[Emperor Smeat]

The Sheets (Observer Newsletter Edition):

Full Gear got great reviews overall. From a PPV standpoint, early indicators, and since most of the buys they get are streaming from FITE TV and BR Live, the early indicators are more accurate than in the past, it looks to have done about the same as All Out in September and Revolution in February (the Jon Moxley vs. Chris Jericho and Page & Omega vs. Bucks show). Domestic buys were lower than those shows but overseas buys were higher, and it should be around 100,000 when all is said and done. They pushed the replay harder than usual on television. Last year’s Full Gear was the lowest number the promotion has done and the feeling was it was the college football on Saturday nights in the fall makes it the hardest month they do a PPV in. The lineup looked very strong going in. The Countdown show was excellent, but aired in a bad time slot and didn’t draw a big number. Based on UFC patterns, it appears when no sports were going on that more people were willing to buy PPV, hence AEW setting a record for its first show when the pandemic started. Now, with so much economic turmoil and sports back, the last few UFC numbers have been disappointing. AEW was happy with the number since the goal was to beat the show last year which it did handily. The Eddie Kingston-Jon Moxley main event promos were tremendous (then again for last year’s Full Gear, Cody and Chris Jericho’s interview stuff was great and to me the number it drew was a disappointment).

Shaquille O’Neal was shown backstage on the show, and on the 11/11 Dynamite show there was a segment that seemed to start the tease of a Rhodes vs. O’Neal match. O’Neal had, when he signed his new deal with TNT, talked about wanting to do a match with Rhodes. But dealing with O’Neal can be difficult since O’Neal vs. Big Show more than once was scheduled for WrestleMania, only to fall through, with each side blaming the other. Obviously AEW needs publicity stunts like O’Neal and Mike Tyson (which also seems to have fallen through since it was originally planned scheduled for All Out, and there’s been no hints of it ever since). AEW has the largest viewers per home in wrestling, but also the number of homes watching is not growing, so they are very popular and have great appeal to couples or families who are already aware. Expanding awareness and growth, which is far more difficult in a fragmented society, is tough, especially because the perception is still the No. 2 brand in an industry that has historically almost always supported only one brand strong, with shockingly few exceptions ... WWE did get tremendous benefits from Mr. T and Cyndi Lauper in 1984-85, and Tyson in 1998. But a lot was different. Even when Tyson did the angle with Jericho, it did get mainstream pub, and perhaps the actual match would have been big, but the media coverage outside of the people who cover wrestling wasn’t as big as I had expected. It certainly did not have the impact of the 1998 angle with Tyson and Steve Austin. Shaq is a move you have to try if you can because if it works, it is what you need if you can use it, get new eyeballs from it and covert those eyeballs into the core, which sounds easy but is actually really hard. Cody on the AEW podcast said, “In year two, we’re going to make some big moves to expand the audience that are not so much moves that you would think we would make, but I’m excited about them.”

There is talent in WWE that has been told in recent contract negotiations that the old way of touring is not coming back, even if and when the country bounces back from COVID. One more step in the company pretty much admitting that is its mindset came this past week when about a dozen employees who work on the live events side, the most well known name being ring announcer Tony Chimel, were released. The reality is the company is setting record profits without doing house shows, and the house show division had started over the past year plus to often be a money loser. The economics of the business are completely different than they ever have been. If anything the key value of house shows now isn’t in money making, but in giving wrestlers more experience. It was also thought to be good for making a stronger base of fans, and selling merchandise. What they found out is that with no house shows, all of a sudden WWE shop merch numbers skyrocketed and the total merch sales ended up being almost identical to when there were shows, which shocked everyone. In theory lack of house shows will slow the progress of the younger talent, particularly the athlete types WWE has signed who didn’t have years learning in the ring on independent shows. But that’s more an NXT issue. They need to get the newer talent more ring time before fans. At the WWE level, with very few exceptions, mostly some of the women, all of the wrestlers are good workers and are doing just fine in the ring wrestling fewer matches. The pandemic has turned into a learning experience because the less travel, less matches, less exhaustion and wear-and-tear has led to fewer injuries and will likely lengthen careers at the top level. A big surprise this past week was the firing of Derek Casselman, who had headed the arena merchandise division. Casselman had been with the company since 1993 and his official title was Director of Venue Merchandise and Remote Operations. But that firing, as well as that of ring announcer Tony Chimel seems to play into the idea that house show touring as we used to know it is not going to come back at the same level.

