Webster Hall Show

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Do you happen to know the buyrates for The TNA PPV's before the year before Russo came in? They must not have been all that great to begin with, otherwise why did Jarrett/Dixie Carter re-hire Russo? Some of you act like TNA before Russo came back was this unstopable, money garnering force, when if in fact it was, Russo wouldn't have even been needed, and those who were on the previous creative team,(whoever the hell that was), would still be employed. No, this is yet another attack to discredit Russo simply because some people don't care for his work.

Do you happen to know the buyrates for The TNA PPV's before the year before Russo came in?

 

Yes. They were in the 35,000 range. PPV buys have unceremoniously sagged in the last 18 months.

 

They must not have been all that great to begin with, otherwise why did Jarrett/Dixie Carter re-hire Russo?

 

Because Dixie thinks Russo was the man responsible for the WWF's success in 1998, and he can duplicate that success with TNA. She doesn't know or realize that not only was that success a team effort, edited by Vince McMahon, but that Russo is greatly overrated.

 

Some of you act like TNA before Russo came back was this unstopable, money garnering force, when if in fact it was, Russo wouldn't have even been needed, and those who were on the previous creative team,(whoever the hell that was), would still be employed.

 

Nobody was acting like that, but exaggerations make it easier to try and put forward a losing argument.

 

No, this is yet another attack to discredit Russo simply because some people don't care for his work.

 

The results discredit everyone, not just Russo. But making it seem like a direct attack on Russo does make it easier to try and cloud the issue. The issue being that the current direction just isn't working.

[Chazz 0]

I actually thought Russo was overrated as well when he and Ed Ferrera left The WWE in for WCW in 1999. Then I changed my school of thought when it became blantanly obvious that Vince McMahon wasn't The Creative Genius everyone thought he was. He simply surrounded himself with 2 talented writers,(Ferrera and Russo), and then took credit for their success. I really don't care about ratings, ppv buyrates, live attendance, etc. to enjoy a pro wrestling program. But since some of you are apparently enamored with that sort of thing, compare the numbers Russo helped to generate when he was part of The WWE Creative Team from mid-1997-late 1999, to the current WWE product of the last several years. Must not be too good, otherwise why is Smackdown being kicked off a shitty, third rate network,(and being put on an even shittier, 4th rate network), and USA lowballing offers to renew showing Raw? I don't remember any of that taking place during Russo's run. The WWE was expanding with their programming during that time,(Heat, Smackdown), because there was obviously a demand for it, unlike there is now.

[garfieldsnose 0]

So you blame Vince McMahon for WWE's decline in ratings, despite having an amazing profitable year in 2007? The boom period is over. There will never be a demand for wrestling unless there is another bonafide #2 contender to give WWE a run.

 

Vince Russo didn't have a Vince McMahon in WCW. Look what happened to it. Vince may not have come up with all of the ideas, but once presented them by Russo, he fixed it up a little bit. That's a huge reason why Russo succeeded in the WWF and not WCW.

[Chazz 0]

Vince Russo didn't kill WCW. They/you expected him to not only restore the half dead patient know as WCW back to life, they/you wanted it back to 100% health? Much like in TNA a year and a half ago, if those in charge at WCW were doing their jobs at the time, then Russo(and Ferrera), wouldn't have been needed, would they? And the boom,(in The WWF/E) probably wouldn't have happened if Russo wasn't at the head of creative. I guess some of you forget that when Nitro started kicking Raw's ass on a consistent basis, Vinnie Mac was still featuring bullshit, 1 dimentional kittie characters,(Doink, T.L. Hopper, The Who, Mantaur,etc.), on their programming. It was only after Russo became head of creative that he convinced McMahon that he was going to have to change direction in the product to make it more exciting and edgier. Russo had the smarts to let people like Stone Cold, The Rock, and HHH, basically be themselves. Vinnie Mac apparently did not. The rest is history. And like I said, The WWE must not have had that great a year in 2007, otherwise Smackdown would be retained by The C.W. and not going to a 4th rate network, and Vinnie Mac wouldn't have to worry about his longest running, highest rated show being lowballed for a new contract because the ratings aren't what he promised USA when they came back there.

[garfieldsnose 0]

Vince Russo didn't kill WCW. WCW was killed by the people running it. Vince Russo was not running it. I am saying because WCW did not have a Vince McMahon, Russo failed there. That is because of the people in charge not knowing how the hell to filter some of the crap that Russo writes to make it great TV the way it was in the WWF.

