AEW’S ROAD MAP
AEW returns to pay-per-view this weekend with WrestleDream and over 7,100 tickets have been distributed, per WrestleTix. The show comes after the enormity of the WBD renewal but also three terrible television numbers over the past week with two airing head-to-head with WWE programming. On paper, it’s another great AEW show but the buzz is not at normal levels despite Bryan Danielson’s full-time career at stake and a very credible challenger, Jon Moxley, who you can see winning the title.
The company is in a popularity lull but is insulated with a massive media rights deal that more than offsets the arena attendance drop-off, which has been evident for months and shows no sign of a turnaround based on the figures we have through the end of 2024. The attendance for WrestleDream is positive and just behind the numbers drawn for All Out and Grand Slam over the past month. The pay-per-view does feel rushed as AEW had to peak for multiple shows over the last month between the two-week turnaround for All Out, Grand Slam at Arthur Ashe Stadium, and even the 5th-anniversary show. If there was a casualty among shows it was this past week’s Title Tuesday, which was not given the usual emphasis for a head-to-head battle and the audience reflected the lack of urgency that the show demonstrated.
We are going to have plenty of “state of AEW” discussions and instead of eliminating the toxic discourse, it will only intensify as the letters AEW bring about the most extreme opinions on either side. The reality is the company has been hurt popularity-wise and that’s not based on one Tuesday night television number but just an addendum to the months-long struggle of selling tickets while also seeing an erosion of its 18-34 audience. To ignore that is naïve but to “doom and gloom” the situation is also an extreme reaction when they are on their most solid footing with WBD for a minimum of three years.
AEW has also sustained talent injuries or provided time off where they are currently operating without the use of Kenny Omega, Adam Cole, MJF, Samoa Joe, Toni Storm, Adam Copeland, Eddie Kingston, Kota Ibushi, Keith Lee, Wardlow, and Powerhouse Hobbs and will be losing Bryan Danielson after this title run. That is a huge loss of talent over any period and yet, the in-ring quality has not suffered. Few, if any companies in history have had the depth of AEW that could sustain such losses and operate at this level. The other side of the coin is having all those bodies back in circulation and creating ample time for all its stars and suddenly, four to five hours of weekly television becomes fleeting when attempting to provide airtime across the board.
A positive for WWE is that whether you buy a ticket for Raw or SmackDown, you are seeing most, if not all the major stars of that brand. AEW is more of a crap shoot given so many stars under one roof and if one were to buy a ticket for next Wednesday’s show there is no guarantee of what you will see given its more of an ensemble cast rather than a clearly defined top 2-3 stars that are must-see for the audience on all shows.
Where AEW does provide guaranteed satisfaction is its pay-per-views. To buy a ticket for a pay-per-view so many months out, I would not need any match announcements in advance to ensure I would receive a quality show. The pay-per-views are nearly foolproof given the matchmaking style of Tony Khan and who he has at his disposal monthly. You may not always be satisfied with a story going into the show, but the product you spend money to watch is about as close to a guarantee as any company’s big shows can provide.
A growing issue I observe is a struggle to define the AEW philosophy, which was easier to do during its infancy. From the outside, it feels like they are attempting to appeal to everyone instead of identifying areas and tropes they don’t want to engage. These are not hard and fast decisions you make, with a WWE product that is connecting with its audience, do you completely run away from that presentation or adopt aspects that are connecting with a large audience but risk the “WWE lite” label? You are never going to have a consensus opinion whether it’s comedic figures like MxM Collection, or even a character like Timeless Toni Storm, which is largely viewed as a tremendous AEW creation, yet a portion of the fanbase doesn’t want that in their pro wrestling and AEW receives the greatest scrutiny. The argument isn’t to avoid going outside the box and risk being a “meat and potatoes” pro wrestling group because you lose the essence of what the industry is.
The unifying objective is talents that get over with its audience and however you achieve that is what “works”. What was successful in 2019 doesn’t ensure approval in 2024 as the audience changes and turns over. A booker must have their finger on that pulse and a keen sense of where the audience is heading, so you can be slightly ahead and ready to deliver the audience’s wants.
In a subjective industry, objectivity is rare and what works for one can turn off another. The data paints a clear picture of where things are, and one can choose to ignore or take steps to remedy it. The positive is that AEW has created enough runway with this latest deal that they are not under the gun to course correct or build to next week’s rating. Rather, they can identify the problems, create a road map to where they want to be and execute without the pressure of a contract year looming.
