Oct 16, 2021 23:58:39 GMT Blindy said:

Oct 16, 2021 23:54:41 GMT NATH45 said:

The 2.5 hour SmackDown drew an average of 793,000 viewers. This is down from last week’s 2.03 million viewers.

Last night’s Supersized SmackDown took a major hit as expected, due to the show airing on FS1 instead of FOX.

On the other hand, last night’s AEW Rampage drew 549,000 viewers. This is up from last week’s 466,000 viewers.

Sasha Banks slayed CM Punk. She appeared on NXT and took down Jericho as well. Absolute boss.

No, she didn’t.

Tony is right though, he can do things Vince no longer can. WWE cannot spend to make WWE better and needs to work consistently to cut costs because WWE is publicly traded and wants to get into a state that is ready for sale.

As for the numbers, losing by 20% is not bad at all given WWE is established. Fast ratings show that AEW is catching up. And for Vince, AEW even getting close is a major loss. When Vince was the only game in town he could dictate the value of the company. With competition, he loses the exclusivity of being the only viable wrestling product to survive on TV for the past 20 years. Moreso, now his talent can become the talent of others. It costs WWE a lot of leverage room.

Rumors are Vince is getting pissed that Tony can spend endlessly while he is limited and wants to run smackdown for three hours to put the last hour against Rampage now to prove he is the better product.  Also it has to hurt them that AEW is showing growth while they are showing losses.  


///

Talk is though the war for talent is not endless.  AEW sounds like they may seriously pass on Bray as he is expected to ask for too much to appear.  They do not think he is worth main event cash is the rumor.

Oct 18, 2021 23:02:41 GMT WMS said:

Oct 16, 2021 23:58:39 GMT Blindy said:

Sasha Banks slayed CM Punk. She appeared on NXT and took down Jericho as well. Absolute boss.

No, she didn’t.

Not with the demo with the news that came out but on a channel that it barely if WWE ever airs in at all, WWE still won the overall rating. 

Though SmackDown won the overall viewership 866,000 viewers to 578,000 viewers, the two shows tied in the demo with a 0.24 rating.

Head-to-head, WWE SmackDown scored 878,000 viewers compared to Rampage's 602,000 viewers.

In the 18 to 49 demographic head-to-head, AEW Rampage drew 328,000 viewers in the demo while SmackDown drew 285,000 viewers.

Tony Khan sent out the following tweets in response to AEW winning the demo head-to-head.

A woman wrestler clowned Jericho on NXT when she faced Io Shirai and defeated Jericho and Guevara in a match and same said wrestler beat Punk vs Matt Sydal. Banks statement.

The 18-49 demo needs to stop being overemphasized, people 50+ also matter as well. As well as the under 18 demographic which WWE goes hard after. I also question how the ratings are conducted, for sons or daughters or even grandsons or granddaughters who live under a household with someone 50+ years old, is that not countered as a view from a 50+ year old despite it not really being the case?

Oct 18, 2021 20:46:37 GMT Todd said:

Rampage probably won in the demo overlapping half an hour according to Thurston. So Khan will pimp this no doubt. Andrew Zarian says SmackDown was simulcast on some shitty network which accounted for 150k viewers in Chicago and New York which would explain why SmackDown was 150k lower than it usually is on FS1. It basically renders the comparison null and void, which is quite funny after all the hype.

It's embarrassing how much of a big deal Tony Khan makes this to be, he made Rampage a Friday night show considering that was Smackdown's night. The idea that SD can only be relegated to just 2 hours is hilarious, and that it's a slight if they at all extend their show by 30 or even 1 hour. Why would SD even care to go after Rampage on 10/15 and not say the very 1st night/debut of Rampage?

Such petty shit. 

Always thought it was weird NXT had a loyal 50+ demo.

CM Punk vs Matt Sydal did a .28
Lynch vs Banks was .21

It's very telling that the early numbers for Rampage have been leaked by the WWE every weekend except this one.

Oct 19, 2021 0:09:20 GMT Blindy said:

Oct 18, 2021 20:46:37 GMT Todd said:

Rampage probably won in the demo overlapping half an hour according to Thurston. So Khan will pimp this no doubt. Andrew Zarian says SmackDown was simulcast on some shitty network which accounted for 150k viewers in Chicago and New York which would explain why SmackDown was 150k lower than it usually is on FS1. It basically renders the comparison null and void, which is quite funny after all the hype.

It's embarrassing how much of a big deal Tony Khan makes this to be, he made Rampage a Friday night show considering that was Smackdown's night. The idea that SD can only be relegated to just 2 hours is hilarious, and that it's a slight if they at all extend their show by 30 or even 1 hour. Why would SD even care to go after Rampage on 10/15 and not say the very 1st night/debut of Rampage?

