggest faces of the nWo storyline). It felt like nothing mattered anymore. We were just supposed to cheer who the booking told us to cheer, and combined with WCW's new look and sets in April, it just tonally began to feel like a completely different promotion.
There's a reason why I've always referred to that era as The Summer of Suck. With the WWF/WWE, it was a gradual stroll into inanity and nonsensical booking (from roughly August 2000 to the InVasion). With WCW it happened in about a month's time, juxtaposed against a white-hot WWF product.
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Post by Oh Cry Me a Screwball on Jan 1, 2020 14:02:30 GMT -5
I don't think DDP was a face when he won the title. In fact I'm not sure what he was. Kinda veering towards a heel turn I think? I think the problem with DDP as a heel inherently is that as a heel he just lapsed back into his B list white trash persona that was in no way a main event act. What's hilarious is that they teased Sting/Goldberg as the main for that Slamboree show on the Nitro where Sting beat DDP, but then DDP won the title back at the end of the night. Nash's booking basically was to have others go over him but at the end of the day he won the title, haha. Page's victory is definitely treated as a long time coming for Page, and he celebrates like a babyface with the commentators putting him over without a shred of insincerity. Granted, Savage essentially handed him the title by screwing Flair, but you really don't get the impression he's supposed to be a heel until they start showing those cards on Nitro the next night with Piper questioning his manhood on commentary as they blow off Steiner vs. DDP to get rid of that loose end.
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Post by cabbageboy on Jan 1, 2020 14:51:45 GMT -5
I am trying to remember this now. I'm pretty sure DDP came back after Uncensored and was now either heel or veering into a tweener. He definitely was not his previous face persona. Either way that DDP title run was a fiasco for business, as Nitro went from doing a 4.4 to a 3.5 and never recovered or hit a 4 ever again. It didn't help that Nitro was in flux due to the NBA playoffs.
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Post by johnnyk9 on Jan 1, 2020 17:52:41 GMT -5
Can’t wait to hear Eric talk about these on 83 weeks
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cjh
Hank Scorpio
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Post by cjh on Jan 1, 2020 19:35:54 GMT -5
I am trying to remember this now. I'm pretty sure DDP came back after Uncensored and was now either heel or veering into a tweener. He definitely was not his previous face persona. Either way that DDP title run was a fiasco for business, as Nitro went from doing a 4.4 to a 3.5 and never recovered or hit a 4 ever again. It didn't help that Nitro was in flux due to the NBA playoffs.1999 was the year Nitro was least affected by the NBA Playoffs. There was no Nitro on May 10, but other than that, WCW had their regular 3-hour show on TNT Monday nights. In 1996-98 and 2000, Nitro would be shortened and/or moved around the schedule for about 4 weeks, but that wasn't the case in 1999.
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