The Survivor Series on 11/22 is being pushed as the farewell appearance of The Undertaker. Undertaker is not going to wrestle, so I guess all have agreed at this point that the A.J. Styles match will be his farewell for real, since historically he’s said he’s done many times, and then Vince McMahon calls him prior to WrestleMania. He said he had badly wanted a great match to leave on. It would be virtually impossible for him to top the Styles match presentation, both because of the production involved, the talent of Styles and the graveyard setting. He did get to go out in the most talked about and popular match on a most-unique WrestleMania show. But the way WWE is promoting this appearance, it seems everyone is on the same page that he’s done and won’t play the character again after the show. IWA in Puerto Rico announced Savio Vega coming to the show so it appears WWE is bringing in many of Undertaker’s personal best friends. Many of Undertaker’s other good friends will also be invited, and confirmed names include Mayor Glenn “Kane” Jacobs and Charles “Godfather” Wright ... The women’s match has Nia Jax & Shayna Baszler & Mandy Rose & Dana Brooke & Lana vs. Bianca Belair & Ruby Riott and three more women to be named. The Raw team storyline is that they don’t get along, and Jax feels Lana will hurt the team so continually puts her through a table and wants her out. It’s pretty clear the idea is to get Lana over by her constantly being bullied and not quitting, but the way they book her character without the hope spots and losing quick squashes and not being competitive at all, while continually featuring her, is certainly unique.

AAA: The update on health conditions in Mexico City is such that no fans will be allowed at shows for at least a few more weeks and AAA can’t announce a date for TripleMania. While they have said on multiple occasions they won’t do TripleMania without a crowd and it’s not cost-effective, there was talk when it looked like a crowd in December isn’t going to happen and since the year ends in December and they don’t want to not do TripleMania 2020, that they are more tan open now to the idea of an empty arena show. I don’t know why instead of empty arena they can’t do a drive-in show since they’ve been doing those over the past few weeks El Hijo del Vikingo, who was going to take a long time off after the birth of his child, is expected back soon.

There is no scheduled start date for Dark Side of the Ring. The belief is that the next season will be a set of seven episodes, then some time off, and then another set of seven episodes. Some episodes have become public. There will be a Smith family episode focusing on Grizzly Smith but going into the entire family, which includes Rockin Robin Smith, Sam Houston and of course Jake Roberts.

Joey Ryan started a Go Fund Me for his legal proceedings. He was hoping to raise $100,000. Last we looked he was at $250 and then lowered the goal to $1,500

ROH: The television from this point will be about building for Final Battle. The date is expected to be announced on 11/16, but it will be sometime in December, be from their usual arena in Baltimore and with no audience. It will air live, the company’s first live broadcast since the pandemic and be on PPV as well as Honor Club. The plan is for Rush and Dragon Lee to return for the next tapings and this show to defend their respective ROH and TV titles as things stand right now. All of the Mexican talent that is on the current roster are scheduled for the tapings. The European talent under contract will not be back this year but they hope to get them back early next year. As far as their future after that, given most contracts expire at the end of this year and both may get other offers, it’s hard to say. Rush got a far better deal than WWE offered him. MLW claimed to have offered him a better deal than ROH previously. WWE can always outbid ROH if they choose to, but considering the number of dates he worked, Rush had a great deal this year at a time when everyone else based in Mexico struggled badly. Lee’s deal is that he loves New Japan and his ROH deal allows him to work New Japan. But he hasn’t been back to New Japan and is working here rather than the Best of the Super Juniors tournament.

