YUCK! Those ratings look ugly this week, especially for the WWF. Overall viewership was down on each day this week, and the WWF really suffered from all of this. A 5.4 in the first hour? Terrible. A 6.4 in the second hour? Weak for being unopposed. This is legit proof, WWF, that your product is becoming stale. Even your lower programs, and even Smackdown, went down in the ratings. What's even worse is that they aren't jumping to WCW's show. WCW suffered a decrease in the ratings as well, which could mean that a lot of channel flippers quit watching.
Many of you criticized me for giving this "stale" WWF a B+ ahead of WCW. Well, I thought that the WWF action was more solid and much more understandable than WCW's. WCW shoves a lot of storylines within each segment, and half the time it comes out of nowhere. I'd say their wrestling matches are a tad bit off compared to the WWF's. WWF put on a good show, but nothing spectacular occurred. That's the reasoning for the B+ versus Nitro's B. Besides, a B+ is just 0.4 points ahead of a B, which isn't much of a difference!
Heat has taken a pounding in the ratings lately, which means that many are saying "forget about it" to WWF shows now. That's not good, and JR can't take his shots at WCW for having its 1st show lower than the WWF's 3rd show. Even Thunder got the best of Heat this week. Yikes. Don't believe me yet about the WWF? Look at poor Livewire and Superstars. Although I believe Superstars is the same from last week, Livewire dropped significantly in the ratings. Maybe many are considering NOT watching on Saturday morning because the program gets repetitive? ECW on TNN had a usual 0.8, and on a good ratings night, they could have taken Livewire! Doh!
Whatever case you can make from this analysis, the WWF certainly needs to start stepping up to their potential. It's been said that the current storylines in the WWF are set until Summerslam, where a planned Stone Cold return will change everything. Can you wait that long for these storylines to change?
A New Wrestler- A new wrestler as in a wrestler just entering WCW from another place. I do believe that everyone in the WWF is under contract for a while, thanks to the Vince Russo scare back in the fall. Any WWF wrestlers who have contracts running out can't work for WCW for a year, so forget that. What about ECW? Raven? Well, he wouldn't be much of a surprise considering he was misused at WCW to grad any attention. I still feel that it's a damn shame how WCW used Raven though. He was a Monster in ECW, and they turned him into a crybaby in WCW. Shame, shame, shame. For those who are wondering, it WILL NOT BE Shane McMahon. I don't know what savage started this, but whoever did it, has a lot of individuals convinced.
ECW Buyout?- I highly doubt this one, especially considering that WCW loses more money than it makes. Buying ECW wouldn't be worth their while, although help from Paul Heyman would be better in WCW than Vince Russo.
WCW selling to SFX?- My question is: Why would WCW make an angle over this? This isn't it, definately.
A return of an old school wrestler- What about Roddy Piper? What about the Macho Man? You know, Macho isn't under any contract to nobody. If he wanted to sign with the WWF, then he could..but he hasn't. Although Savage wants top dollar for his contract, he'll eventually realize that he's not worth it anymore and come back...probably to WCW. As for Piper, I would be so shocked, I'd turn the channel!
I don't know, whatever it may be, it better be the best thing since sliced bread from Bischoff and WCW's hype about this situation. A letdown could be devastating for WCW right now.
Yes! The Great Muta is coming to WCW the week of June 19th through June 26th! He's, by far, my favorite Japanese wrestler of all time. I remember him when he had a great stay at WCW. He was one of the best television champs around in his day, and he always gave Sting problems. Of course, that was young Great Muta, and the new one isn't as agile, but he's more better on technical wrestling skills. I think Russo should take a good look at the Great Muta and notice that he was a man who was over without English speaking skills!!!!
Nothing like a good serving of Chunder Thunder on a Wednesday night. That show that SHOULD gain higher ratings than Nitro, but that proves there are a lot of channel flippers in this world. Here's a preview from the wonderful WCW.com to rip on look at:
Oh no, Goldberg is going after Bischoff on Thunder!! Maybe he'll challenge him for the covetted Hardcore title(more on this in a moment). Yeah, that would be the day. Gee, somebody firing their top superstar...I wonder where that was done before?