Such petty shit. 

Reality is relative.  Depends on which side the wrestling news writers take in the end if Vince does go three hours.  And frankly, if he can Vince should go three hours as he has talent that he pays to sit home, which is massive waste.  More writers are cheap than more wrestlers and that extra hour lets you try out more stuff to find that one gimmick a generation that will make billions.  Or, without anymore work just give six matches an extra 10 minutes.  

Vince wants to kill AEW do 40 minute main events ever week.  Do fucking mat classics as your smackdown trademarks and let the guys steal the show as many of them have proven in the past they can do.  I mean, Seth and Edge, 45 minute main event AEW could never hope to compete with as the one match could be the same length of their entire show.  Khan needs that hour and a lot of the WWE will do longer matches to just shove it in the face of indy matches that get long time and have people wet themselves because they have a 20 minute period of mat work.  

Oct 19, 2021 2:41:08 GMT c said:

Oct 19, 2021 0:09:20 GMT Blindy said:

It's embarrassing how much of a big deal Tony Khan makes this to be, he made Rampage a Friday night show considering that was Smackdown's night. The idea that SD can only be relegated to just 2 hours is hilarious, and that it's a slight if they at all extend their show by 30 or even 1 hour. Why would SD even care to go after Rampage on 10/15 and not say the very 1st night/debut of Rampage?

Such petty shit. 

Reality is relative.  Depends on which side the wrestling news writers take in the end if Vince does go three hours.  And frankly, if he can Vince should go three hours as he has talent that he pays to sit home, which is massive waste.  More writers are cheap than more wrestlers and that extra hour lets you try out more stuff to find that one gimmick a generation that will make billions.  Or, without anymore work just give six matches an extra 10 minutes.  

Vince wants to kill AEW do 40 minute main events ever week.  Do fucking mat classics as your smackdown trademarks and let the guys steal the show as many of them have proven in the past they can do.  I mean, Seth and Edge, 45 minute main event AEW could never hope to compete with as the one match could be the same length of their entire show.  Khan needs that hour and a lot of the WWE will do longer matches to just shove it in the face of indy matches that get long time and have people wet themselves because they have a 20 minute period of mat work.  

Didn't we see from the Wednesday night war there isnt that much of an overlap of the two fanbases? I dont think the person that has embraced AEW is going to be ditching rampage for a seth vs edge match

It is a good rating for AEW to be fair, expected after there was so much hype.

I mean, if we’re only going to count the demo in the overlap, which is fair enough I suppose, this was always going to happen. Rampage does a good demo in its time-slot, and SmackDown did the same terrible number it always does on a bad channel, especially without those 100k people that watched on local TV. In the overlap, Rampage was going to win. Vince may have thought stacking that half hour was going to swing it, but it didn’t happen. As I said though, the simulcast kills the comparison for me.

There is very little overlap between the two fanbases. Dynamite and NXT do the same ratings now as they did when they went head to head.

This was a lot of fun this past week and yes obviously the narrative that people ‘chose CM Punk over Reigns and Lesnar’ is silly but Tony Khan has got his base to buy into this being a fair battle and he’s a clever son of a bitch. He cultivates support for his wrestling promotion like it’s a football club, it’s quite ECW-like. It works and he has a very loyal audience. Let’s see how the next few weeks go. Got to get some stories going now and keep Dynamite above a million.

Interesting ratings breakdown:

While Rampage tied SmackDown in the 18-49 demo with the 0.24 rating, they also tied WWE in the 18-34 demo with a 0.20 rating, according to PWTorch. AEW also picked up a narrow win in the Males 18-49 demo – 0.34 to 0.32.

WWE topped AEW in the Males 12-34 demo with a 0.20 to 0.16. They both tied with a 0.10 in the Females 12-34 demo. AEW topped WWE in the 18-34 demo, 0.17 to 0.15. They both tied in the 25-54 demo with a 0.28, while WWE easily topped AEW in the 50+ demo 0.43 to 0.21.


www.wrestlinginc.com/news/2021/10/aew-rampage-tops-wwe-smackdown-in-30-minute-overlap-fridays-demo-breakdowns/

AEW appeals more with the key demo, but WWE has broader base appeal.  

Win is a win for Tony, he took the key demo, 18-49.  But also shows a limitation of AEW.  Too lazy to break it out mathematically, but eye balling, looks like AEW only wins in the 18-25 demo with WWE winning all others.  This is not a good band for growth.  Nor is it a good band to use older stars to draw ratings.  

Also quarter hour breakdown do not paint a good picture of AEW.  Many fans tuned in to Punk then tuned out.

