I actually think the brand extension..

[Cheex Incarnate 0]

In the years following the split, I think the brand extension has worked. Sure ratings are down, but do you actually think that they'd be any higher with one brand (in fact i think they'd be lower). Each brand has effectivley made me think that they have they're own stable of superstars (despite the trades in the early going). Don't you think it would be a bit odd looking seeing John Cena, Kurt Angle, or Edge coming down the RAW ramp, or Rob Van Dam, the Dudley Boyz, or Steve Austin coming down the SmackDown! ramp? I think that was the feeling the WWE was aiming for, and if they keep it up, maybe I will one day consider them to be completely seperate (well, in the sense that the AFC and the NFC are seperate anyways).

-Cheex

[JJMc 0]

Yeah, I think it worked out to a degree.

[UseTheSledgehammerUh 0]

The idea was also to give the entire roster exposure.

 

Smackdown! has failed to give exposure to the proper talent.

 

Instead of seeing Mysterio, Hardy (for his run)Kidman, Ultimo, WGTT, London Spankings, etc. featured in bigger roles, and portrayed as new, cool characters that we can see at house shows and PPV, we get...

 

"That's Matt Morgan, he's huge, what's he doing here!"

"Nathan Jones, the Colossus, oh my God!"

"Hardcore Holly is back!"

MCMAHON-O-MANIA

"The Cat is dancing!"

"A-Train...the Derailer...1-2-3."

"Big Show wins the U.S. Title!"

 

etc. They have failed to push the entertaining talent.

 

Guerrero got a U.S. title reign, so what? It was squashed in a couple months. He had a multi-month IC reign before the brand extension in 2000.

 

Cena has developed a decent gimmick.

 

Benoit's played job-boy and stuck in hoss feuds, doing nothing for him.

 

So what's the Brand Extension done for Smackdown? Given Sable for TV Time? More APA Matches?

 

And RAW, hoo boy.

 

RAW's extremely weak roster needs work.

 

RICO Vs. MAVEN MATCHES?

 

KANE Vs. ROSEY?

 

What the hell is this CRAP?

 

I just watched the first ever Smackdown Special, from '99.

 

EVERYTHING clicked. While some matches may have been poor, such as D'Lo Vs. Droz, they ALL had a purpose, and produced a crowd reaction. Mark Henry returned to a BIG pop from injury.

 

E & C spoke for the first time.

 

Hayes got a bloodbath.

 

Rock and Austin cut a great promo together.

 

Shane was really entertaining.

 

Kane/X-Pac V. Outlaws was fun to watch.

 

Etc...

 

When's the last time you could watch a show and look for lots of GOOD THINGS, not just the extra CRAP that the "brand extension" has added?

 

All the extension is, is Vince paying less PPV-rev. to his workers, and cutting the chances of a union down from happening by permanently seperating the rosters.

 

With Bischoff and Paul E as the figureheads of the shows, it doesn't even feel like the WWF anymore.

 

Fuck Vince and his awful shows.

[razazteca 0]

Lets not forget Kane losing his mask and getting the worst haircut in the history of wrestling.

 

Or the Rico he's queer, he's here, get used to it now with facepaint and diva flava.

 

The HHH holding Raw hostage and giving his fluff boys all of the gold.

 

Random tall blond guys hurting midcard jobbers on Heat.

 

Lots of beer drinking by the GMs

 

S.H.I.T. and xenophobia

[Guest wildpegasus]

Screw the WWE and to some extent the brand extension. It's a good idea but all it's done is allow ---- Ahhh, it's not even worth talking about.

[Steviekick 0]

At least it seems that the WWE is determined to keep the split going. The problem is that too many of the people in the upper card on both shows are the same.

[Lil' Bitch 0]

RICO Vs. MAVEN MATCHES?

 

What the hell is this CRAP?

 

I happen to like that crap you know.

[JJMc 0]

True, the midcarders don't get enough time, but did you really expect that sort of thing to happen? Really.