A few notes on Kylie Rae. She was scheduled to win the women’s title from Deonna Purrazzo at Bound for Glory. She was also going to be one of the two women playing Marvel characters in AAA which was going to be a high-profile mainstream spot, with lots of merchandise in Mexico and the possibility of it opening up in the U.S. as well. As of right now, even though she is no longer wrestling, she has not been released from her contract here

Dezmond Xavier, Zachary Wentz and Trey Miguel have deals that have just expired and will be finishing up with next week’s television show with a match with Rich Swann & Miguel. On the TV show this week, they handled it very strangely. They got a letter they were being evicted form the tree house next week and thus, somehow, must leave Impact so next week’s TV is their final match. The way we heard the story is they got an offer that wasn’t great and they have had interest from WWE for NXT for all three. The belief is they are headed to NXT and will be part of the loaded next class that looks right now to also include Alex Zayne and Benjamin Carter. Miguel has been talked about for NXT but others close to the situation say that either NXT or AEW is still a possibility

Regarding AEW talent and the two Tokyo Dome shows, right now nobody is scheduled to be on either show. That’s not locked in stone, just the situation as of 11/12. In a normal year the entire Dome card(s) would be laid out by now but we’re told they actually have two sets of shows, one with foreign talent they think they can get if traveling restrictions ease and another if they don’t. For Americans going to Japan, to appear on the Tokyo Dome show they have to fly out by 12/20. AEW is not taping on 12/23, as that show will be taped 12/17. They are taping 12/30, so talent would only have to miss that episode since you can work the first day and easily make it back for a live show on 1/6. The only two key guys are Jericho and Moxley, the latter in particular since he’s U.S. champion. But as of press time that’s a no

The woman bodybuilder in the Cody Rhodes segment was Jade Cargill, 28, who was signed to a regular contract. There are different types of deals. All wrestlers where the company announces publicly that they have signed, like Cargill, are on weekly guarantees. For the newcomers, those talents are as a general rule higher paid than NXT talents, but would be lower paid than WWE main roster talent but obviously things vary based on individuals. The wrestlers who are brought in regularly to Dark as opposed to maybe once or twice, often are signed to contracts but they are per-show deals. Benjamin Carter was an exception, but almost everyone who appears on Dynamite has one deal or the other. If they’ve been announced as signing it’s the weekly guarantee. If they haven’t been announced as signing it’s a contract being paid per show booked. Cargill is currently training at QT Marshall’s wrestling school and has also trained at AR Fox’s school and Heath Miller’s (Slater) school.

There was no real political thing behind Don Callis announcing Kenny Omega’s match at Full Gear. The two are super close. All of what Callis said while announcing was true. He’s known Omega since was ten because Omega’s uncle, The Golden Sheik, was Callis’ manager and mentor in the late 80s. Then, when Omega started wrestling, Callis was promoting indie shows and he pushed Omega from the start. Callis considers Omega like his little brother. When the Golden Sheik died in 2007, Omega pushed for Callis to deliver his eulogy. It was also Omega that got Callis, who had been out of wrestling for more than a decade, back in when he got him the New Japan announcing gig. New Japan had wanted Bret Hart for the role but Omega suggested Callis. Omega asked he help call the match and Tony Khan was fine with it even though Callis is an executive for Impact. From what we were told Callis was doing it as a favor for Omega. Ed Nordhom and Scott D’Amore at Impact were also fine with him doing it. Khan did tell Callis at the show that if it wasn’t for Omega vs. Jericho, there probably wouldn’t be an AEW, since Callis was the one who convinced Jericho to do the match

Arn Anderson is trying to trademark the term Four Horsemen for pro wrestling. There has been an issue from Notre Dame University. There was a group of players on the Notre Dame football team decades ago that were known as the Four Horsemen, even though the term comes from Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

Most have believed this to be the case, but we were confirmed to that Alex Zayne has signed with WWE which is why he’s leaving the indies. Zayne is really spectacular and was one of the best guys on the indies. He probably could have used another year there and hopefully he doesn’t get stockpiled. My sense of him was that he had great potential but he wasn’t as ready as Jake Atlas, who is getting TV time but I don’t think has ever come across close to what he was when he had more freedom. But given the state of everything, the impetus to sign an offer early from WWE or AEW is there with so many fewer indies running

We’ve been told that several of the people who left [WWE] and signed elsewhere did get offers to return, but for lower money.

