I haven’t finished the Cornett’s pod cast but he is right on about how I felt about the Battle Royale. It was a little silly at times for my personal taste, and given the matches on the main card it really felt like it did not fit in. So if I made the decision to watch the PPV based on the pre-show I might have skipped it.
That said I think when he gets to the main card he is largely very biased against some of the talent, and small minded when it comes down to what acts are good.
Likely anything I had to add to the conversation has been said – but I’d just like to state that DoN was the most fun I’ve had watching a wrestling show in a while, even if the production itself wasn’t without it’s hiccups and I can’t wait to see what else comes from the promotion.
good strong start for them, now they need to start building up on that momemtum and fix some of the mistakes they made during the show to make the next one even better especially as far as presentation is concern.
You want to be a REAL alternative to WWE, stop doing the crappy stuff they are doing. If they are doing a three man booth, you have a 2 man booth. If they are doing backstage stuff, you don’T do that. If they are doing lame comedy, you present a more serious product and the list goes on and on.
The problem with DON was that it was their first show and they are learning on the job how to produce their vision of wrestling. Watching the show today on replay, i saw part of what they talk about but their was still too much comedy and thing that made no sense for me to say that they had a 100% sports oriented presentation like they’ve been hyping for so long.
Was this the best PPV ever produce? Hell no, it didn’t even come close to be on that level. But it was a nice first impression for a product that nobody really knows and let’s hope they can keep the momentum going as we need more competition for the number 2 spot in north america.
They never said it was going to be a 100% sports presentation. People took a few quotes about the idea of wins and losses actually mattering, etc - and decided it was going to be a straight sports show. It was never sold as that.
Can you please clarify all the comedy that apparently bothered you so much? Coming from a guy who week after week talks about how entertaining the Uso / Revival segments are, I really need to hear what you’re talking about specifically.
Also, you keep saying they need to learn and build from this. OBVIOUSLY they will be doing that. Why do you presume they won’t? Again, everything about AEW is based around talents betting on themselves and becoming successes /furthering their careers outside the WWE system. Up and down the card were talents that have spent years working hard to master their craft and characters - and continue to evolve. Just because you’re not familiar with them, doesn’t mean they aren’t obviously working on their careers constantly. Literally nobody is saying that they don’t need to stay focused on bettering themselves - but you feel the need to suggest it in every post about AEW.
The Battle royal as a whole is one example. They build it up as the winner of the battle royal will be one of the 2 man to compete for the vacant AEW title and they did all that meaningless comedy throughout. How can anybody that’s not a hardcore wrestling fans take the winner seriously when you have all the crap happening during the match. Also nothing again the disable guy in that match, but if i was them, i would have found a way to spotlight him instead of putting him in the battle royal itself. He looked like a complete idiot for most of the match because he was just standing there doing nothing and waiting for his spot while everybody else was fighting. I would have like it better if he was part of the second match on the pre show. At less in a single match, he would have gotten the chance of to showcase his ability instead of just look like a complete idiot and making everybody else looking like idiot for not eliminated him earlier.
Second, the opening backstage segment, didn’t need to be there and served no purpose what so ever. I’m hard on WWE when they do stuff like that that make no sense and it doesn’t make any sense for them to do that either.
The best friends vs angelico and jack evans as a whole. Against just dumb indy comedy stuff that even WWE wouldn’t do.
The super smash bros. coming out after the tag match. Not really comedy but i sick and tired of that spot as a whole. That’s such a tired spot in wrestling and really should be retired.
Having a mask color commentator, Loved what he did, hated the gimmick.
If any of these think was done by WWE, they would be crucified by the AEW fans.
As far as me saying they need to learn to build from this: i’m not in no way shape of form saying they wont’t do that. i’m just mentioning this because it’s the truth. If they decide to just continue to grow to please they’re actual fanbase, no matter what they do, they will always remain in the position they are now. You have to realize that AEW is going to be on a major network in October and will need to adapt to that market if they want to grow their audience.
It’s all well and good that they are betting on themselves to advance their career and everything but if nobody outside the current fanbase knows who they are, what good does that do them. You have around 8 millions wrestling fans that have stop watching wrestling since 2001. That a lot of wrestling fans that you have to try and get back and you won’t get them back with workrate alone. You have a ton of great wrestlers on the indy scene right now waiting to get a shot at getting major t.v. exposure.
They want to be a REAL alternative to WWE and be competitive with them, they need to get those fans on board to do so, they need to be 100% different from anything else that’s out there right now because nothing right is grabbing them as far as wrestling is concern. Not ROH, not New Japan, Not ROH or MLW or Even IMPACT, not even WWE and NXT and right now, they are pretty much like every other like that’s not name WWE and that’s not a good sign. They have all the tools in the world to succeed and make this something worth watching for casual and lost wrestling fans and i’m believe that they will succeed because i know Cody is determine to make this successful but everybody on top need to learn from some of the mistakes they made with the first one, that’s was a learning curve and i’m sure they have learn from that. AEW is a long way from standing out from the pack at this point, they have the money, they have the determination and they people behind the scene motivated to make this thing work so i’m not worried that they will learn and modify stuff so that the next show will be a better show that will attract more casual fans.