 

The CW only got rid of Smackdown because wrestling fans would only tune in to CW to watch Smackdown and none of the other shows. It was on a press release or news story or something. It was even posted on here. So you're wrong in your thinking that CW got rid of Smackdown because of its ratings, because it's still one of the highest rated programs on CW. As for RAW, as long as they keep raking in good PPV buyrates and expand overseas, the TV ratings don't matter much in the long run.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

So, in amongst all that pro-Russo nonsense, is there any kind of defense of the current TNA direction? Or is talking about the subject at hand a little hard to do when you can't defend Russo, or the rest of the TNA writing team?

[iggymcfly 0]

I wasn't trying to say that TNA's lack of main event faces was all on a lack of talent. In the Impact thread, I wrote a whole paragraph specifically about how badly TNA books its faces. My point was that the general format of the show is fine, the midcard is great, and they don't need to turn Impact into a freaking house show. All they need is to take a couple of characters that can act cool by themselves, get out of their way, and push them to the top.

 

It's kind of frustrating, because the heels consistently deliver hilarious lines, and have well-written, fleshed out characters. The bookers are also great at getting the heels heat in the ring. (See how well Awesome Kong has been protected, even with a couple of losses.) It just puzzles me how they fail so miserably trying to get the faces over.

 

Just wanted to bring this down to the bottom since somehow the forums gave it a date-stamp of February 3rd instead of March 3rd.

 

Also, for people that have followed TNA/indys longer than me, how do Daniels and AJ Styles do on the mic as faces (Curry Man gimmick aside)? I think the next TNA champion should be a face that's a homegrown talent that's still fairly young, but I'm really struggling to find someone worthy. I think Joe doesn't have the mic skills to handle that unless he's got someone feeding him really good lines and he just won't getthat in TNA. I love, love, love AJ Styles' heel work to the point that he's probably my favorite wrestler right now, but I don't want him to turn if his character's significantly weaker as a face.

 

It would be kind of fun too if Curry Man somehow got a TNA title shot by winning a battle royal or something, Kurt Angle didn't take him seriously, and he picked up a win before unmasking to reveal himself and saying that if TNA wants to keep its title, he better be rehired ASAP and at huge money.

[Guest Shylock]

I wasn't trying to say that TNA's lack of main event faces was all on a lack of talent. In the Impact thread, I wrote a whole paragraph specifically about how badly TNA books its faces. My point was that the general format of the show is fine, the midcard is great, and they don't need to turn Impact into a freaking house show. All they need is to take a couple of characters that can act cool by themselves, get out of their way, and push them to the top.

 

It's kind of frustrating, because the heels consistently deliver hilarious lines, and have well-written, fleshed out characters. The bookers are also great at getting the heels heat in the ring. (See how well Awesome Kong has been protected, even with a couple of losses.) It just puzzles me how they fail so miserably trying to get the faces over.

 

Just wanted to bring this down to the bottom since somehow the forums gave it a date-stamp of February 3rd instead of March 3rd.

 

Also, for people that have followed TNA/indys longer than me, how do Daniels and AJ Styles do on the mic as faces (Curry Man gimmick aside)? I think the next TNA champion should be a face that's a homegrown talent that's still fairly young, but I'm really struggling to find someone worthy. I think Joe doesn't have the mic skills to handle that unless he's got someone feeding him really good lines and he just won't getthat in TNA. I love, love, love AJ Styles' heel work to the point that he's probably my favorite wrestler right now, but I don't want him to turn if his character's significantly weaker as a face.

 

It would be kind of fun too if Curry Man somehow got a TNA title shot by winning a battle royal or something, Kurt Angle didn't take him seriously, and he picked up a win before unmasking to reveal himself and saying that if TNA wants to keep its title, he better be rehired ASAP and at huge money.

Joe does perfectly fine on the mic. He had a string of good promos leading up to BFG06. The Steiner ones, the one in the video package for the four way, and the one he did bleeding from the head on Jarrett.

 

He can do fine when he's not being given lines by some hack magazine writer.

[Chazz 0]

So, in amongst all that pro-Russo nonsense, is there any kind of defense of the current TNA direction? Or is talking about the subject at hand a little hard to do when you can't defend Russo, or the rest of the TNA writing team?

 

Ratings are good for Impact, and Spike T.V. is happy with it. PPV Buyrates aren't where they should be, but I attribute them to the general state of wrestling the last several years. For example, I've never seen R.O.H., but I've heard very good things about it. I read just last week that their last PPV did 19 TOTAL buys. 19. But hey, Russo must be doing something right; You,(and many others), supposedly hate Russo and The TNA Product, yet continue to watch Impact. I don't think it makes much sense to continue watching a show,(or visiting a folder discussing said show), of a program you can't stand. So the current direction must not be that bad afterall.

[Toxxic 0]

I hate Impact, by and large. I watch it in the hope that it'll get better, back to how it used to be. Just like I used to watch Raw and Smackdown before I finally gave up on them both. I've already decided that I'm not going to watch it live anymore, just tape it and fast forward through all the shit, particularly all the Kurt Angle stuff.