The WWE Network has gone from current to nostalgia for the most part, especially now when all the focus of the network’s feeds are Undertaker shows. The top ten most-watched for this past week were: 1. Mortician: The Story of Paul Bearer (people have told me this one is really good); 2. Talking Smack; 3. Undertaker: The Last Ride episode one; 4. Meeting the Undertaker; 5. Best of Eddie Guerrero; 6. Raw Talk; 7. Undertaker’s Most Bone Chilling Matches; 8. Survivor Series 2019; 9. Uncool with Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross; 10. Undertaker’s Last Ride episode two. NXT for 11/4 placed 18th. NXT U.K. for 11/5 placed 25th. No 205 Live or independent shows or compilations were in the top 25

WWE Ratings, AEW vs. NXT Ratings:

SPOILER: show

Raw on 11/9 started with a good deal of interest and a very strong first hour, but had a big drop as the show went on, finishing at 1,690,000 viewers and 0.53 in 18-49 (689,000 viewers). Raw was fourth in 18-49 behind the New England Patriots vs. New York Jets game (9,828,000 viewers and 2.79 in 18-49) and two other football related shows on ESPN. The news shows were back to normal levels after gigantic weeks and aside from the NFL, Raw beat everything on cable in 18-49 as well as beating CBS (all reruns) and FOX on the network side. It placed fourth in every key male demo under the age of 49. Raw was 40th overall, behind three shows on ESPN and 36 news shows, being first on cable overall among entertainment shows. The key story was the three hours, with hour one at a strong 1,847,000 viewers, hour two falling hard to 1,690,000 viewers and hour three did 1,532,000 viewers, which would be the fifth lowest hour in the history of the show, for Nia Jax vs. Asuka, the 24/7 title skirmish, Ali vs. Ricochet and Miz & Morrison & Randy Orton vs. Drew McIntyre & New Day. The 17.1 percent drop, and heavily male rather than female, was the negative. Raw was up 2.1 percent in viewers but 10.1 percent in 18-49 from last week. The comparisons to the same week last year were much closer than they have been, but last year’s show on the same week was the least-watched show up to that point in the history of the show. The drops from last year were still 17.8 percent in viewers, 17.2 percent in 18-49 and 29.5 percent in 18-34. As far as where the first-to-third hour drops were, they were shockingly low with women (teenage girls actually showed a big increase in hour three) and shockingly high with men. The drops were 4.7 percent in women 18-49, 24.7 percent in men 18-49, but there was an 10.6 percent increase in teenage girls and a 27.9 percent decrease with teenage boys and 16.5 percent in over 50. Women doing well as far as hour three retention looks to be related to people tuning in early to see the first episode of the new season of Miz & Mrs. The show did 111,000 in men 18-34 (down 1.8 percent), 101,000 in women 18-34 (up 27.8 percent), 308,000 in men 35-49 (up 7.3 percent) and 169,000 in women 35-49 (up 15.0 percent). The show did a 0.26 in 12-17 (same as last week), 0.31 in 18-34 (up 10.4 percent), 0.75 in 35-49 (up 8.7 percent) and 0.78 in 50+ (up 9.9 percent).