[Guest Man Of 1,004 Modes]

Not to sound stupid, but whats Xenophobia? I never really paid attention to crap like that.

 

But S.H.I.T was funny.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

House Show attendance is crumbling. That's probably the biggest disadvantage of the split - people don't want to go out and pay to see half the stars; especially if they aren't going to be on camera.

[Guest Disbadger]

Not to sound stupid, but whats Xenophobia?

Anything Jim Ross says during a La Resistance match.

[Guest Man Of 1,004 Modes]

Not to sound stupid, but whats Xenophobia?

Anything Jim Ross says during a La Resistance match.

So its an Arrogant American making fun of other nationalities/races/beliefs?

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

I didn't know football was xenophobia-in-action..

 

wait...

 

*thinks about "football" and the rest of the world*

 

You are SO right.

[Spaceman Spiff 0]

Xenophobia = fear of foreigners

[Guest Man Of 1,004 Modes]

Xenophobia = fear of foreigners

Thanks for clearing that up. But that leaves one question...why doesn't Jim Ross hate evil foreiegner Rosey for being Samoan? Or Val & Lance for being Canadians?

[Spaceman Spiff 0]

Because JR is senile.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

Let's just put it this way: If you carry a flag that is not American (or, if that American flag is upside down *burn!*), you are bad.

[Toxxic 0]

Until Lance turned into a dancing face, he was a Bad Canadian. I still remember the fits of laughter I was in during Christian/Storm vs Hogan/Edge for the tag titles, where Ross slagged off Xian and Storm for their non-American attitude, whilst conveniently ignoring the fact that Edge was Canadian. I think that after a barrage of abuse on the Canadians he actually remembered and said something like "of course Edge is Canadian too - but he's not like them!".

 

Even more sickening was Lawler's analysis of American foreign policy during that match. I think it went something along the lines of "all these other nations - do they respect our American values? No. Do they like handouts and our American dollars? Yes!"

 

Well done Jerry. Tits and xenophobia, what a wonderful commentating ability you possess.

[Masked Man of Mystery 0]

The idea would work fine if they booked it even close to right, which, of course, the have not. See Dragon, Ultimo. See Helmsly, Hunter Hurst. See Kendrick, Brian, etc.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

They haven't even done a press conference in regards to a trade. THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT OF THE SPLIT!

[EdwardKnoxII 0]

Until Lance turned into a dancing face, he was a Bad Canadian. I still remember the fits of laughter I was in during Christian/Storm vs Hogan/Edge for the tag titles, where Ross slagged off Xian and Storm for their non-American attitude, whilst conveniently ignoring the fact that Edge was Canadian. I think that after a barrage of abuse on the Canadians he actually remembered and said something like "of course Edge is Canadian too - but he's not like them!".

I remember this one time after the US went to war. Harvard Chris was coming the ring and he said something like this "Should the US bomb a country just because they don't agree with us." And JR yells back "HELL YEAH WE SHOULD."

[Guest Man Of 1,004 Modes]

Until Lance turned into a dancing face, he was a Bad Canadian. I still remember the fits of laughter I was in during Christian/Storm vs Hogan/Edge for the tag titles, where Ross slagged off Xian and Storm for their non-American attitude, whilst conveniently ignoring the fact that Edge was Canadian. I think that after a barrage of abuse on the Canadians he actually remembered and said something like "of course Edge is Canadian too - but he's not like them!".

I remember this one time after the US went to war. Harvard Chris was coming the ring and he said something like this "Should the US bomb a country just because they don't agree with us." And JR yells back "HELL YEAH WE SHOULD."

......Ok, Jim Ross officially pissed me off, and I defend him all the time. Time to turn the mute button off when I watch anything with him past 1996.

[EdwardKnoxII 0]

......Ok, Jim Ross officially pissed me off, and I defend him all the time. Time to turn the mute button off when I watch anything with him past 1996.

