[Emperor Smeat]

The Sheets:

Originally Posted by Observer Prior to their investors' call Thursday morning, WWE released their 2019 Q2 numbers, showing a year-over-year decrease in revenue to $268.9 million and 1.69 million average paid WWE Network subscribers. They attributed the 5% year over year decrease from $281.6 million to declines in their media, live events, and consumer products divisions. WWE highlighted the following quarterly highlights in their release: - $17.1 million operating income, down from $21.2 million in last year's Q2. - $34.6 million adjusted OBIDA (operating income before depreciation and amortization) which was higher than they previously forecasted for ... - Network subscribers were down 6% and they expect a further drop in Q3 to 1.53 million average paid subscribers, saying they do not expect a record number of subscribers this year. - A 17% increase in digital video views to 9 billion and a 22% increase in consumed hours to 324 million hours across digital platforms. Those are assumed to include YouTube and other social media platforms and not just WWE Network ... - They pointed to June for improvements in year over year decline of both Raw/SmackDown TV ratings and live attendance ... - Average North American attendance was 5800, down 2%. Average international attendance was 4900, a 14% decrease. - Merchandise sales were down 13% year over year to $23.1 million, attributed to lower online sales, lower toy product royalties, and less live events to sell merchandise at.

Stock market ended up being happy for some strange reason and WWE stocks rose to $75.83 afterwards.

Originally Posted by PWI George Barrios said today on the WWE Second Quarter earnings call that for the month of July, Raw's audience share is up. In a Greg Brady kind of way (for those who aren't aware, it's a classic moment from The Brady Bunch), it's true. But, there's a caveat. If you look at the first three weeks of the month, they were actually down over 9% from 2018 ... When you add in this week's shows, the numbers change. Last year Raw did 2,780,000 while Monday's show did 3,093,000 viewers. Of course, this year we had the Raw Reunion nostalgia show, which was designed to bring back lapsed viewers. And it worked, but it also allowed WWE to make a point that things were turning around that went unchallenged on the call.

Originally Posted by PWI Major League Wrestling has entered into an official working relationship with Japan’s Pro Wrestling NOAH, PWInsider.com has confirmed. The relationship will be announced officially in the days ahead.

Originally Posted by PWI The Austin, Texas-based Wrestlecircus group has canceled its 7/28 date. Owner Al Lenhart sent an email to those booked on the show apologizing, stating that he was shutting down and was done with wrestling. The promotion has not announced the cancellation but a number of talents booked forwarded the email announcing the cancellation privately.

Originally Posted by PWI WWE Network News is reporting today's WWE Network "Hidden Gem" selection for today is the April 19, 1985 Pro Wrestling USA Show from East Rutherford, New Jersey at the Meadowlands. The description reads as follows: Pro Wrestling USA 04/19/1985 – Meadowlands Mayhem [Duration: 01:54:41] Sgt. Slaughter battles Kamala in a Ugandan Death Match, while Larry Zbyszko tangles with Bob Backlund in this Pro Wrestling USA spectacular.

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter The term Wednesday Night Dynamite was never used in the release and only All Elite Wrestling, but Tony Khan said that All Elite Wrestling would not be the name of the television show. It is believed the show name will be announced in the next week or two. Dynamite is a possibility but there are other names being test marketed ... The 10/2 date means it will go head-to-head with major league baseball playoffs, which are likely for at least three of the four Wednesdays up through 10/23 including the World Series on the latter date. There is a National League playoff game on 10/2, an American League playoff game on 10/16, and the second game of the World Series is 10/23. If there is a seventh game of the World Series, it would be on 10/30. But all wrestling in October will have major baseball competition. It’s also not a secret that WWE is looking to counter program this show with an FS 1 airing of NXT. Whether that show would be one hour or two hours, or live or taped, is not known. The talks are serious enough that in a FOX call to Northeastern affiliates last week, they brought up that possibility ... It should be noted that FS 1 had a contract to air Big East basketball on Wednesday nights, so there may be a scheduling issue in the early months. The idea of NXT on FS 2 would be counter productive since the goal is to beat AEW in ratings with a developmental show, not to draw lower numbers than AEW. AEW would have the advantage of being on a much stronger station that is also available in more homes. TNT is in about 89 million homes as compared to 82 million for FS 1 and 57 million for FS 2.

