This week’s episode took place from Denver featuring Samoa Joe appearing at the home of AJ Styles and discovering his mailbox, Aiden English teases a mysterious night in Milwaukee with Lana, R-Truth hosts Truth TV, and Randy Orton attacks Tye Dillinger.Wai Ting reviews the the latest edition of the Mixed Match Challenge with R-Truth & Carmella vs. The Miz & Asuka, and Bobby Lashley & Mickie James vs. Jinder Mahal & Alicia Fox.
We discuss TODAY’S TOP STORIES including the WWE’s update on Liv Morgan following Raw, the viewership figure for Raw plummets, and a look at the WrestleMania Week shows announced from MLW, WWN Live, and WrestleCon, plus DDT and wXw running cards in New York.
Wai reviews the Season 8 premiere of Total Divas with the return of Paige and her discovery of voodoo, the women prepare for WrestleMania and Brie Bella wants to be President.
John reviews the July 15th, 1996 episode of Monday Night Raw as a primer for this Friday’s Rewind-A-Wai on In Your House “International Incident”. This show features TWO TITLE MATCHES involving The Smoking Gunns, Psycho Sid behind the wheel and Vince McMahon screams about sex.
Additional reviews from John & Wai on Impact Wrestling’s “Day of Slammiversary”, WWE’s “The Day of: Jeff Hardy” feature, Ten Pounds of Gold and New Japan Pro Wrestling’s “The Recount: Bullet Club Betrayals”.
Saw somebody post the Rock’s Miami’s appearance from 2016 where is interacts with Lana and notes he taught her the Wisconsin Wheelbarrow! Amazing if this is what it leads to at maybe the Saudi show?!
Regarding the NJPW booking - if the Dome is going to feature Kenny v Tanahashi and Okada v White as I suspect it will then I would creatively book Tana to beat White to retain the contract but in a way that either involves CHAOS or a dusty finish where White can boast he doesn’t care who wins Kenny or Tana because he gets the next shot and he’s beat both this year (fact). Then build to Okada and White using Power Struggle as a place to do a major tag with CHAOS members.
Those two matches with Jericho v Naito for IC belt and Ibushi v Osprey could be incredible too 4 for the Dome.
Lastly - if WWE did want to acquire the Bucks / Elite, the merch sales alone and how that would bump revenue and how the market and their stock may benefit from that could mean the wallet for those guys is unlimited. Add in bigger venue shows for the Rumble, NYC for Mania, and shoulder programming on FS1 when SD goes to Fox I don’t see the stock sinking below 85-90 again and I am long on it crossing 100$ before Q4 ends (when they have the Video game sales, Saudi, Melbourne)
The more I think about it…if the WWE is looking for star power and a one off match/feud booking Rusev v The Rock and using this as a callback would be phenomenal for Crown Jewel. Plenty of incentive for Rock to go over their - money and building his star profile in that market. Plus with SD1000 could see something there. I’m fantasy booking this into existence!
Merch sales = revenue, increases to revenue = favorable movement in stock. Is it your view that the Bucks / Elite wont be able to move the merch needle that much?
It’d be hard to know what Yr/Yr or Qtr/Qtr sales would look like but I can’t think of others that could move those metrics like the group who has penetrated retail stores.
Agree with you on those two being the big drivers. But given the TV rights are locked in now
what propels it going forward? Network subscribers, live events and merch/liscensing deals. No doubt the two you listed are biggest sources of revenue but showing how healthy other aspects of the business is may prove as impactful drivers.
I Might be wrong but I read (unverified that the Saudi show is getting WWE 45 million dollars.) Either way Merch Sales are a drop in the bucket compared to other WWE revenue streams even if they are leading in that department. Young Bucks have a strong and loyal following but they don’t have Mass appeal to women and kids like Cena does or even to a degree the New Day kids eat up there merch like crazy. they will always out number 10 to 1 the hardcore adult market. Pus another factor I am Not 100 percent on young back merch if any of the bullet club merch goes towards them, but if its anything to do with the bullet club or anything that depicts bullets guns or death WWE is going to stay a million miles away from any of those images even in a rip off spoofing way with the mass public shootings in the states. Don’t get me wrong they be a big asset to WWE and nice for there merch sales But I doubt it would effect the stock price at all by them selves nice big bucket to add in the pool though. (if anything I think the young Bucks would help WWE House show numbers a lot but then again that’s not really adding value to the stock. Not hurting but not helping in any significant way. Now If they help draw huge more numbers and advertisers when they are on fox a young buck main event like Austin did back in the day then you are actually having an impact on the stock.