Also with this demo, Orange and Darby are likely far bigger stars than people are giving them credit for.  

If TK wants to measure dicks, then I challenge AEW to fill a 100,000 stadium on the other side of the world.

That's how you know who's dick is bigger.

Well SmackDown had more viewers but if you break it down into quarters and focus purely on the key demos and factor in that one of those quaters Rampage had a six minute ad break AEW won in a landslide.

What a week for TK!

Oct 19, 2021 14:12:42 GMT Big Pete said:

Well SmackDown had more viewers but if you break it down into quarters and focus purely on the key demos and factor in that one of those quaters Rampage had a six minute ad break AEW won in a landslide.

What a week for TK!

This is the first post in PW history where I genuinely don't know if this is taking the piss or if it's real.

Oct 19, 2021 14:17:51 GMT Todd said:

Oct 19, 2021 14:12:42 GMT Big Pete said:

Well SmackDown had more viewers but if you break it down into quarters and focus purely on the key demos and factor in that one of those quaters Rampage had a six minute ad break AEW won in a landslide.

What a week for TK!

This is the first post in PW history where I genuinely don't know if this is taking the piss or if it's real.

:lol:

I'm not sure if you've heard it or not, but the Observer just posted the clip which made it sound like Dave was performing all these mental gymnastics to call it a huge win for AEW.

The giddiness from Dave is what makes it.

In terms of any AEW vs. WWE stuff, I think Bischoff puts it well here, in a small clip from his podcast.

Oct 19, 2021 0:05:12 GMT Blindy said:

Oct 18, 2021 23:02:41 GMT WMS said:

No, she didn’t.

Not with the demo with the news that came out but on a channel that it barely if WWE ever airs in at all, WWE still won the overall rating. 

Though SmackDown won the overall viewership 866,000 viewers to 578,000 viewers, the two shows tied in the demo with a 0.24 rating.

Head-to-head, WWE SmackDown scored 878,000 viewers compared to Rampage's 602,000 viewers.

In the 18 to 49 demographic head-to-head, AEW Rampage drew 328,000 viewers in the demo while SmackDown drew 285,000 viewers.

Tony Khan sent out the following tweets in response to AEW winning the demo head-to-head.

A woman wrestler clowned Jericho on NXT when she faced Io Shirai and defeated Jericho and Guevara in a match and same said wrestler beat Punk vs Matt Sydal. Banks statement.

The 18-49 demo needs to stop being overemphasized, people 50+ also matter as well. As well as the under 18 demographic which WWE goes hard after. I also question how the ratings are conducted, for sons or daughters or even grandsons or granddaughters who live under a household with someone 50+ years old, is that not countered as a view from a 50+ year old despite it not really being the case?

0.28 > 0.21 during the same quarter, so no she didn’t beat Punk and Sydal. Punk’s replied on Twitter to her tweet moments ago. Banks statement indeed. Clown. :lol:

The funny part is, at what point in the last 15 years has WWE cared about the 18-49 demographic?

If WWE was so concerned with that demographic, the product wouldn't be geared towards kids. We watch every week and see that.

Also, how was the viewership for AEW in Australia or New Zealand or Japan or... oh, right. AEW isn't a global brand.

Someone has dug up a post on Twitter by Meltzer in 2019 saying that ratings are based on total viewers. Made me chuckle. 😂

The demo is definitely a real thing, it’s how TV shows have been ranked for years. Meltzer used to ignore it because it provided context that WWE wasn’t struggling as much as he wanted to show that they were. As soon as Dynamite started and did better in the demo than in viewership, Demo Dave arrived.

Why does AEW have the constant urge to compare themselves to WCW?

" we're WCW in 1996 "

It's like rebuilding the Titanic. It's going to sink.

Oct 19, 2021 18:10:42 GMT WMS said:

Oct 19, 2021 0:05:12 GMT Blindy said:

Not with the demo with the news that came out but on a channel that it barely if WWE ever airs in at all, WWE still won the overall rating. 

Though SmackDown won the overall viewership 866,000 viewers to 578,000 viewers, the two shows tied in the demo with a 0.24 rating.

Head-to-head, WWE SmackDown scored 878,000 viewers compared to Rampage's 602,000 viewers.

In the 18 to 49 demographic head-to-head, AEW Rampage drew 328,000 viewers in the demo while SmackDown drew 285,000 viewers.

Tony Khan sent out the following tweets in response to AEW winning the demo head-to-head.

A woman wrestler clowned Jericho on NXT when she faced Io Shirai and defeated Jericho and Guevara in a match and same said wrestler beat Punk vs Matt Sydal. Banks statement.

