Vince McMahon "freaking out" over WWE ratings

[Everlong]

For what it's worth, Bryan Alvarez noted on Wrestling Observer Live today that Vince McMahon is apparently "freaking out" about the decline in WWE TV ratings, something that usually happens every year around this time. WWE usually makes some kind of big change when Vince is "freaking out" about the ratings.

Not that we can expect any changes to result from this, but yeah, it's definitely that time of year. Football season starting up especially doesn't do WWE any favors.

[DBSoT]

I wish he would freak out enough over the ratings to where he actually makes major changes and attempts to make the product better. Granted, I don't think even he has a clue how to do that.

Vince's real formula: Ratings are falling = BRING IN MORE OLD WRESTLERS.

Kane is in the main event scene in 2015 for shits sake. Big Show is being primed to face Brock. The only time bringing in old wrestlers has really worked was the first few weeks of Brock's return and Rock's return. After the awe of them coming back faded, the ratings dropped right back.

[The Legend]

Well, I guess we can expect Sheamus to cash in on Rollins at any moment now.

I just looked up the Cable ratings from Monday for myself, RAW was still in a near tie for second place for anything on cable on Monday Night in the time slot, they got beat by Monday Night Football 4:1, but that always happens. I'm not sure he's freaking out as much as the report says.

[Hanley!]

RAW was still in a near tie for second place for anything on cable on Monday Night in the time slot, they got beat by Monday Night Football 4:1, but that always happens. I'm not sure he's freaking out as much as the report says.

The ratings are almost as low as they've ever been. Last week was their lowest non-holiday rating since 1997 and this week they broke that record.

I mean, I know they're always going to suffer a hit when Monday Night Football comes around. But Monday Night Football happens every year. The ratings aren't always this low and this time of year. I wouldn't be surprised if he was freaking out. He should be.

I wouldn't expect any good change to come from it though. More dumb short sighted stuff intended to pop a quick rating (that barely will in the end) and nothing to stabilise or improve the gradual slump that they've been going through for years now. We could see a hot-shot title change (or a number of them) for little or no reason. Lots of advertising 90s stars. Maybe a desperate attempt to secure a couple of extra celebrity hosts (which has rarely made a difference).

Vince freaks out about the ratings every now and then it would seem, but he never has new ideas to tackle the issue. His ideas are unfortunately just outdated and he doesn't understand what people want anymore, and infinitely worse than that, he's unwilling to delegate or ask for help from people who could actually change things for the better.

[The Legend]

RAW was still in a near tie for second place for anything on cable on Monday Night in the time slot, they got beat by Monday Night Football 4:1, but that always happens. I'm not sure he's freaking out as much as the report says.

The ratings are almost as low as they've ever been. Last week was their lowest non-holiday rating since 1997 and this week they broke that record.

I mean, I know they're always going to suffer a hit when Monday Night Football comes around. But Monday Night Football happens every year. The ratings aren't always this low and this time of year. I wouldn't be surprised if he was freaking out. He should be.

I wouldn't expect any good change to come from it though. More dumb short sighted stuff intended to pop a quick rating (that barely will in the end) and nothing to stabilise or improve the gradual slump that they've been going through for years now. We could see a hot-shot title change (or a number of them) for little or no reason. Lots of advertising 90s stars. Maybe a desperate attempt to secure a couple of extra celebrity hosts (which has rarely made a difference).

Vince freaks out about the ratings every now and then it would seem, but he never has new ideas to tackle the issue. His ideas are unfortunately just outdated and he doesn't understand what people want anymore, and infinitely worse than that, he's unwilling to delegate or ask for help from people who could actually change things for the better.

Right, but what I'm saying is that in the end what the actual number of a rating is ultimately is less important than the comparison of how that program does against its actual competition. Ratings aren't important for the TV show themselves so to speak when you actually talk about the industry. Ratings are important for advertising dollars. Ratings tell potential advertisers what programs get the most eyes. The program with the most eyes is the most desirable commercial positioning which allows that network to charge more for the extra eyes watching the commercial. Being a program that draws bigger advertising for a network allows WWE to demand more money when it comes time to re-negotiate their rights contract with USA and other networks. And the bottom line is there isn't a program on cable television anywhere from 8-11 pm on Mondays, besides Monday Night Football that drew more eyes than RAW did last week even if it was the lowest rating in almost 20 years.

And on a 2nd point, if you compare almost any cable television show to its counterpart 20 years ago I would guarantee that the show today gets a lower rating. Because, a rating is a percentage of all the TV's in America how many are turned to a particular program. 20 years ago there were like 25 cable channels to choose from, now there's 250 to choose from. More options, more choices dilutes every rating across the board.

[DanielsonTHAGOAT]

You know what this probably means... put the title back on Cena .

It's Vince's own fault that they're suffering in ratings. You spend all that money promoting Summerslam on mainstream outlets like ESPN, Washington Post, etc. You put on a great show only to follow it up with complete garbage and no compelling storylines.

It's not rocket science at this point, learn how to write a well structured story with a compelling protagonist and antagonist. You watch the product now and you can clearly see that they fail to follow the simplest rule in writing. You add in the fact that they constantly take talented guys who go over with the fans like Dean Ambrose, Ryback, Cesaro, and push them to the side. At least give some of those guys compelling storylines so they can build their character and build a brand for the audience to buy into. Look how over Dean was in his feud with Rollins. They missed out on having Dean become one of their top babyfaces.

