Ozman
Unicron
Chi-Town!!!
Posts: 2,645
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Post by Ozman on Aug 6, 2022 8:58:23 GMT -5
A perfect example of a guy Vince liked disappearing is Omos, who hasn’t been seen or heard from since HHH took over.
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Post by Feargus McReddit on Aug 6, 2022 9:00:30 GMT -5
A perfect example of a guy Vince liked disappearing is Omos, who hasn’t been seen or heard from since HHH took over. Funnily enough, he and Ezekiel just had a match on WWE Main Event. Which is the WWE way of saying "You're correct in your assumption".
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Post by Final Countdown Jones on Aug 6, 2022 9:11:02 GMT -5
I think Vince played more of a part of super indy NXT than people may think. Beyond just him being the boss and the buck stops with him. He wanted to cut AEW off at the knees. He hired a massive amount of talent that would be AEWs cup of tea. He got USA to give him a timeslot against AEW. Is it so out there to think that he told H to do a super indy style show but in the WWE way to show the fans that they can do anything better. Only when it faile to hurt AEW he finally listened to his money men and fired excess talent, moved the show, and turned it into his type of show. Like you say H had plenty of character, wackiness, and fun in NXT. It didnt become the super indy until AEW was on the horizon. I'd argue it was a bit earlier than that. With how the timeframe was, it was much more when European wrestling was becoming a place to go with PROGRESS, ICW, OTT and WXW growing along with GCW becoming more of a thing in America. It was how we got WWE acquiring EVOLVE and forming partnerships with promotions and eventually hoovering them up for NXT UK. And even NXT UK was ramped up the moment ITV announced World of Sport was coming back so there were a lot of factors that basically had WWE go in recruitment overdrive. Also worth keeping in mind that NXT went the way it did to appeal to the people who were actually watching it. A lot of people are just never going to watch NXT no matter what; it doesn't look as good as the main shows do, it lacks their favorite stars, you can't really sell it without conceding it's their developmental show and a lot of people won't want to watch it no matter what. The person who watches the main shows, flirts with watching PPVs live maybe when it's convenient, and believes anything outside of WWE isn't worth bothering with because it's the 'small time' isn't going to be enticed by indieriffic NXT, no. But they also haven't given a shit about NXT 2.0. The indie fans ducked out and stopped giving a shit, but the casual Raw viewer doesn't give a shit about it either. It has its fans still, but it's a way more niche product than what people have been yelling for five years is too niche to be viable. There's a reasonable theory in the idea that not only was WWE in recruitment overdrive, but NXT was a show being oriented toward the people actually tuning in to it and building up a stronger audience and following off of the hype of it being a show people would actually want to watch. And it worked. That's not something I think needs to be bogged down and litigated on the idea that it was a bad approach, but lauded for successfully growing an audience in a time when WWE's overall viewership was in decline, and even for, by a lot of accounts, giving otherwise-lapsed WWE fans something to hold onto while they tuned out of the main shows. It's always felt like a narrow-minded approach to write off NXT in absolute comparison to Raw and Smackdown and be like "This is proof of even broader, bigger things because I disagree with it".
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Post by Feargus McReddit on Aug 6, 2022 10:05:19 GMT -5
There's a reasonable theory in the idea that not only was WWE in recruitment overdrive, but NXT was a show being oriented toward the people actually tuning in to it and building up a stronger audience and following off of the hype of it being a show people would actually want to watch. And it worked. That's not something I think needs to be bogged down and litigated on the idea that it was a bad approach, but lauded for successfully growing an audience in a time when WWE's overall viewership was in decline, and even for, by a lot of accounts, giving otherwise-lapsed WWE fans something to hold onto while they tuned out of the main shows. It's always felt like a narrow-minded approach to write off NXT in absolute comparison to Raw and Smackdown and be like "This is proof of even broader, bigger things because I disagree with it". It was definitely going into the idea that people who weren't usually WWE guys were getting their flowers in the company and giving us big matches that were easier to access then having to subscribe to other services or seeing them in person. Like, you didn't need to live in Raceda, California and be lucky to get PWG tickets that day to see Dominik Dijakovic vs. Keith Lee, you could watch NXT Takeover: Portland from 2020 and watch their North American title match. Same with dozens and dozens of matches of that same variety and with how independent wrestling was, that had a real appeal to it. It never felt too capitalized outside of NXT, the main roster never tried to big it up and to this day, there was no good reason for it but that was the format it kept. The issue, long term, was that it didn't allow many homegrown talent to pop up which counter-acted with what the developmental brand was supposed to be. When WWE signed Kevin Steen, they immediantly had him squash Bull "We have a Kevin Steen at home" Dempsey because, hey, we have Steen now, we've renamed him Kevin Owens, why would we need him anymore? Braun Strowman, Omos and Babatunde were staples of the Florida shift and were called up with zero TV experience, same with people like Dio Madden and Tay Conti and yeah, homegrown people got on the show, especially in the women's division but for every Rhea Ripley and Bianca BeLair, there's dozens of Vanessa Bornes and Kavita Devis who either spent their time jobbing or were never seen again after Mae Young Classics. Because why would you when you've signed Io Sharai, KAIRI and Toni Storm?
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fw91
Patti Mayonnaise
FAN Idol All-Star: FAN Idol Season X and *Gavel* 2x Judges' Throwdown winner
Tribe has spoken for 2024 Mets
Posts: 39,792
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Post by fw91 on Aug 6, 2022 11:03:48 GMT -5
Just like presenting an alternative side of things, as I don't think things are cut and dry as we like to make them out to be. But hey can't make friends with everyone. My point never was Vince is blameless. My point is that I think his choice of players weren't as off base as we'd like to think. HHH is a better creative mind, but, my judgement comes from the audience reception. But...the....audience reception..............y'know what, never mind. no, make your point. I don't play the "concern troll" game. As long as your respectful, I welcome any response.
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