Best case scenario: the situation is addressed and treated seriously.
Worst case scenario. WWE does wwe things.
It’s the first smackdown since the draft and the Saudi debacle that I’m vaguely interested in.
Stephanie is going to talk about how brave she, her father, her husband, and the company are. And I will switch over to another network.
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How long before this is a NBA situation and we have a wrestler spread it to others in the locker room and the WWE suspends shows?
WWE won’t suspend any major TV, they’ll isolate, replace and then tag on the extra time to any performer who’s coming to the end of their contracts
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No way
They will be in the same boat as sports.
WWE stuff then.
This feels really odd to watch.
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I didn’t watch all of it, I was busy with family stuff. But what I did manage to watch was pretty entertaining.
I don’t think I’ll be saying that though if WWE has to do this for 9 hours a week for the next several weeks.
Only watched until they threw on the elimination chamber tag match. Show was what it was but I think it was a little cringey and tone deaf of HHH to make jokes about the empty crowd. Acknowledge it obviously, but joking about it was a little wierd and uncomfortable.
Is Cesaro/Bryan empty arena match worth watching?
It’s like 3 minutes, don’t waste your time.
Still was the best part of the entire show BY FAR.
… and they had the audacity to cut it 2 minutes in for a commercial friggin break. It really pissed me off. Than they returned from commercial and it ended. I was infuriated.
Yup if they are going with empty arena matches they should just do them taped and not live. Honestly that would be the best thing they could do. Bring people in tape a ton of content and then send everyone home.
Or just start showing classic stuff.
They have the largest wrestling library in the universe.
Maybe it would even help promote the network.
They could probably police in some classic stuff, but I don’t think many people are going to watch 5-7 hours a week of re-run content. I could see doing something where they film a few matches and video packages building up their current feuds and then splice in matches featuring those performers from the catalogue.
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I thought this Smackdown, as a unique standalone episode wasn’t too bad.
But it doesn’t bode well for Raw on Monday, or for upcoming weeks. I know it was a late decision to hold it at the PC, which restricted the talent available - but for me I think replaying that Elimination Chamber match was the stupidest thing they could done. Cos it leaves me going into Raw thinking “if they can’t fill 3 hours of interesting stuff with the talent available, why would I watch it?”
On it’s merits, I could see Monday’s ratings being a disaster. But I also acknowledge that, across the globe, there’s bugger all “sport-like” stuff to watch, so maybe that will rescue them.
I might watch Raw just to see:
Austin: “Give me a hell yeah”
crickets
Think the last thing on Earth we should be worrying about right now is ratings.
Meltzer came on WFAN in NY yesterday and had the good thought that WWE should have everyone available Monday and just pump out the rest of the month’s shows so they don’t have to worry about anymore travel from here and it’s not like spoilers will come out of an arena with a bunch of talent and cameramen.
Then he said no one will care if the shows aren’t any good.
That was not a good thought.
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I don’t think it’s worth the risk
Close it up for a while and show reruns
It’s looking more and more realistic that there could be a domestic travel ban soon which would limit the performers or Raw or SD even more. It seems like there are only three options going forward:
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Continue trying to film tv (either live or pre-recorded) at the Performance Center with a production skeleton crew and most likely only the performers that live in the Tampa area.
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Try to pre-record as much as they can with as much talent as can fly in (and might get trapped in Tampa) right now and then air it over the next couple of weeks along with random videos of remote interviews, highlight reels, etc.
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Just shut it down. Let USA and FOX either air old PPV’s and documentaries which would be ridiculous for 9 hours a week. Or just let USA and Fox air Law & Order reruns and movies for a few weeks and then restart WWE with a big show when the restrictions are removed (May?).
As a fan and a human being interested in limiting the Coronavirus spread option 3 seems the most preferable.
After a couple of months of no sports and no WWE I would be all in on a big WWE return to hopefully usher in a return to normalcy.
Live wrestling is done by next week.