[Emperor Smeat]

Dirtsheets:

Originally Posted by F4W On what will be an interesting day for WWE, the world's top wrestling organization announced that their subscriber number as of 9/30 was 731,000 total, a net addition of up to 4% (31,000) since last quarter. Over the last quarter, there were 286,000 new subscribers and 255,000 cancellations. Considering they were available in 170 new countries and added Canadian TV (Rogers) since the last report, this is a terrible number. Of the 286,000 new subscribers, 23,000 ordered the $12.99 monthly deal. The network will be available in the same version as the U.S. in the United Kingdom during the month of November.

Lost a big chunk of their US base to the point the international market barely put them in the positive for the quarter. Still haven't been able to reach a million overall even with counting unique accounts. Also of those new subscribers, just 3,000 was from the US.

Originally Posted by F4W Worse, the July PPV number, the prior B show, was 99,000 buys worldwide but September's Night of Champions fell to 48,000 worldwide, so more people stopped buying B PPV's than have been added to the network as subscribers.

Originally Posted by Observer The battle plan is still for Brock Lesnar to defend the title next at the Royal Rumble, against John Cena, and for Roman Reigns to wind up as champion. WWE made it clear on Raw that Cena is being primed for champion emeritus, calling attention to his being at the tail end of his run, which was a portrayal most felt was premature to be made public. Reigns, with new nicknames like “The Juggernaut” and “The Big Dog,” is being primed for the top position. The plan has always been for Lesnar to retain against Cena and be the unstoppable monster that Reigns stops, preferably at WrestleMania, and after winning the Royal Rumble. Generally, WWE top of the card Mania plans are usually pretty obvious by December, although this plan was evident much earlier. And usually, they don’t change, although they changed greatly last year, between the crowd turning on Batista, Daniel Bryan’s emergence and C.M. Punk quitting.

Originally Posted by Observer Daniel Bryan was also in the news. In Houston on 10/28, at the Smackdown tapings, Big Show, in a segment not taped for television, and seemingly taped to cheer Bryan up, led the crowd chanting “Yes” and telling them that Bryan may need elbow surgery. We’d reported it was likely he would need surgery because his strength in his right arm still isn’t coming back. The situation is significant. Bryan made a public appearance on 10/28 in Santa Clara. According to what we were told, even though he was wearing a long sleeve shirt, it was described to us, and photos backed it up, that you could tell Bryan’s left arm looked big and has retained its usual muscle (while not a big muscular guy by wrestler standards, by normal person on the street standards, he’s thickly muscled) and his right arm looked much smaller. We were told there is no timetable for his return nor a guarantee he will return. There have been reports that he’s going to get Tommy John surgery, an elbow procedure common among baseball pitchers, which has a long recovery time. WWE officially has been quiet about his situation publicly but wrestlers have talked about him needing major elbow surgery.

Originally Posted by Observer Cody Barbierri, the employee who allegedly made the comments regarding Del Rio that led to Del Rio slapping him hard and being fired, is no longer with WWE and has started his own social media consulting business. Barbierri was in catering several months back and didn’t clean off his plate. When someone brought it up to him, he said, “That’s what guys like Del Rio are here for.” Del Rio wasn’t there at the time, but somebody told Del Rio he made that remark. Del Rio confronted Barbierri and complained about him saying it and asked for an apology. Barbierri didn’t apologize. Del Rio slapped him really hard and knocked him down, and was then fired.

Some other sheet news include the Network dropping the 6 month commitment option but staying at $9.99 per month, new Network subscribers get a free month, and WWE somewhat gave up on Ambrose as a possible top star for now.