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter Among WWE plans for the show, if the deal is done, would be to have more main roster talents appear on NXT, but it would not be a haven for main roster talents. The idea right now is a few guys here and there and not to have them dominate the show. Even though A.J. Styles made a remark to Shawn Michaels about he knows he’s in NXT, which some felt was leading to the O.C. going to NXT for a program, we were told that was not the current plan. Of course, all plans will change greatly as time comes closer and in particular, after the early ratings come in.

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter While we’ve heard nothing official on this, one idea that has been floated from both the AEW and TNT side has been to air the U.S. debut of “Omegaman,” the TSN in Canada documentary on Kenny Omega, as a promotion vehicle for the launch in some form and to expose Omega to a wider audience as a top superstar. The documentary is very strong in Omega coming across as someone who can carry a promotion, but the flip side is much of the documentary focuses on the Omega & Kota Ibushi Golden Lovers tag team, and there is no movement at all right now regarding Ibushi working for AEW. At this point it seems like it’s something that has been brought up, but I don’t know the odds of it happening are particularly good.

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter Fyter Fest ended up being the second biggest event ever on B/R Live. The only event the service has ever had that added more subscribers was the day they did the Tiger Woods vs. Phil Mickelson golf head-to-head match this past November The goal right now is to run 100 to 120 live events per year, probably four PPVs, 51 television shows and many Saturday night house shows and on occasion more than one house show a week, but with the idea that in spreading the talent out, the top talent does maybe 75 matches, a number hopeful to keep their ability to work great matches high, since that’s probably more of a key goal is high match quality on top as compared with any other promotion

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter SummerSlam has been updated with six official matches as well as one other confirmed, and likely several more to be added over the next few weeks ... The other name from the past originally advertised for the show, The Undertaker, is not going to be there at least as of right now. He was never on the list of matches even though Undertaker vs. Drew McIntyre was the only match being advertised in the market prior to the Extreme Rules show. You have to always remember that WWE, for whatever reason, believes that they have no compunction to deliver advertised matches they do for the local market. It still boggles my mind how they do this regularly and because it’s wrestling, it’s acceptable ... Bray Wyatt, in his new character, The Fiend, will face Finn Balor ... This would seem to be a program that can lead to Balor’s split personality of The Demon coming out. The last we were told, Balor was not doing this match as The Demon, but it would seem that at some point down the road it would be logical.

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter They haven’t done interviews for Benoit but the names they were hoping for were the first ones I would have picked, Sandra Toffoloni (the sister of Nancy Benoit who knows the case better than anyone), Chris Jericho (who has studied the case harder than any pro wrestler because he considered Chris Benoit his best friend in wrestling at one time), Chavo Guerrero Jr. (Who Benoit was close with, often traveled with, and who Benoit texted that weekend), Michael (Chris’ father) and David (Chris’ son from a first marriage) Benoit. They either have or will talk to Bravo’s widow soon for that piece. Brawl for All looks to be a certainty as a topic and they have already talked to Bart Gunn for that story. A piece on Jimmy Snuka has also been discussed

In regards to current plans for season 2 of Viceland's Dark Side of the Ring series.

