RAW's viewership under 3 million for the 5th straight week; lowest of 2017

[Momentum]

WWE made more money in 2016 than ever before. I wonder how much they care about ratings at this point.

I hope they do care because we do need a change of scenery. We can start with how the sets look.

If RAW gets cancelled they will care.

 

[Box Factory]

Raw is the same show every week

Taken from uproxx

Before Payback, Jeff Hardy pinned Cesaro. The next week, Matt Hardy pinned Sheamus. At Payback, the Hardys pinned Sheamus and Cesaro. After that, Jeff Hardy pinned Sheamus. The next week, Matt Hardy pinned Sheamus. What comes next in this equation? Why, The Hardys and Dean Amborse pinning The Miz, Sheamus and Cesaro, of course!

 

[llt23]

Raw is the same show every week

Taken from uproxx

It is, and even worse the show plays out like an infomercial. There is no story throughout the episode, once you see a guy in one segment, hes done for the night. Theres no hooks going into breaks, none of the heels have heat, babyfaces are boring because every 'storyline' is I want the belt.

Watch Lucha Undergrounds episode from today and watch Johnny Mundo get heat in a supposed "you cant get real heat in 2017" world.

WWE is delusional and its fans are becoming deluded too. They buy into the BS that "thangs just aint the same" and yet I turn on Lucha and I see more storylines in one episode than 5 years of Raw. Matches with psychology that go beyond 1950s "work the arm brother."

Someone else said it in another topic, they are rehashing the early mid 90s era of Raw when WCW was murking them, except instead of 50 minutes its 3 hours. Think about it. Raw back then was maybe a squash match and another match and Vince telling you to buy the PPV. Now its that x20 and instead of PPV's its the Network

Neckbeards gotta finally realize that Russo adding storylines to wrestling is what brought in and kept viewers. Its not 20 minute wrestling matches x 11. Its not just good promos, you gotta give these guys something to work with beyond "i want the belt" in order for them to really shine. And they just cant format the show as segment to segment with nothing connecting. They just are clueless as to how to do a television show.

Ratings wont go up if they "push wrestler x" or whatever, thats retarded. They need to make a better TV Show period.

 

[Here Comes the Pain]

Monday night raw is still the highest rated show on the USA network(smackdown included).

I'll go as far as to say that Raw is the only wrestling brand putting up any presentable #s & that's TNA & LU included.

As far as storylines people have been complaining about it for about a decade now. Wwe over the past year or so have given these marks as much as they can give them in such a short span of time. It is what is.

Brock being champ has nothing to do with this.

These marks complained when reigns was the champ, they complained when Goldberg was champ, they complained when ko was the champ, they complained when Rollins was the champ & so on.....

 

[Berniewood Hogan]

the new generation of wrestlers lack personality because they're all plugged into the same exact internet matrix, brother

in the old days, people grew up in more insulated, unique cultures. this produced jake the snakes, scott halls, bruno's, etc.

now everybody just wants a retweet from beyonce.

 

[Saysumthinfunnymike]

It is, and even worse the show plays out like an infomercial. There is no story throughout the episode, once you see a guy in one segment, hes done for the night. Theres no hooks going into breaks, none of the heels have heat, babyfaces are boring because every 'storyline' is I want the belt.

Watch Lucha Undergrounds episode from today and watch Johnny Mundo get heat in a supposed "you cant get real heat in 2017" world.

WWE is delusional and its fans are becoming deluded too. They buy into the BS that "thangs just aint the same" and yet I turn on Lucha and I see more storylines in one episode than 5 years of Raw. Matches with psychology that go beyond 1950s "work the arm brother."

Someone else said it in another topic, they are rehashing the early mid 90s era of Raw when WCW was murking them, except instead of 50 minutes its 3 hours. Think about it. Raw back then was maybe a squash match and another match and Vince telling you to buy the PPV. Now its that x20 and instead of PPV's its the Network

Neckbeards gotta finally realize that Russo adding storylines to wrestling is what brought in and kept viewers. Its not 20 minute wrestling matches x 11. Its not just good promos, you gotta give these guys something to work with beyond "i want the belt" in order for them to really shine. And they just cant format the show as segment to segment with nothing connecting. They just are clueless as to how to do a television show.

Ratings wont go up if they "push wrestler x" or whatever, thats retarded. They need to make a better TV Show period.

Russo didn't invent storylines in wrestling breh. One thing he did in the Attitude era was make use of everyone on the roster. Even the very bottom of the roster had character development and a story.