But seriously man, you really need to chill on this. Stop being so on the defensive all the time because i have a more objective view of the show then you have. AEW is on the right track and they will learn from what didn’t work but if fans get all out of shape everytime somebody points out some of the flaws that their precious AEW as ,that’s not healthy and i’m sure that’s not what the guys at AEW wants from you guys.
That’s a lot of nit picks for what the vast majority consider a very successful show.
Plz send me the list for the 7 hours of WWE tv this week. It must be huuuuuuuuuuuge.
you have no idea, 9 time out of ten i don’t even bother watching the show, i just let it play in the the background while i’m doing something else.
If you want something 100 % different than the WWE, watch baseball. We are talking about a wrestling promotion built off of a YouTube series, essentially. Yes, the wrestling is the main draw in AEW, that doesn’t mean it’s all serious. ECW had fun stuff. NWA, AWA… it all had fun stuff in it. The problem now is that the entire WWE roster is a literal joke.( and not a good one) Nobody takes anything seriously. Because none of what happens on TV matters in the WWE. That is the problem we have with vinny mac
That’s also why they didn’t take AEW as a serious threat on Monday. They produce one of the worst episode of Raw in recent history as a response to AEW. They really don’t cares about AEW, the fact that they had sami zayn mention them on tv make me think that they feel like this is just another flavor of the month type thing that will fizzle out in a few years and it could bite them in the ass if they are not taking the situation seriously.
Bruh
They do this every fucking week. AEW has nothing to do with it.
yeah but this one was really awful compared to some shows they produce in the past. When was the last time they produce a full hour without one match on the show? That barely never happens. If they truly cared about AEW, they would have done something to step up their game and make raw a must see show but they didn’t. They continued their marry way like nothing happened on saturday.
The point i’m making is WWE really don’t see AEW as a threat and I’m sure that HHH is thinking that he can at any given moment sign any of the young talent that comes out of AEW to a NXT contract if he just choose to. Both Him and Vince are oblivious to the current situation and that show the arrogance that both have toward AEW. They don’t see them as competition but just as another company they can squash wherever they want to and that’s not going to be the case.
That was them stepping up their game. The big advantage WWE had over every other wrestling promotion was their ability to tell stories. During the peak years (late 90s to late 00s) they excelled at story telling. But now, it is just embarrassing. Might as well put Abe Simpson as the head Booker. That was the response to AEW. Pathetic, really
And, the Khan family has more money than vinny mac. Ain’t no “squashing” going on any time soon
…so WWE intentionally put on a terrible episode of Raw, as a message to show how little they care about AEW?
Look as for your critiques - I guess I am just puzzled by some of them. Excalibur, a retired masked wrestler, who is one of the best commentators outside of the WWE system - but people are hung up because he wore a mask while doing commentary… Meanwhile, one of the most beloved WWE commentators of all time wore a crown most of his career, and that’s all good.
Other than poorly planned, I don’t see the pre-show battle royal being any worse than the majority of Royal Rumble matches from the last 10-15 years.
Because YOU don’t know the characters apparently means nobody else does - and they’ll never be able to learn them. Anybody tuning into any random episode of WWE would have even worse of a time figuring it all out.
I will say that it’s quite obvious that hardcore AEW marks are counting their eggs too early and are acting as if AEW have WWE on the ropes and seem incapable of taking any sort of criticism regarding AEW. One of their responses seems to be that if you’re not an AEW mark, then you must be a WWE mark…
They’re a start up promotion with a lot of potential. No need to take it further than that for now.
Once again creating new fans and a new audience > trying to recapture some casual fans from TWENTY YEARS AGO!
And I just want to state, I have no dog in this fight. I just again, don’t see ant downside to hoping AEW can be wildly successful.
I don’t either, so we have that in common. I’m just pointing out the obvious. To be successful, they will need to grow their audience and get those that abandon watching wrestling.
Just to put it into perspective, if let’s say five years from now, AEW’s fanbase hasn’t grown, they still get the same number of fans buying tickets, buying ppv and watching their show on tnt. Do you think that tnt will be interested in signing a new contract with them? I’m not sure they will. TNT will want to see some growth in the ratings and in the fanbase. I can’t talk for the khan’s but with the amount of money they are putting in this project, i’m sure that they will want to see some growth in the fanbase as well and that’s were the casual and the other that stop watching wrestling come. You have a huge fanbase that wwe just forgot about after the monday night wars. Why not try to win them over.
They can have all the money in the world, if they can’t get a type of crowd wwe is genrating on a regular bases, you won’t be competition for them no matter how much they want to be.
As a fan, I just want to see a QUALITY wrestling show. That’s all. Just present a product that I can enjoy. Quality wrestling, interesting characters, logical stories.
It should not be that revolutionary of an idea, but here we are… Hoping a unproven upstart company can give us that quality we’ve been waiting for, because it hasn’t come from the WWE
Dude, you’re usually wrong about basically everything and this is more of the same.
Pro wrestling as a concept isn’t broken at all - just WWE is. AEW has the in-ring talent, guys who can speak, a TV deal and a big audience already - you can’t ask for much better of a start. So I don’t know why you sound worried, what else could they have done?
Remember the Ambrose thread a few months back? The one where you blamed him for everything to do with his career? How do you feel about that now? WWE is not going to change until Vince dies and giving fans an alternative that makes sense is all they have to do.
They’ve already done that and have a ton of momentum. But it’s ok WWE is still big in Saudi Arabia.