The Sasha Banks vs. Bayley women’s title match on the 11/6 Smackdown show did a whopping 2.52 million viewers for its entire presentation over the first half. It was the most-watched match and segment on WWE television since before the pandemic. The entire reason for the rating was the women’s title match, and the entire gain over previous weeks was because the show did a monster numbers with women 18-34, likely the best number any wrestling show has done in that demo since the early part of the year. The match led Smackdown to a 1.39 rating, 2,135,000 viewers (1.38 viewers per home, continuing a strong showing for two straight weeks in that category that had been low previously) and 0.67 (866,000 viewers) in 18-49. The 18-49 number isn’t far from pre-pandemic numbers which were around 0.75 and has made a huge comeback in recent weeks. As compared to last week, the ratings was up 2.2 percent, viewers were up 1.3 percent, 18-49 was up 2.0 percent and 18-34 was up the 0.4 in 18-34 was the same as the prior week. Smackdown was first among network shows in 18-49, but 22nd for the night behind 21 cable news shows. And really, with the difference in cable and network homes, it’s realistically closer to about 38 news shows, but you can’t fight the news on election week. Nothing else on network TV topped 0.5 in 18-49. Smackdown beat two prime time network shows although both were at 10 p.m. so they were last in total viewers among the network shows ... In the key demos, the show did 181,000 in men 18-34 (up 2.3 percent), 129,000 in women 18-34 (up 59.3 percent), 355,000 in men 35-49 (down 11.8 percent) and 243,000 in women 35-49 (down 6.2 percent) ... It was notable because the first Banks vs. Bayley match after the split on Smackdown didn’t do well as far as TV ratings went, so it was the continued build and the storyline of whether Banks could retain the title she always loses quickly that was the key. The other thing is the match came off like the blow-off because they are switching to Banks vs. Carmella in the title program. As compared to the same week last year, the show was down 14.7 percent in ratings, 11.3 percent in viewers, 21.6 percent in 18-49 and 33.3 percent in 18-34. Still, in comparison with a year ago, those are far better comparison numbers than WWE television has done in a long time. Because that was the thing that drew the rating, the audience actually dropped significantly during the show, at the level of a worse than usual three-hour Raw. Coming from a week where a segment with the Jey Uso vs. Daniel Bryan match featuring Roman Reigns was the first WWE show in months where the final segment did the biggest number, this week was the biggest drop during a show in recent memory. The half hour breakdowns (we don’t get quarters for Smackdown) told the story. The second half hour, built around the Mysterio family storyline with Seth Rollins & Murphy, and featuring Rey vs. King Corbin, did 2.33 million viewers, a big drop but that half hour does usually fall a little. The third half hour, which usually rises and is often the peak of the show, with the last 5:00 of Rey vs. Corbin, a Natalya vs. Ruby Riott vs. Zelina Vega match and Otis vs. Seth Rollins did 2.28 million viewers. The final segment, the Michael Cole interview with Lars Sullivan and the Jey Uso vs. Kevin Owens match did 2.13 million viewers.