But look back at the 80s and 90s. Yeah there was a lot of squash matches but there were storylines everywhere. Let's look at Jake the Snake. He has a storyline with Rick Rude about his wife and shyt. A storyline with Andre. A storyline where Rick the Model Martel blinds him temporarily and that carried on for like a year where we saw Roberts coming back from injury, we saw updates every week on how he was doing, etc. Finally they had the blow off at Mania. Then he's involved with Warrior and turns on him, then he interrupts Macho Man's wedding, etc.. he always had something to do and rarely was it about a title.

Most of the roster has nothing to do. No promos, no story, no nothing. They just come out, match, fight someone they've already fought and that's that.

 

[prophecypro]

Bad writing with no place for the people they want to see.

It aint about who's on but how long the show is to with no sense of continuity

Its insane that this show is still 3 hours.

blaming the "indie guys" is kinda lazy when rating hemoraging for years with Vince's picks on top too

 

[cartierhoe]

This shyt is fukking terrible

 

[Lord Scion]

With Raw on Memorial Day doing the second lowest rating in the history of the show, and that includes holidays and shows during football season, on a week when all signs were that there should logically have been a strong bounce back, it asks a ton of questions.

Before people start making excuses about cord cutting, cord cutting can’t effect ratings more than one or two percent. The rating is derived by the percentage of homes that get the station, in this case the USA Network. If people no longer get USA Network, they aren’t figured into the percentage. You can argue that wrestling fans are cutting the cord, a term that is almost a joke the way it’s overused, greater than the public at large, but even then that’s a joke.

One year ago, USA Network was in 92.7 million homes. This past week USA Network was in 91.8 million homes. Yes, it is down and cord cutting probably is fair to account for maybe a one percent decline in audience and a zero percent decline in ratings, since those 900,000 homes aren’t figured in to begin with on the ratings. One would also think, with the wrestling audience being more hardcore than ever before, and fewer fans who are more loyal, that if anything, they would be the ones most likely to keep cable since they are willing to spend more money per capita on the product than any audience of wrestling ever. There are just fewer of them than ever before, probably even dating back to the dark ages of 1992 to 1995 when nobody was making money running wrestling companies in the U.S.

Now, to be fair, the business of pro wrestling is doing well with those hardcore fans. WWE attendance is mixed, but it was strong in March, although fell in April and May. WWE ratings were actually not that bad in April. The combination of WrestleMania and the Superstar shakeup saw Smackdown way ahead of last year, and Raw behind last year, but not by a lot.

Ever since the second week after the Superstar shakeup, both shows having fallen to a significant level. Some of that is the NBA Playoffs, but the NBA Playoffs take place every year at the same time.

There is also the argument that there are more ways of consumption of the product. You can subscribe to Hulu and watch the next day. And it is true the need for immediacy is way down. More people by percentage, are DVRing Raw than in the past, although that’s also misleading. If Raw was doing 10 percent increases from DVR viewership at 3.2 million last year, that’s 320,000 more viewers. If they are doing 12.5 percent now at 2.6 million, that 325,000 more viewers. So essentially it’s the same. People do watch YouTube clips, but looking at those numbers is misleading because most of that comes from India and 80 percent is outside the U.S., and in markets the company derives little revenue from.

Is this trouble? It’s not good. But generally, television ratings are down. Raw and Total Divas are both down well more than the decline of television on average. Smackdown is up, but Smackdown is an unfair comparison given its move to Tuesday live and having an exclusive roster. Perhaps you can argue that the increase in Smackdown is part of the reason for the decline in Raw, and that the combination is relatively even. Come July, when Smackdown is the same as it was a year earlier, as would be Raw, measuring the decline or lack thereof will be notable. My gut says that Raw will continue to decline, and Smackdown’s numbers will be well below the previous year.

Still, aside from cable news shows and major sports, both Raw and Smackdown do better than almost anything on cable most weeks. And the cable news shows that were beating it, on Fox for the most part, have taken a major hit with the loss of Bill O’Reilly. No, pro wrestling isn’t near the force it once was, but it’s still good.

The problem is that it’s also not cost-effective. At 22 cents per viewer per show, if Raw does 3 million viewers per week and Smackdown does 2.5 million, numbers that both shows are unlikely to be reaching on a consistent regular basis unless there is a turnaround, that’s $1.21 million per week or $63 million per year. Wrestling costs USA in the range of $160 million.

Still, there is other value. USA gets money per home from the cable companies. Would the cable companies want to cut back on USA without wrestling? USA’s big claim is that they are consistently top five in prime time ratings, and have been No. 1 most recent years. Take away the five hours of WWE, they would not be top ten.

But benefits of other programming is it can be replayed over-and-over, and USA can also sell original programs overseas. They can sell the rights many ways and have digital distribution as well down the line. With Raw and Smackdown, they don’t have those revenue streams since WWE owns the shows and derives the revenue for any of those type of usages.