[iggymcfly 0]

I've already decided that I'm not going to watch it live anymore, just tape it and fast forward through all the shit, particularly all the Kurt Angle stuff.

 

I hope you're not including the AJ Styles/Karen Angle stuff or Angle's actual matches in this, because if you are, you're fast-forwarding through the best parts of the show.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

That's the BEST part of Impact?

 

No wonder I watch old wrestling on 24/7 on Thursday nights.

[iggymcfly 0]

Hell yeah, it's almost reaching the quality of the old Kurt/Steph/HHH triangle that helped launch Angle's career in the first place only Kurt's playing the HHH role of the gruff over-confident husband while AJ Styles is playing the Kurt Angle role of the sweet innocent guy who's slowly falling in love with the wife. Kind of a neat contrast I think.

 

And as for Angle's matches, well LDO. He just dragged about **1/2 out of Kevin Nash last week, he of the gray hair and no working joints below the stomach area. The thought of an eventual Angle/Styles match is enough to make me cream my pants.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

I thought you didn't care about star ratings and workrate?

[iggymcfly 0]

You don't know me very well then. I just said that the primary purpose of television is putting on quick entertaining segments that build up the big matches at the PPV, and I also said that a good storyline is very important and enhances the matches a lot.

 

It's not like I don't care about in-ring ability at all though. It's not a coincidence that all my favorite wrestlers (Angle, Styles, HBK, RVD) are extremely talented on the wrestling side of things.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Hell yeah, it's almost reaching the quality of the old Kurt/Steph/HHH triangle that helped launch Angle's career in the first place only Kurt's playing the HHH role of the gruff over-confident husband while AJ Styles is playing the Kurt Angle role of the sweet innocent guy who's slowly falling in love with the wife. Kind of a neat contrast I think.

Except people were emotionally invested in that angle, and when it ended so badly, it turned a lot of people off. If this angle ends as badly as the Kurt/Stephanie/Hunter one did, I doubt we'd get the same reaction.

 

 

[AlaskanHero 0]

I think the angle is good little bit of television and I'd like to get emotionally invested in it, everyone involved is doing such a good job in their roles. However, I've been trained to expect a swerve. I just know I'll be pissed at the ending, so I'm not going to bother and get worked up over it.

[Jericho2000Mark 0]

I'd like to see the source that says the last ROH PPV did 19 buys.

[RedJed 0]

I'd like to see the source that says the last ROH PPV did 19 buys.

 

Same here, especially considering I accidentally ordered it twice, lol.

[Chazz 0]

I'd like to see the source that says the last ROH PPV did 19 buys.

 

I got it off Scott Keith's Blog for Feb. The entry is ironically entitled, "And you thought TNA's buyrates were bad?"

[MikeJordan23 0]

I'd like to see the source that says the last ROH PPV did 19 buys.

 

It's in the Observer.

[Jericho2000Mark 0]

Can you confirm this, HTQ/CHP? I'm not going to look through useless moron's blog.

[tekcop 0]

I haven't read the Observer, or anything, but I remember reading that they were getting about that much in Canadian buys, but I thought they were getting at least 100 or so domestically.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

The source for the low ROH buys was Slam (as the 19 refers to Canada only), but they might have got it from the Observer.

 

The PPVs cost $10 more in Canada for no good reason which may have hurt buys ($15 ROH PPV? Sign me up! $25 when I'm already ordering a WWE show? We'll see).

[Cheech Tremendous 0]

19 buys? 19 goddamn buys?

[MillenniumMan831 0]

19 buys? 19 goddamn buys?

 

You can't say goddamn on pay per view.

[The Dames 0]

From what I've heard, it was 19 buys on Dish Network, not 19 buys total. They get the majority of their PPV buys through InDemand.

 

Dames

[Cheech Tremendous 0]

19 buys? 19 goddamn buys?

 

You can't say goddamn on pay per view.

 

Don't worry, nobody is buying them anyways

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

From what I've heard, it was 19 buys on Dish Network, not 19 buys total. They get the majority of their PPV buys through InDemand.

 

Dames

Ditto. It was one provider in Canada that only had 19 buys for one of ROH's shows. There hasn't been a number released yet for overall PPV buys.

[Cheech Tremendous 0]

From what I've heard, it was 19 buys on Dish Network, not 19 buys total. They get the majority of their PPV buys through InDemand.

 

Dames

Ditto. It was one provider in Canada that only had 19 buys for one of ROH's shows. There hasn't been a number released yet for overall PPV buys.

 

 

Let's not let facts get in the way of a really hilarious story.