Uh oh, Vince Russo will be personally throwing Ric Flair a retirement party. Wow, I finally see why Flair didn't want to be involved in Russo's storylines before. Look how badly Flair gets ridiculed with Russo in charge. It's simply ridiculous. Many call this whole angle the best thing on television, and I'll call it one of the worst.
Apparently, Jeff Jarrett suffered some "broken bones" at the hands of Sting Monday, which puts his colossal high profiled match up with the very skilled Kevin Nash on the big buyrate Great American Bash in jeopardy. Wow, that sentence has lots of prepositions and adjectives. Anyway, we'll probably see Jarrett fool somebody with these fake injuries, and it will probably be Nash to "hype" their match at GAB.
Oh baby! Misfits will have a lot of wrestling to do. Here are the matches that will just smell the ratings:
Lt. Loco Chavo Guerrero vs. Disco Inferno vs. Daffney for the Cruiserweight titleCorporal CajunLash LaRoux vs. Mike AwesomeMajor Stash Van Hammer vs. Billy KidmanGI Bro Booker T and Captain Rection Hugh Morris vs. Chuck Palumbo and Shawn Stasiak
Boy, that was fun to type. 2 more matches will be booked tonight as well, you know, to replace the Luger/Liz matches.
Gerald Brisco- First off, this man was a wrestler. A very tough one at that. I'd believe he could still take a very young and green Crash Holly any day, even at his very old age right now. So with that out of the way, you must also consider another thing. Ever since Crash became Mr. 24-7, that Hardcore title has PURPOSELY became a joke to the wrestling world. It was meant to mean nothing but fun. The theme was that ANYBODY could win that belt at ANY time. With the Hardcore title in WCW, Terry Funk was making a good stand as champ. He had respectable matches, and he brought the term hardcore back into the title. Bischoff winning that somewhat ruined that notion.
Vince McMahon- I keep defending this idea, but here goes again. When Vince won the title, he was one of the top stars on WWF television. Listen to him today, he still gets loud pops when he comes into the arena. With that being said, Vince won the title. But this mistake was repaired though. With months of great matches, Triple H put that World Title back on the map with his historical run. So forget about this. But do you actually think that Vince winning this title is worse than an actor, like David Arquette winning the world title in WCW? Oh please! How about Oklahoma winning the Cruiserweight title?
Stephanie McMahon- With her title win, did it matter? That women's title was so rarely defended anymore, and giving her the title didn't matter as much. Besides, winning that will only now anger the women, as the WWF has decided to bring them back to fight Stephanie. Again, since this title was rarely defended anyway, why not?
Besides, look at the Cruiserweight division at WCW...Daffney, an actress, holds that title. Now that's worse than anything.
I don't know about you, but I'm definately NOT enthused about the Vince/Shane/Triple H versus Kane/Undertaker/Rock match at the King of the Ring. That's the kind of Pay Per View match that scares me away from NOT buying the event. However, I see the WWF jumping to the original format of the show, and that's the tournament itself, which is shaping up with some tough wrestlers. Still, that main event will be a pushover for myself, and other fans from what I've read in the mail.
There has to be some kind of law or restriction on the PTC bothering WWF sponsors. Seriously, they shouldn't be allowed to harass any of them, but yet they got away with brainwashing many to stop placing commercials on WWF shows. It's also funny how they promised to lay off anything associated with WWF programming, including sponsors, but yet they keep coming back. I just hope that the current sponsors are strong enough to avoid this Cult of jealous parents because WWF programs are such a ratings gainer!
@Wow, I didn't know I'd write this much for today. Anyway, that's all for today, as I am set to take my Last Final of the Quarter today! Yipee!!! This past quarter has been burning me out bigtime with craploads of school work. Now, freedom has arrived. I'll be back tomorrow with some Thunder thoughts and the usual PDC.
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Take Care, and Thanks for Reading.