From a cost-effective standpoint, a show that does one-third the audience will do more advertising revenue than WWE.

As far as 2019 goes, when the USA contract is up, are these ratings going to pose a problem?

There is no way of knowing. Most stations won’t drop their top rated show, and with USA’s other programming falling badly and the station unable to make new hits like they used to do regularly, wrestling is farm more valuable than ever before, at least for total ratings. There is the argument that USA can also advertise its new shows before more eyeballs if they keep WWE. Plus, generally, programming rights have been going up even with audiences declining.

UFC is counting on a huge increase in rights fees at the end of 2018, and if they do or don’t get it may be a barometer for WWE. UFC was, and still is hoping for a bidding war, and perhaps winding up like the NBA, NASCAR, the NFL or Baseball, where they make deals with multiple networks. But the problems with ESPN, a station counted on to bid for UFC programming, if they aren’t interested given their declining number of homes due to cable bundling (far more than cord cutting which is still only four percent from the peak of U.S. cable, and cable homes right now are 24 percent ahead of where they were during wrestling’s popularity peak) and thus loss of revenue, the UFC leverage is gone.

Similarly, if multiple parties see WWE’s numbers as a way to put their networks on the map, because WWE does give you a consistent solid audience very Monday and Tuesday, WWE could get much bigger numbers even with the steep decline in audience.

If nobody else wants it, and there is a change at the top (Bonnie Hammer, who runs USA and several other NBCU cable networks is a major fan of Vince McMahon) like what happened with TBS and TNT in 2001, and they think bottom line rather than fighting for No. 1, WWE could be in major trouble. With the WWE Network, they will survive in that situation, although will have to make major cuts, and it will be much harder to create new fans. Still, the Internet is a strong way to reach and maintain hardcore fans. This also may explain the attempt to reach out and try and create local stars in foreign markets. In the dark ages, when the U.S. wrestling scene was struggling badly, WWE did lose money, but they still did well in Europe and Canada.

The reality is that most revenue streams are strong. Attendance, which is in many ways a far better barometer to judge real interest than TV ratings, especially today, is only down a little, and with price raises, is more profitable than before.

But people who make the argument that ratings don’t matter are as shortsighted as they come. Ratings matter far more today than in the days of the Monday Night Wars. In those days, for whatever reason, both companies got sucked into a battle of hotshotting. Wrestling in 1998 was on fire, and WWF was on fire for a few years after that as WCW collapsed. Did the hotshotting long-term lead to another decline after 2001? Or was it the lack of competition? But the key was, in 2000, no matter what the ratings were, WWE made its money by presentation of live shows, licensing and PPVs. They only grossed $5.5 million in the U.S. from television in 1999 which grew to $28 million because of the bidding war between USA and Spike in 2000, because the attitude of television was that wrestling needs us so we don’t have to pay for it. Today, WWE’s television rights are closer to $160 million, a huge percentage of overall revenue. While there are many other factors in play, ratings are the No. 1 factor besides multiple bidders wanting the product when it comes to the No. 1 profit producing revenue stream.

Now, are ratings not as big a deal when measuring actual popularity than before? No doubt, but they were always misleading. There were companies like Mid South and Memphis that did ridiculously high ratings while they struggled at the gate. Even with WCW in 2000, while overall business collapsed, ratings did fall, but not to the extent of PPV and house shows. People would watch the train wrecks out of fascination or loyalty or habit, but they were don’t paying money for them. With WWE, that’s not the case. People just aren’t watching the TV, perhaps because of too much product, sameness, or lack of stakes, but still will pay for the network and go to the live shows. And another point is that WWE live shows are good. The talent is very good at what they do, and they are better athletes and have a far better work ethic. The mentality of conning people into the seats and doing as little as possible past conning them back, and it being an excuse to stay in high school, do copious amounts of drinking and drugs and have access to far more women as television stars has been completely overhauled by a performer base that is there because they love performing. If they can be criticized, it’s for working too hard for their own good and taking risks that lead to more injuries. They are paid well enough, although not nearly what they deserve, so the always hustle for every buck mentality isn’t there. It also creates less individualism, which makes it difficult to create real stars.

PPVs have mostly been good, although of late WWE big shows in quality have fallen well behind the competition and many have been average or even below average. But at $9.99 value, nobody is going to feel ripped off like the would at a higher price point. From a fan perspective, because the TV revenue, the No. 1 stream, is guaranteed, and the PPV revenue isn negligible and the network revenue is seasonal and barely at all affected by quality of shows, the incentive is just there to churn out product. The money is rolling in whether good or bad. Technology changes may hurt them, or may help them. No matter what anyone says, nobody knows what the landscape of media will be in 2019, and until then, WWE doesn’t have a thing to worry about. But in 2019, it’s the media landscape, not quality of product, that will be the difference maker.