The 18-49 demo needs to stop being overemphasized, people 50+ also matter as well. As well as the under 18 demographic which WWE goes hard after. I also question how the ratings are conducted, for sons or daughters or even grandsons or granddaughters who live under a household with someone 50+ years old, is that not countered as a view from a 50+ year old despite it not really being the case?

0.28 > 0.21 during the same quarter, so no she didn’t beat Punk and Sydal. Punk’s replied on Twitter to her tweet moments ago. Banks statement indeed. Clown.

That's a demo and that was WWE not even on it's regular channel vs AEW being on TNT that the almighty Punk barely won the 18-49 demo.

Am I the only one who doesn't give a flying fuck about these drawing money conversations, breaking it down by segment/match and demographic? Why do need to go that level of detail? It's so petty, and in my opinion, meaningless. Billionaires waving their dicks around.

I'm a fan, and I just want to see wrestling. I watch WWE for Roman Reigns, I watch AEW for...most of their content. Don't care if one attracts more fans than the other. Both are successful, and that's great.

Oct 19, 2021 23:56:31 GMT Emperor said:

Am I the only one who doesn't give a flying fuck about these drawing money conversations, breaking it down by segment/match and demographic? Why do need to go to that level of detail? It's so petty, and in my opinion, meaningless. Billionaires waving their dicks around.

I'm a fan, and I just want to see wrestling. I watch WWE for Roman Reigns, I watch AEW for...most of their content. Don't care if one attracts more fans than the other. Both are successful, and that's great.

I feel the same way, Considering when Roman says we run sports entertainment. That's saying that there is a different fanbase that each promotion caters to.

Oct 19, 2021 23:56:31 GMT Emperor said:

Am I the only one who doesn't give a flying fuck about these drawing money conversations, breaking it down by segment/match and demographic? Why do need to go that level of detail? It's so petty, and in my opinion, meaningless. Billionaires waving their dicks around.

I'm a fan, and I just want to see wrestling. I watch WWE for Roman Reigns, I watch AEW for...most of their content. Don't care if one attracts more fans than the other. Both are successful, and that's great.

I’m only in this thread because I am easily bored and like participating in any conversation I can, but I agree with you 100%

For anyone wondering why the 18-49 demo is such a big deal, it’s because that is the demo that buys tickets and merch. It’s also the best demo to build a fanbase on. AEW coming out on top in that demo is important for business whether you think it matters or not.

While the "18-49 demographic" might be important, saying you won that while overall losing in the total rating is the equivalent of saying "we outscored the other team in the third quarter, and even though they out scored us in the other quarters and have the "W" by their name, we still won".😂

18-49 might actually purchase the tickets but young kids can bug their parents til that demo buys them so it's still not necessarily a bad market to tap into.

Kids are also more likely to want, say, John Cena branded backpacks or Super Soakers or whateves.

I think we've well established this sort of talk appeals to their core audience and does little more than stir the pot online.

Oct 20, 2021 0:56:26 GMT Michinokudriver said:

18-49 might actually purchase the tickets but young kids can bug their parents til that demo buys them so it's still not necessarily a bad market to tap into.

Kids are also more likely to want, say, John Cena branded backpacks or Super Soakers or whateves.

Most of those kids watch what their parents watch. And most 30-40 year olds that have kids are more likely to watch AEW at this point.

NATH45 raises a good point though.

Here's what I don't get...

The whole point of the key demos is because they attract higher ad-rates but doesn't AEW actively drive advertisers away with how violent it is and liberal use of coarse language? It's something they've been better with but that Nick Gage incident seems like a real black eye for the promotion and exactly what the WWE were driving at with the blood and guts quip.

As a fan I don't really care about ratings beyond why certain talent seems to be featured above others. I understand it's one of the few metrics you can judge success under and it sort of helps quantify Pro Wrestling as a sport but it can be really boring and there's little rhyme or reason. The only reason why this receives so much attention is that if you listen to Meltzer it's unavoidable so you have to take the good with the bad and that includes him being giddy over The Bunny drawing the same demo as Brock Lesnar.

The issue WWE is having is it brands itself for children.  AEW does not.  WWE is PG, AEW is TV-14.

I don’t know why people are saying 18-49 spend more on merch or whatever, it’s just an advertising demo because those people are more suggestible and less likely to be brand loyal.

Also, WWE isn’t marketing toward children specifically. It’s accessible to children. It’s marketed universally, similar to Marvel films.

As always, Big Pete nails it on the head. There is a lot that goes into why WWE is more advertiser-friendly. And the AEW stan (Meltzer included) circle jerk about this ratings win is cringe inducing. I don’t mind people niggling Reigns because he asked for it but there are AEW guys posting on Twitter how proud they are of Bunny for winning the demo, unironically. What are we doing here?