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WWE TV September 11-17


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What Dave actually said is the headbutt was real but the intention was not to be so hard to draw blood hardway. Vince did the prep beforehand and Owens just had to hit him hard enough to break the nu-skin (which is still harder than a 70 something year old man should be hit in head).

 

I don't mean to pull a "well actually" on Johnny, but considering we have a megathread commenting on people who have largely based their dislike of Dave on misquotes I felt it was necessary to clarify that.

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What Dave actually said is the headbutt was real but the intention was not to be so hard to draw blood hardway. Vince did the prep beforehand and Owens just had to hit him hard enough to break the nu-skin (which is still harder than a 70 something year old man should be hit in head).

 

I don't mean to pull a "well actually" on Johnny, but considering we have a megathread commenting on people who have largely based their dislike of Dave on misquotes I felt it was necessary to clarify that.

 

I didn't really get that from Daves comments, which I've listened to. It seemed to me that it was more that annoyed about the unrealism of a one-shot headbutt busting Vince open when it doesn't happen in other instances, which I thought was quite ridiculous.

 

Of course, I should clarify that he was mostly critical of doing a shoot headbutt in the first place.

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He said the headbutt was real, was disappointed Vince would do that but realizes he probably has no idea who Shibata is let alone what happened to him. He also said that the blood was most likely from a pre bladed cut that Vince sealed prior to coming out to create the illusion that he was busted open by it.

 

 

So in summation:

 

Headbutt= real

 

Blood= from prior cut not directly from the headbutt

 

Vince = dumb to be doing this when someone almost died from a shoot headbutt

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Do you all think they may have changed directions in this angle? Last week Shane is suspended in a big emotional segment with Daniel Bryan and the hook is Kevin Owens suing WWE. This week, it takes five minutes for Vince to bring Shane back, shoot down the possibility of Owens suing them, and book them in a match for HITC. I'm wondering if this beating was a late decision by Vince for who knows what reason, maybe he sneezed or had a bad workout.

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Do you all think they may have changed directions in this angle? Last week Shane is suspended in a big emotional segment with Daniel Bryan and the hook is Kevin Owens suing WWE. This week, it takes five minutes for Vince to bring Shane back, shoot down the possibility of Owens suing them, and book them in a match for HITC. I'm wondering if this beating was a late decision by Vince for who knows what reason, maybe he sneezed or had a bad workout.

 

I feel like they hotshot that by a week or two when they could have had Owens garnering heat bragging to Bryan about being untouchable etc. But I guess they needed something big to explain Vince being on TV and they want to get the match on the cards well in advance of the PPV

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In spite of the Vince McMahon appearance, and blood from the head butt angle, I really did not enjoy Smackdown this week. Way too much talking, most of it not that good, and not enough wrestling. Owens had that segment with McMahon at the end of the show, I don't think he also needed that talking segment at the opening. I really did not think Ziggler needed his long segment, when he had a similar segment last week. Neither Owens or Ziggler are very exciting on the mic. The matches we did have were mostly broken up by commercials, and it felt like the bulk of the match was happening during the commercial. I really don't think the current format is working, I feel like they should only need like one long talking segment, and anyone else they want doing a promo should do shorter ones either between matches, or one after the other in a short segment between commercials. I don't feel like this Owens/ McMahon story is going anywhere I want to go, and the Ziggler stuff is a waste of way too much time when we haven't even announced an opponent for him for Hell in a Cell. Why does Mahal have to come out and talk every week? Why can't he just have a match, even if it's a non-title or in a tag or something? Yeah, a lot of garbage, I think they need to put the main belt back on Styles, as he at least was entertaining to watch during the talking segments a year ago.

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Wrestling tv shows should be mostly talking. Smackdown is doing a good job. Short sprints and quick promos, one major angle and an overarching story are nice. Too much wrestling waters down the PPV and good long tv matches. RAW trots out Finn/Bray on go home show and they have a carbon copy of the match six days later. IF wrestlers actually had matches that built on each other and/or were different it would be ok. But with wrestling being so same-y, the old school SD! Approach of Angle development and lots of talking and building to the long matches is refreshing and more entertaining.

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I actually think Raw has been hitting a nice balance lately where we usually get at least one really good match every week while they still give time to multiple different angles/feuds up and down the card.