POST SCHEDULE
Tonight: Rewind-A-SmackDown with John Pollock & Wai Ting (POST Wrestling Café)
Saturday: AEW WrestleDream
Monday: Rewind-A-Raw
Wai Ting & I are live at 10:05 p.m. ET tonight on the POST Wrestling Café after SmackDown with a review of the show. We will also discuss the Tuesday night ratings for AEW & NXT, a final look at the WrestleDream show, and we will take calls.
We are back with another show late Saturday night after WrestleDream for a review of the pay-per-view.
Some highlights that we covered on this month’s two-hour ASK-A-WAI Mailbag Show on the POST Wrestling Café:
– Assessing rating scales for wrestling matches
– Dynamic pricing of tickets
– Cable & Broadcast vs. Streaming data
– ECW airing in Canada
– Vince McMahon’s succession plan before his resignation
– McMahon’s Millions promotion in 2008
– WrestleMania 41 ideas
– Streamyard price increases
– Athletic achievements
WRESTLING NEWS
**WWE is receiving $7,125,250 in public funds from the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority for next year’s two-night SummerSlam. Wrestlenomics notes that it’s the largest subsidy WWE has ever received for a domestic event (only behind the shows in Saudi Arabia) and exceeds the previous U.S. record when they received $5,198,205 in connection with WrestleMania 38 at AT&T Stadium in Texas two years ago. The funds for SummerSlam in East Rutherford, New Jersey, are provided by the Coronavirus State Fiscal Recovery Fund to increase hospitality and tourism in affected areas. Wrestlenomics also obtained records from a WWE-commissioned study by Applied Analysis that believes SummerSlam will provide $80.7 million in economic impact for the area including $32.4 million in salaries and wages. It is not the only TKO-based company deriving revenue from the state as the site notes that UFC obtained a $5 million fee for staging UFC 302 at the Prudential Center in Newark this past June. The UFC announced a live gate figure of $7,225,040 for the June 2 show featuring Islam Makhachev vs. Dustin Poirier for the UFC lightweight title. (Wrestlenomics)
**ABC is picking up six additional Monday Night Football games this season to simulcast with ESPN. This will greatly inflate the audience watching the NFL on Monday nights against WWE Raw for those weeks. Last year, all Monday Night Football games were simulcast on ABC and ESPN. The September 30 simulcast had a combined audience of 20,641,000 viewers between the two networks. This Monday, there will be a simulcast with the Buffalo Bills against the New York Jets airing against a taped edition of Raw. (Deadline)
**The current lineup for WrestleDream features eleven matches with one announced match for the Zero Hour portion and likely will see a few more added to the pre-show.
*AEW World Championship: Bryan Danielson © vs. Jon Moxley
*AEW International Championship: Will Ospreay © vs. Ricochet vs. Konosuke Takeshita
*AEW Tag Team Titles: Young Bucks © vs. Private Party
*AEW Women’s Championship: Mariah May © vs. Willow Nightingale
*TNT Championship: Jack Perry © vs. Katsuyori Shibata
*ROH Championship: Mark Briscoe © vs. Chris Jericho
*Two-of-Three Falls Match: Hologram vs. Beast Mortos
*Hangman Page vs. Jay White
*Darby Allin vs. Brody King
*The Acclaimed vs. MxM Collection
*ROH Television Championship: Atlantis Jr. © vs. Brian Cage (Zero Hour)
**Timeless Toni Storm will miss tonight’s CMLL card at Arena Mexico due to flight delays out of Florida. Storm was set to headline tonight’s show with La Catalina, but CMLL was transparent in conveying that the AEW star would be unable to attend, although stated the match would happen in the future. The following matches are set for tonight’s show at 10:30 p.m. ET on the CMLL YouTube channel for subscribers:
*CMLL Universal De Amazones Semi-Final Cibernetico: Lluvia vs. Valkiria vs. Kira vs. Tessa Blanchard vs. Hera vs. Skadi vs. Sanely vs. Reyna Isis vs, Tabata
*La Catalina & Samantha Black vs. Zeuxis & Dark Silueta
*Volador Jr. vs. Hechicero
*Dark Magic, Espanto Jr. & Raider vs. Barboza, Difunto & Zandokan Jr.