Like @DBSoT said, they just bring in old wrestlers and hope nostalgia can carry them to the top again. Add in the fact that these old wrestlers are actually not interested in putting over younger talent and you just have a disaster.

It's always 1 step forward and 10 steps back with the WWE. Always. And this may sound morbid but I don't see it changing until Vince McMahon passes away.

[Hanley!]

Right, but what I'm saying is that in the end what the actual number of a rating is ultimately is less important than the comparison of how that program does against its actual competition. Ratings aren't important for the TV show themselves so to speak when you actually talk about the industry. Ratings are important for advertising dollars. Ratings tell potential advertisers what programs get the most eyes. The program with the most eyes is the most desirable commercial positioning which allows that network to charge more for the extra eyes watching the commercial. Being a program that draws bigger advertising for a network allows WWE to demand more money when it comes time to re-negotiate their rights contract with USA and other networks. And the bottom line is there isn't a program on cable television anywhere from 8-11 pm on Mondays, besides Monday Night Football that drew more eyes than RAW did last week even if it was the lowest rating in almost 20 years.

And on a 2nd point, if you compare almost any cable television show to its counterpart 20 years ago I would guarantee that the show today gets a lower rating. Because, a rating is a percentage of all the TV's in America how many are turned to a particular program. 20 years ago there were like 25 cable channels to choose from, now there's 250 to choose from. More options, more choices dilutes every rating across the board.

Surely though advertisers can choose to advertise in whatever slot they want. A smaller rating still means less eyes on the product. So the more lucrative deals are more likely to go to another show in another time slot, at least that's what I imagine must happen.

Also, ratings are indicative of the amount of fans the company has at any given time, so it's valuable as a kind of metric to judge likely future performance in terms of ticket sales, Network subscriptions, merchandise sales, etc. If the amount of people watching your show is trending downwards for a sustained period of time, you can make a fair guess that everything else is going to start trending downwards too.

[JPG619]

Since football season is here I can see why but then again he should change his approach at things since if he created great product that keeps people coming back for more then I can see people skipping football to see what happens on RAW.

I still wish there was WCW or a major rivals out there that can keep the product up there since I seem to lose interest half way into the show since for one thing the show is to long. They should go back to the 2 hour format or at least utilize the time wisely. I feel like that are just using the extra time for bull shit segments that could of been easily cut or just shown on the WWE app or on WWE.com. They should easily just say to see more of this go to WWE.com

[Headlesspete]

It's not rocket science at this point, learn how to write a well structured story with a compelling protagonist and antagonist. You watch the product now and you can clearly see that they fail to follow the simplest rule in writing. You add in the fact that they constantly take talented guys who go over with the fans like Dean Ambrose, Ryback, Cesaro, and push them to the side. At least give some of those guys compelling storylines so they can build their character and build a brand for the audience to buy into. Look how over Dean was in his feud with Rollins. They missed out on having Dean become one of their top babyfaces.

Ambrose....yep....Cesaro.....yep,.....Ryback,..y, WAIT WHAT??

Vince should be worried, because the trend or Raw being awful has been going on for so long, he's probably deluded himself into thinking this is normal and okay. The fact is, ever since Raw went to 3 hours its always struggled, and before then it had some major issues to tackle.

I've never known such a bad situation where upon a creative team of 20+ can't put together a decent show because one person holds them all back. I respect Vince for all he's done, and thank god for him because the WWE would't be here right now if it were not for him, but somebody needs to wake up and see the older WWE fans who have stuck around this long, are starting to fall away, and then who are they gonna keep trying to make buy the Network?

[prophet]

Make new main event talent then, you fucking moron.

[DBSoT]

@headlesspete nailed it on the head. 3 hours has been killing this product for to long. WWE has just extended their fans loyalty just to damn far. They expect us to watch 3 hours on Monday, 1 on Wednesday, 2 on Thursday, and 3/4 more once a month. I can't sit through all that. I could do it for one show even if the writing was bad because I enjoy good matches, but I can't sit through all that week after week. Especially if the stories are crap. If the stories were interesting then I would be willing to at least follow it more. I could then be interested not to miss what is going on, you know like every other TV show.

[Everlong]

Make new main event talent then, you fucking moron.

Very succinct yet filled with truth, I dig it.

[Hanley!]

I feel like prophet could make a variation on that basic sentence as the response to basically every WWE thread that's ever posted on this forum going forward, and it would always be appropriate.

[Circled Square]

Make new main event talent then, you fucking moron.

[Str8Shooter]

Make new main event talent then, you fucking moron.

The sad part is I think WWE is actually not bad at building up talent onto the cusp of the main event, but for whatever reason they're afraid to take that last step and really get behind some people and give them an extended run to prove themselves. And when they do take that chance, they screw it up somehow.

Rollins they are doing it now, but they've booked him as a buffoon mostly and people don't take him seriously. And they did it with Reigns but the fans weren't on board and it almost ruined his career.

But think about all the guys that with the right push could be legit main event talent going forward. Reigns/Ambrose/Wyatt/Owens/Cesaro/Rusev to name a few. Hell they've had chances with Ziggler and Ryback but blew it.

[Circled Square]

That's very true Str8shooter.

Wade Barrett was on the cusp of getting paid stacks and holding a diamond covered belt until they put the Cena roadblock in front of him because WWE pussied out.

[VaderBomb]

PUSH CESARO AND STICK WITH IT.