When Jeff’s real thoughts about all this come out I think a lot of people will look stupid in this thread.
Above all else it’s just a shitty angle. Not only that, they’re copying the same storyline TNA did for Jeff in 2012 but have just made it worse.
Out of curiosity, does anyone know if Jeff has ever spoken publicly about how he felt about these types of story-lines in the past?
I don’t know about that!
I bet you think Ross makes too many weird faces and weird hand gestures.
Ha ha. No, I just don’t think it is remotely funny or entertaining. I understand why fans of current wrestling like it. 
I do think something is getting lost in the discussion.
I think people would be okay with a storyline involving these sorts of real life inspired experience, if they were handled with any sort of tact or mature storytelling.
WWE, and WCW before it, only seemed capable of telling these stories in hacky and less than tasteful ways. From the current Jeff Hardy angle, to the previous storylines involving Hawk, and Scott Hall.
I’ve never paid enough attention to TNA to know if they did anything similar.
The fact is, nationally televised professional wrestling hasn’t managed to tackle many stories involving substance abuse with any sort of subtlety.
Enough with the argument about them just being
another TV show. If this was any other TV show handling this sort of subject matter, it would be laughably bad and comparable to an 80’s after school special, or a terrible cult movie.
And in terms of AEW, because of course you know it needs to come up… the bias that exists among fans exists with good reason. Many people are giving an opportunity to a new promotion that doesn’t come filtered through Vince McMahon, nor the majority of the same minds that have shaped most wrestling television of the last 30 years. Whether that be Vince, Heyman, Bischoff, Prichard, HHH, or others.
Those minds also shape how AEW works. They offer what people are used to but under a different name.
Fans get a similar product but get to pretend they’re a part of some sort of counter culture.
Except they don’t… They are a nationally aired “arena product”, but I fail to see how WWE’s creative or anybody else has shaped it. They produce TV to look like most big tv products, but also avoid most of the “creative tropes” that WWE, Impact and WCW really relied on.
Other than having some agents who have worked for both promotions - the booking team has never worked for WWE in that capacity. And that being the team of Kahn, Bucks, Cody, and Omega, with input from Jericho.
The promotion era I see the most in it is 1992-1994 (pre-Hogan) era WCW. Lots of clean finishes, talent booked strongly, and a variety of styles being given platforms.
And maybe AEW does offer a faux counter culture feeling… But choosing between the two I’d rather watch a promotion that doesn’t carry the indisputable negative baggage WWE carries these days. Or even ROH and Sinclair’s horrific business decisions lately.
Anyways, I wasn’t trying to sidetrack this into a WWE vs AEW argument, I was simply giving a valid reason why that bias may exist.
To be fair, I didn’t say it was funny 
The final number for the 24 July Smackdown were revised down from the fast overnights (which were thrown off by a few Fox stations carrying baseball). Final number was 1.924M, up very slightly from the previous week (1.912M).
Smackdown performs well enough for it to be the highest rated in the mid-age male demo.
Frankly, it doesn’t seem baseball made much of an impact at all on Smackdown.
I suspect that Monday will be harder for Raw to compete with sports, but I still think that sports bringing more viewers back to linear TV programming may help WWE as channel flippers before/after a game or midway in a game could help WWE.
Thank you, this is all I was trying to say. I think when the word bias it brought up some posters automatically take it as an insult.