*El Audaz, El Hijo del Pantera & Volcano vs. Crixus, Hijo de Stuka Jr. & Okumura
**Friday Night SmackDown is at the Bon Secours Wellness Center with over 6,500 tickets distributed. The major story being pushed is the angle after Bad Blood where Kevin Owens attacked Cody Rhodes with tonight’s follow-up. The timing comes as Rhodes will be wrestling Gunther on the premium live event, but Rhodes will be continuing this story on SmackDown. Roman Reigns is also set to appear on tonight’s show along with the following matches:
*Women’s Tag Team Titles: Jade Cargill & Bianca Belair © vs. Lash Legend & Jakara Jackson
*United States Championship: LA Knight © vs. Carmelo Hayes
**AEW Rampage airs at 10 p.m. ET on TNT and is the final AEW episode before the pay-per-view with no Collision this week. The following matches were taped in Spokane this week:
*Mike Bennett & Matt Taven vs. Orange Cassidy & Kyle O’Reilly
*Bryan Keith vs. Rocky Romero
*Beast Mortos vs. The Butcher
*Kris Statlander vs. Amira
*Lance Archer vs. Matt Brannigan
**After Rampage, TNT will air the Countdown to WrestleDream special at 11 p.m. ET.
**MLW will return to Atlanta on Saturday, February 8 at Center Stage for its SuperFight event. Tickets will go on sale on October 18 at 10 a.m. ET and the promotion are advertising Matt Riddle, Donovan Dijak, Satoshi Kojima, Mistico, Paul London, Minoru Suzuki, and Tom Lawlor among the talent set to appear.
MMA NEWS
**Dana White came out of his political shell to support Donald Trump after Kamala Harris’ appearance with Stephen Colbert:
I don’t like to post a lot of political content, but this clip should scare EVERYONE. She is the sitting VP and running for President of the United States. She is incapable of putting a sentence together without a teleprompter and even she appears to know she is in way over her head. This election is very important and this along with the many other clips of her attempting to answer questions should SCARE THE SHIT OUT OF YOU!!!
**Three fighters missed weight on Friday for the UFC Fight Night card tomorrow night. Josh Fremd, Dan Argueta, and Jared Gooden all missed the mark and each will be fined a percentage of their purse. The fights will continue to proceed as catchweight bouts with Fremd being fined 30 percent of his purse and the other two being fined 20 percent each.
Here is the lineup for the card:
MAIN CARD (7 p.m. ET on ESPN+)
*Brandon Royal vs. Tatsuro Taira
*Brad Tavares vs. Park Jun-yong
*Jared Gooden vs. Chidi Njokuani
*Grant Dawson vs. Rafa Garcia
*Alex Morono vs. Daniel Rodriguez
*Abdul Razak-Alhassan vs. Josh Fremd
PRELIMINARY CARD (4 p.m. on ESPN+)
*C.J. Vergara vs. Ramazan Temirov
*Jonathan Pearce vs. Pat Sabatini
*Niko Price vs. Themba Gorimbo
*Junior Tafa vs. Sean Sharaf
*Cory McKenna vs. Julia Polastri
*Daniel Argueta vs. Cory Haddon
*Lucas Rocha vs. Clayton Carpenter
***
ASK-A-WAI: Ask Us Anything! (October 2024)
John Pollock and Wai Ting answer their patrons’ questions about anything and everything in the October 2024 edition of Ask-A-Wai.
***
POLLOCK & THURSTON
John Pollock and Brandon Thurston are joined by Kendra Barkoff-Lamy to speak about their request for WWE to release women from NDAs.
***
REWIND-A-DYNAMITE
John Pollock and Wai Ting review AEW Dynamite: Title Tuesday with Bryan Danielson & Wheeler Yuta taking on Claudio Castagnoli & PAC and the final build towards WrestleDream.
***
upNXT
Braden Herrington and Davie Portman review WWE NXT from October 8th, 2024 featuring Randy Orton vs Je’Von Evans.
***
THE QUEEN OF VILLAINS REVIEW
Karen Peterson (POST Puroresu) and JP Houlihan (GRAPPL Spotlight) review Netflix’s The Queen of the Villains, the historical dramatic presentation of the rise of Dump Matsumoto.
***
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