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter Dr. Michael Sampson, who was a longtime WWE doctor and the guy who saved Jerry Lawler’s life, is the head physician at AEW

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter The Saudi Arabia show is back to its original date on 11/1 in Riyadh at King Saud University Stadium ... So now it’s back to a situation where there is going to be a PPV on a Friday afternoon, and a few hours later there will be a live Smackdown from the Prudential Center in Newark, unless the decision is made to tape Smackdown that Monday or move the Newark show to Tuesday that week and tape Smackdown ahead of time. One way they could manage is promote the Friday show in Newark as an all-women’s Smackdown show. That would at least take the place of the Evolution PPV that for whatever reason isn’t on the schedule this year. They could heavily promote it as an all-women’s Smackdown, the first time ever and could use that to offset the obvious criticism of them running if Saudi Arabia doesn’t allow the women to come ... I really don’t know why they didn’t schedule an Evolution show this year and it is still possible they could but it’s not on the schedule. Last year’s show was considered a huge success as far as a show itself goes. Business-wise, it did sell out the Nassau Coliseum even though it was a slower moving ticket than usual and the secondary market tanked ... There is the feeling that without Ronda Rousey they didn’t want to risk an all-women’s PPV show, but that doesn’t matter if it’s a television show. We’re told that it being back on the same day as a TV taping, which is the plan right now so they aren’t planning on moving TV up at this point. As far as how all of this is handled, we’re told that is so far in advance that no discussions have taken place

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter Paul Levesque met with officials from Dragon Gate when he was in Japan. WWE officials have also met with Stardom officials. So that tells you Japan is more of a target. Australia is also a major target right now as they have been actively recruiting all the top wrestlers there. Robbie Eagles, who many consider the best guy, is under a New Japan deal and Gino Gambino has been announcing for New Japan and is a member of Bullet Club but no word if he’s got a deal there

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter Corbin was the first performer in WWE this year to hit 100 matches. At press time, he’s got 20 wins and 80 losses. Others with the most matches are Scott Dawson with 96 (which includes two matches on most shows in recent weeks the way they’ve been booking the tag title at house shows), Dash Wilder with 95, Kofi Kingston with 95 and Ricochet with 90

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter The most notable name people asked about not being there was Bret Hart. Hart was asked, but declined. Some thought his being on the AEW show made him a persona non grata, and I’m certain they weren’t thrilled he was, but he was invited. He said that he’s loving the summer in Calgary and didn’t want to miss one day of it. He wasn’t taking any appearances this summer because of that, and won’t be until August. He’s in a unique position in life that he can do what he wants in life and has no need to do anything he doesn’t want to at this stage

Originally Posted by Observer Newsletter Regarding the 10/4 Smackdown debut on FOX in Los Angeles, the hoped for big hook would be Dwayne Johnson there live. At this point he has not committed to doing the show but that is something talked about Some have thought Balor would enter the club. Of course anything is possible at some point but right now there are no plans in that direction. There are actually no plans with Balor after SummerSlam since he’s leaving on a two-month sabbatical at that time Even though during the DX vs. The O.C. angle on Raw Styles made a remark about knowing you’re at NXT to Michaels, right now there are no plan for Styles, Gallows and Anderson to invade NXT. At this point, at least for now, there are no plans for The Street Profits to do anything but what they are doing on Raw, meaning no plans for them to wrestle at this time on Raw. By wearing the NXT tag titles in all of their segments, while this is not the main reason they’re on the show, it is considered an advertisement for NXT and that if you like them and want to see them, that NXT is where you see them wrestle

Didn't take long before WWE started messing up Heyman's plans since I doubt he actually wanted them to do nothing on the main roster.


TPWW Frontpage:

• Impact TV Update: Potential Bad News as Talks With AXS TV May Have Failed
• WWE: SmackDown Re-Written By Vince, Why Corey Graves Missed SD, HBK Not Wrestling
• Vince McMahon Says WWE Will Stay “PG,” Won’t Have “Blood and Guts” Like AEW
• CM Punk Says AEW Made Him an Offer Last Month, Talks the Probability of His Future in Wrestling
• WWE Network Launching Free & Premium Tiers Over the Next Few Months
• Jimmy Uso Arrested for DUI