 

Smackdown's biggest issue to me is who they're using and who they're NOT using. You have your 2nd worst woman wrestler on the roster as the heel champion, a fun character but bad worker as the heel MITB holder and the other act in the women's division getting the most time is Tamina who is ANOTHER heel. I can't remember the last time Becky Lynch did anything and I know Charlotte has probably not been at TV because she's been with Ric but even before that she wasn't doing much.

 

Then you have Dolph Ziggler getting yet another push while Luke Harper hasn't been on TV in months and even a guy like Sami Zayn, who I'm not the biggest fan of but at least is better than Dolph, is just treading water trading loses to Aiden English.

 

It's no surprise to me that Smackdown house shows aren't drawing because the house show audience is more of a kids/families audience than a hardcore/smark audience and all the acts that could and should draw on house shows (Naomi, Becky Lynch, Sami Zayn) haven't been booked well. I think the only act that really appeals to kids that's been getting pushed well on Smackdown is The New Day and they're still just a midcard tag team/trio.

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I actually think Raw has been hitting a nice balance lately where we usually get at least one really good match every week while they still give time to multiple different angles/feuds up and down the card.

 

Smackdown's biggest issue to me is who they're using and who they're NOT using. You have your 2nd worst woman wrestler on the roster as the heel champion, a fun character but bad worker as the heel MITB holder and the other act in the women's division getting the most time is Tamina who is ANOTHER heel. I can't remember the last time Becky Lynch did anything and I know Charlotte has probably not been at TV because she's been with Ric but even before that she wasn't doing much.

 

Then you have Dolph Ziggler getting yet another push while Luke Harper hasn't been on TV in months and even a guy like Sami Zayn, who I'm not the biggest fan of but at least is better than Dolph, is just treading water trading loses to Aiden English.

 

It's no surprise to me that Smackdown house shows aren't drawing because the house show audience is more of a kids/families audience than a hardcore/smark audience and all the acts that could and should draw on house shows (Naomi, Becky Lynch, Sami Zayn) haven't been booked well. I think the only act that really appeals to kids that's been getting pushed well on Smackdown is The New Day and they're still just a midcard tag team/trio.

These are all really good points! The Smackdowns women division booking is baffling. Becky is most over female on either roster. Sasha & Bayley have been getting mixed to no reactions. Lack of use of Becky is silly.

 

Jinder mahal is dreadful. Boring on the mic & in the ring.

 

New Day vs USOS has been incredible. AJ IS God. Owens/McMahon has been great past two weeks.

 

Thin roster but they should be doing better. I think the format of the show is good just need to plug in the right people.

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OK I will admit, if they kept the same format for Smackdown, and just replaced Mahal, Owens, and Ziggler with guys that were not boring to listen to talk for that long, I probably would like it better. I remember really loving Raw in the late 90's when there was a lot of talking, but it was guys like Rock, Austin, and Foley. Or maybe it is just this week was too dominated by heels, like they could keep the Owens stuff, but maybe have the Mahal and Ziggler segments replaced by some faces, like maybe a Sami Zayn promo and a fashion files segment. I am not sure if a long promo from Nakamura would really work, but maybe some kind of skit or angle involving him would work.

 

I can understand how having long matches on TV every week could undermine the pay per views, but maybe they could have more shorter matches on TV involving some of the underneath guys who don't get TV time every week? Or maybe some squash matches? Or maybe to keep it interesting they could rotate who will see every week so we don't see the same guys every episode leading up to the pay per view. Like maybe one week we see Ziggler, and the next week we see Mike Bennet or something? I get the feeling they really don't want to give too much tv time to people who aren't going to be on the next pay per view, unless it is just to get squashed.

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I agree with everybody who is expressing the sentiment that Smackdown seems to have a weird rotating visibility/TV time policy. At one point, Mojo won the Battle Royal at Wrestlemania, and seemed to be heading for something bigger, then he kind of disappears. Bennett comes in, then all of the sudden he is inexplicably off TV for a few weeks. (Which I am not personally complaining about, but it is symptomatic of the larger issue.) Luke Harper and Erick Rowan both seemed to be getting some exposure, and then they vanish from TV. And I actually forgot Becky Lynch was on Smackdown for a bit there. I thought the same thing was happening with Gable and Ziggler, but now both are back on TV again. I don't know if the issue is that the writers can't find enough time for everybody in the two hours they have, or if they just don't like the people they aren't using, but the whole thing is weird to me.