Even though election week is over, the news still dominated the ratings on 11/11 and wrestling ratings were roughly the same as last week. AEW did 764,000 viewers and 0.30 in 18-49 (389,000 viewers), for the No. 17 spot on the night, but the top 15 were all news shows so AEW was third in non-news shows behind two episodes of Real Housewives. Still, that has to be disappointing coming off a PPV. The show was hurt in the sense that none of the draws–Moxley, Jericho, Young Bucks, Omega, Cody or even MJF and Orange Cassidy wrestled on the show. AEW was seventh in Men 18-49 and first among non-news shows since Real Housewives are heavily female skewed . It was only 20th in 18-34 and sixth among non-news shows which is lower than usual. Males 12-34 did poorly by AEW standards, finishing 22nd, and being beaten by six non-news shows as opposed to usually finishing much higher. AEW had more women 18-34 watching than men by a 43-57 split. NXT did 632,000 viewers and 0.16 (210,000 viewers) in 18-49, for the No. 56 spot overall and No. 18 among non-news. The only sports competition was college football on ESPN head-to-head with both that did 722,000 viewers and 0.18 in 18-49. AEW was up 6.6 percent overall and 1.6 percent in 18-49. NXT was up 3.6 percent overall and 16.0 percent in 18-49. As compared to the same week last year, AEW was down 20.2 percent in viewers, 30.2 percent in 18-49 and 58.8 percent in 18-34, which is better in comparison to last year than Raw and Smackdown were doing except in 18-34, but worse than Raw and Smackdown are now doing. NXT was down 15.7 percent in viewers and 36.0 percent in 18-49. AEW doubled NXT in women 18-34 and men 35-49. But in women 18-34, where back in August AEW was winning overall, the comparison this past week was 129,000 for Smackdown, 111,000 for Raw, 56,000 for AEW and 23,000 for NXT. By key demo, AEW did 43,000 in men 18-34 (down 23.2 percent from last week and that was against the monster news numbers) and NXT did 28,000 (up 115.4 percent). In women 18-34, AEW did 56,000 (down 12.5 percent) and NXT did 23,000 (up 53.3 percent). In men 35-49, AEW did 202,000 (up 9.8 percent) and NXT did 95,000 (up 3.3 percent). In women 35-49, AEW did 88,000 (up 11.4 percent) and NXT did 64,000 (up 4.9 percent). In the main event battle, AEW with Penta vs. Rey Fenix and Pac return did 732,000 viewers and 389,000 in 18-49 and NXT with Oney Lorcan & Danny Burch defending the tag titles against Tyler Breeze & Fandango and the post-match did 555,000 viewers and 173,000 in 18-49, so AEW more than doubled NXT in 18-49 in the main event segment. The opening segment saw AEW do 773,000 viewers and 385,000 in 18-49 for the Taz promo and Brian Cage vs. Matt Sydal. NXT did 717,000 viewers and 247,000 in 18-49 for Johnny Gargano vs. Leon Ruff for the North American title and the post-match backstage stuff. The second quarter saw AEW do 764,000 viewers and 387,000 in 18-49 for the Cody Rhodes segment with Jade Cargill and Brandi Rhodes and the Starks & Cage angle with Cody Rhodes & Darby Allin & Will Hobbs. NXT did 666,000 viewers and 227,000 in 18-49 for Santos Escobar vs. Jake Atlas. The third quarter saw AEW do 816,000 viewers and 398,000 in 18-49 for the Omega-Page video and Dustin Rhodes & QT Marshall vs. Butcher & Blade in a bunkhouse match. NXT did 680,000 and 239,000 in 18-49 for the end of Escobar vs. Atlas, a Shotzi Blackheart promo and the Raquel Gonzalez/Boa deal. In the fourth quarter, AEW peaked with 870,000 viewers and 430,000 in 18-49 for the end of Rhodes & Marshall vs. Butcher & Blade for the bloodbath part, a Miro & Kip Sabian & Penelope Ford promo and the beginning of the MJF induction into the Inner Circle. The big thing to me was how a bloodbath street fight match with guys who aren’t pushed at the top would do on national TV, and it was by far the best thing on either show as far as how it did. NXT fell to 609,000 viewers and 199,000 in 18-49 for the Timothy Thatcher/August Gray/Dexter Lumis angle and the beginning of Candice LeRae vs. Toni Storm. In the fifth quarter, AEW did 747,000 viewers and 383,000 in 18-49 for the ending of the Inner Circle induction of MJF & Wardlow, a Young Bucks vs. FTR video and Young Bucks promo and the beginning of Scorpio Sky vs. Shawn Spears. NXT did 641,000 viewers and 213,000 in 18-49 for the end of LeRae vs Storm, the post-match and beginning of Lumis vs. Thatcher. In the sixth quarter, AEW did 716,000 viewers and 374,000 in 18-49 for the end of Sky vs. Spears, a Kenny Omega promo and beginning of Tay Conti vs. Red Velvet. NXT did 617,000 viewers and 197,000 in 18-49 for Thatcher vs. Lumis, the post-match with Cameron Grimes and Gargano with William Regal. In the seventh quarter, AEW did 696,000 viewers and 364,000 in 18-49 with Conti vs. Velvet, an Inner Circle promo and an Eddie Kingston promo, basically doubling NXT in the key demo. NXT did 571,000 viewers and 183,000 in 18-49 for a Tommaso Ciampa promo, a Rhea Ripley/Io Shirai video and a Pat McAfee promo with his group. In the main event segment, AEW gained 36,000 viewers and 25,000 in 18-49 while NXT lost 16,000 and 10,000 in 18-49. AEW did a 0.11 in 12-17, 0.14 in 18-34 (down 17.5 percent), 0.46 in 35-49 (up 10.3 percent) and 0.27 in 50+ (down 6.9 percent) ... Since NXT didn’t finish top 50, we don’t have comparisons past NXT was up 82.1 percent in 18-34 and 3.9 percent in 35-49.

AEW on 11/4 did 1.52 viewers per home. Of course with 717,000 viewers, that means the number of homes watching was only 472,000, much lower than usual due to news shows. The AEW issue is that in the homes where people watch, they are very popular, but that number of homes is not growing. On 11/4, it was way down from usual, but that was expected due to all the news coverage, but that is the biggest issue of growth of somehow getting more homes to know about them. Really, it’s the epitome of a niche product that does well with its audience but isn’t expanding. Which is better than heavy contraction like a lot of television and staying even under these situations is better than most things on television. But as far as trajectory goes, in August it looked like with WWE huge declines and AEW’s steadiness that things would get close in a year or so, and right now the trajectory has changed in the sense WWE is no longer declining, and Smackdown is growing with its three big angles. So the long-term prognosis is very different.