 

Just the way JR yelled the answer to Chris after he asked the question just made me want to punch the TV.

[UseTheSledgehammerUh 0]

I remeber watching WM 19 this year with some old friends that didn't know about "the split".

 

"So who's the champ now," Bill asked.

 

"Well, Triple H is the "world champ" on RAW, but Angle's got the old WWE Title on Smackdown."

 

"Oh, so they fight tonight to unify it?"

 

"No, see there's like, 2 different 'brands'...like WCW and WWF, with different "styles" or something.

 

"So there's two world champs of the WWE? That's so dumb."

 

How do you think the occassional old fan of WWF feels about seeing two fucking champions? SO LAME.

 

Might as well consider WM 18 the end of the WWF, forever. The last true "moment" that wasn't "forced" on us by JR (Rock/Hogan I was just...incredible...). Both brands before the split. ONE champ, and one man to end his reign and start the beginning of the SHIT, Triple H.

 

A case can be made that the "brand extension" represents a whole different company.

 

I don't view the IC title, which already was kinda worthless, as important anymore, because it's RVD or Orton defending against HALF the roster.

 

The RAW title gets defended against, what, 2 different opponents in a span of several months?

 

Fuck the brand extension. It's totally watered down the WWE.

 

R.I.P. WWWF/WWF

1963-WrestleMania 18.

 

(and I know the WWF changed to WWE in May 2002...but WM 18 is my official end of the company's glory. It's just two shitty shows now.)

[tommytomlin 0]

The brand extension may have helped make a few new stars (Cena, Lesnar) and bump up a few others (Edge, Eddie), but who is to say a unified WWE wouldn't have done even more? The WWF didn't need a brand split in 1997-00 to make Austin, Rock, Foley, Kane and Triple H.

[Guest Ray]

The brand extension sort of worked for a while (on the Smackdown side at least). Around July-August 2002, Smackdown started getting good. HHH left, and Rock/Benoit/Guerrero/Mysterio joined. Then we got all that tag stuff leading to and around No Mercy. Smackdown has gone WAY downhill since the summer/fall of 2002.

[Art Sandusky 0]

GASP!

 

The split worked and failed at the same time.

 

After the first few months of shoddy jumps to and from shows and things were stabilized with the GMs and then exclusive PPVs, it worked well from a television perspective. It has also really given a feeling of two different promotions, which was the idea in the first place. Competition is breeding between the crews to be better (although they seem to go backwards most of the time to get ahead), and partisanship has evolved with the fans (see the usual "Smackdown is better" versus "Raw is better" comments).

 

Now then, it failed because, as RRR pointed out, no one wants to go to house shows to see half of the people they see every week on TV. Things have bottomed and leveled out at this point, or so the year-to-year numbers suggest, but they need to find a way to actually motivate people to go see that half of the people on TV. Showing footage from house shows and such is a good first step, but they could probably do something more. I don't know what they could do myself outside of changing a major title at a house show more than once and making it stick on TV for a while.

[Austin3164life 0]

The split still hasn't realized its full potential due to horrific booking decisions made by Vince & Co. The plus is that each show has its own identity in a way. Raw is viewed as the live show with more entertainment and more "star power". Smackdown is seen as the "Sport" side of the WWE, with a bit less "star power" but better athletes. If the Raw crew realized that stories can be told just as well, if not better, in the ring than in a pointless mic/promo segment, then they'd improve their match quality. If Smackdown stops trying to garner the shitty storyline aspect of the WWE (with pointless, and way too many, backstage segments and in-ring promos) then they'll realize that stories basically write themselves if you let the athletes do what they do best; put on great matches(the good ones at least). Letting Brock and Benoit call their match on the spot at least 60% of the match (with the major spots and finish being practiced) is a good thing. Trying that formula with Randy Orton and Maven is not. If they let the workers do their job the way they want to (without letting them run the show completely) then the workers will feel happier and will show a bit more passion during promos (thus increasing their value).