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To echo what Marty said, I feel the constant reruns of matchups on TV is diluting the significance of the PPV's. I can't get excited to see two guys (or women) go against each other for a big PPV match knowing that they've already had essentially the same match multiple times in the previous week, and if it's a title match, having the spectre of the obligatory rematch on the Raw or Smackdown afterwards. I may be in the minority, I'm not sure, but I like wrestling when it at least attempts to mimic elements of "real" sports. How many fights do boxers have a year? In soccer, at maximum, teams will face off 4 times domestically (at least in England) and perhaps another 4 times in Europe; in the NFL, teams can only play 3 times including the playoffs; in the NBA it's only 4 times not including any potential playoff series (which is another animal entirely); and so on. Keeping the key combatants away from each other both keeps the matchups fresh but also allows an organic buildup of anticipation. Instead WWE love to dissipate that anticipation on an almost weekly basis. It would be okay if the workers were called upon/or able to build upon each match and add layers each time to form a coherent narrative, but that never seems to happen.

I also cosign the critique of not using the entirety of their roster to it's potential. There are a litany of bodies available to fill up TV time and for some reason people go missing for weeks, and occasionally months on end, with no explanation. In many ways I feel that just by using all of the people at their disposal, they could remedy a large part of what people find frustrating about their programming.

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I think it is actually simple and obvious why it is the way it is. With how they changed how they get revenues (no more lucrative PPV money), and with how reliant they are on the few hours a week they are on regular tv, it would behoove them to not piss off the bosses at USA, who we know makes copious suggestions to the WWE how things should be on their channels. They want stars, not Luke Harper. They want character focused stories, not 3 star matches between Gran Metallik and Brian Kendrick. They want appearances by Vince McMahon, not appearances by Mojo Rawley. So for the two main shows, of course USA has a big role to play in what we get to see on our television sets. Then you have to think about how to present the WWE Network so that it can also be used to support what they are doing on tv. This means they focus on the stars that they intend to feature on tv in order for people to continue to treat them like stars. If you want fan service, go watch the old footage on the Network or their lesser emphasized properties on there featuring the lesser known talent, however very little that is available. But this mindset isn't going anywhere. When it is Stephanie's time to run the company, I seriously doubt she'd reverse the trend considering she was one of the big proponents of "Screw wrestling, lets do soap opera" style of presentation. People think Triple H will help but I think it's becoming clear Triple H isn't going to be better than Vince. He isn't trying to change the structure of the organization. All he is doing is slowly replace Vince's cogs with his own. Basically all Triple H is doing is replacing car engine parts for new but same quality parts. The engine still runs the same. WWE will too.

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Raw main events, which are obviously Vince's number one priority, show that Vince can still book a hell of a main event picture when he decides he wants to -- I'd say he's more capable of it than HHH to this day, honestly. However, I think HHH is better at doing a top-to-bottom card that draws people in.

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I think it is actually simple and obvious why it is the way it is. With how they changed how they get revenues (no more lucrative PPV money), and with how reliant they are on the few hours a week they are on regular tv, it would behoove them to not piss off the bosses at USA, who we know makes copious suggestions to the WWE how things should be on their channels. They want stars, not Luke Harper. They want character focused stories, not 3 star matches between Gran Metallik and Brian Kendrick. They want appearances by Vince McMahon, not appearances by Mojo Rawley. So for the two main shows, of course USA has a big role to play in what we get to see on our television sets. Then you have to think about how to present the WWE Network so that it can also be used to support what they are doing on tv. This means they focus on the stars that they intend to feature on tv in order for people to continue to treat them like stars. If you want fan service, go watch the old footage on the Network or their lesser emphasized properties on there featuring the lesser known talent, however very little that is available. But this mindset isn't going anywhere. When it is Stephanie's time to run the company, I seriously doubt she'd reverse the trend considering she was one of the big proponents of "Screw wrestling, lets do soap opera" style of presentation. People think Triple H will help but I think it's becoming clear Triple H isn't going to be better than Vince. He isn't trying to change the structure of the organization. All he is doing is slowly replace Vince's cogs with his own. Basically all Triple H is doing is replacing car engine parts for new but same quality parts. The engine still runs the same. WWE will too.

 

Despite the mega-contracts that the Premier League and the big four US sports have signed over the last few years, with the increased chord cutting and access to streaming links, how tenable is a business model reliant on TV money going to be? Surely there will come a point where this bubble will burst, so what's the plan after that?

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