Ratings will decline as long as there is too much product. There’s a long history of overexposure when it comes to television, but now, because the expectations are lower, and wrestling in theory will always have a competitive sized audience, plus the increase of money spending by hardcore fans, this current product is doing well with the overexposure. A key is the lack of appearances in markets. I believe if this product was to run monthly as opposed to being an annual or two or three times a year special event in most cities (and New York is the exception to this as they run often, and while they don’t sellout unless it’s TV or PPV, they do well), the situation would be different. But it doesn’t have to be and it’s not.

 

[prophecypro]

Monday night raw is still the highest rated show on the USA network(smackdown included).

I'll go as far as to say that Raw is the only wrestling brand putting up any presentable #s & that's TNA & LU included.

As far as storylines people have been complaining about it for about a decade now. Wwe over the past year or so have given these marks as much as they can give them in such a short span of time. It is what is.

Brock being champ has nothing to do with this.

These marks complained when reigns was the champ, they complained when Goldberg was champ, they complained when ko was the champ, they complained when Rollins was the champ & so on.....

Not really, they;re kind of bookings their favs in a pretty shyt way

The problem is shyt booking and storylines over a loooooong ass programme. Doesnt matter if its vince's favs or the marks favs everyone is gonna suffer

This has been a problem going back 15 years with creative. I mean damn they had a stacked roster after the WCW acquisition and still lost viewers back then and the creative was so shyt icons like Hogan and Austin bounced.

 

[jackswstd]

Save.Us.Brock

Spoiler

 

[ORDER_66]

Wrestling sucks... Kids not getting drawn into it like they used to and people grow up...

 

[Tide Run This]

shyt sucks these new guys are booked like dweebs and nothing matters. No fukking feuds worth while just I want title shot so let's fight type of shyt shyt trash I'd rather watch nwo come out with rodman in Chicago over any bullshyt on raw or smackdown for rest of the year. shyt went in the tank for me moment AJ Styles lost the strap shows are terrible anyone who watches this shyt start to finish weekly at this point is a fukking loser.

 

[llt23]

Russo didn't invent storylines in wrestling breh. One thing he did in the Attitude era was make use of everyone on the roster. Even the very bottom of the roster had character development and a story.

But look back at the 80s and 90s. Yeah there was a lot of squash matches but there were storylines everywhere. Let's look at Jake the Snake. He has a storyline with Rick Rude about his wife and shyt. A storyline with Andre. A storyline where Rick the Model Martel blinds him temporarily and that carried on for like a year where we saw Roberts coming back from injury, we saw updates every week on how he was doing, etc. Finally they had the blow off at Mania. Then he's involved with Warrior and turns on him, then he interrupts Macho Man's wedding, etc.. he always had something to do and rarely was it about a title.

Most of the roster has nothing to do. No promos, no story, no nothing. They just come out, match, fight someone they've already fought and that's that.

Yeah you are right. Not gonna lie though lot of that was before my time or I was too young to really remember. Mostly remember the New Generation shyt, whats weird is yeah they had a lot of memorable storylines, but if you ever go back and watch the Raw's feels like aint shyt happening. Like I remember so many angles...Bulldog and Shawn with Davey Boys wife, Goldust Razor, Mankind Taker, Piper Goldust. etc...So yeah I was exaggerating. But Raw 97-99 is unfukkwithable. GOAT era and should be used as a guide on how to do TV. You dont even need the mature angles or extreme violence...just follow the format and attempt to be creative.

But eh why are we even talking about it....we already know they wont do shyt about the show being awful.

 

[Tide Run This]

Yeah you are right. Not gonna lie though lot of that was before my time or I was too young to really remember. Mostly remember the New Generation shyt, whats weird is yeah they had a lot of memorable storylines, but if you ever go back and watch the Raw's feels like aint shyt happening. Like I remember so many angles...Bulldog and Shawn with Davey Boys wife, Goldust Razor, Mankind Taker, Piper Goldust. etc...So yeah I was exaggerating. But Raw 97-99 is unfukkwithable. GOAT era and should be used as a guide on how to do TV. You dont even need the mature angles or extreme violence...just follow the format and attempt to be creative.

But eh why are we even talking about it....we already know they wont do shyt about the show being awful.

Val Venis had more going on storyline wise than this so called star Seth freaking Rollins Val beefing with Jarrett over Debra had more heat weekly than any of this bullshyt Finn Balor or give divas a chance bullshyt they put out weekly. Cats on here cosigning these lame ass brand wars smackdown is just as bad fukking Jinder Mahal might as well make fukking Zack Ryder champ while we at it.