The General Wrestling Thread

[Spidey]

Could not agree more with the last couple posts. I haven't paid a dime since Rock/Cena 1, mainly just for the Rock's initial return. Before that, nothing in like 5-7 years maybe more. But I'll definitely go in for at least the first 6 months. If the product is good, I'll keep going. If they start pulling some PPVs off the network to make them "more important" or exclusive events and they are actually more important, I'm more likely to buy them now with this scenario then I was in the past.

I don't follow quite as close as the regulars in this thread, but if they went to having monthly or every couple weeks having a glorified raw that only the network gets and then having 5-6 major PPVs that you actually have to buy in the future, Im much more likely to get those as long as they truly feel special. So now instead of getting nothing from me, they have roped me in to $120 per year as well as potentially another $60 x (5-6) per year. Hell, even if only half of them are important, they are still getting far more than they have gotten from me in a very long time.

If they do this right, I think they will do well. The big thing is, in the future, they need to make the actual PPVs important and special. Whether they can do that or not, remains to be seen. I have my doubts, but I'm hopeful.

[JimLeavy59]

TNA wasted the prime years of Samoa Joe's career.

[JayDizzle]

TNA wasted the prime years of Everyone NOT from the WWE's career.

FTFY.

[Warner2BruceTD]

Why have I not been following Missy on twitter all of this time?

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[LiquidLarry2GhostWF]

Missy Hyatt has been a good follow. She's ridiculously hilarious.

[Warner2BruceTD]

Missy Hyatt has been a good follow. She's ridiculously hilarious.

She watches an obscene amount of wrestling. Tweeting about Wrestle Kingdom & BIG JAPAN HOUSE SHOWS.

This is my dream woman, even if she looks like a wax museum version of herself now.

[LiquidLarry2GhostWF]

She watches an obscene amount of wrestling. Tweeting about Wrestle Kingdom & BIG JAPAN HOUSE SHOWS.

This is my dream woman, even if she looks like a wax museum version of herself now.

Enjoy your Hepatitis HIV.

[Warner2BruceTD]

Enjoy your Hepatitis HIV.

Are you saying it's not a good idea to follow Buff Bagwell, and half the UWF locker room?

[Guest]

So not only has Ric Flair received death threats from Panthers fans for his support of the 49ers, he ask has a warrant out for his arrest due to "separation support and legal fees" and if he were to be arrested, he would have to pay all of it before being released.

Man, it must suck to be him right now.

[Warner2BruceTD]

And the dominoes are starting to fall...

Satellite broadcaster DirecTV is less than thrilled with the WWE's plans to launch an online network and said it will have to rethink its relationship with the programmer and whether it will continue to offer its pay-per-view specials.

As part of the WWE's online network, which will launch next month, its 12 pay-per-view specials including the hugely popular "Wrestlemania" will be made available to subscribers at a price tag of $9.99 a month.

Traditional pay-TV distributors including DirecTV have for years counted on WWE's pay-per-view specials as a solid revenue source. Typically the distributors and WWE split the cost to consumers 50-50 and the price for the pay-per-view specials ranges from $55 to $70.

...

"Clearly we need to quickly re-evaluate the economics and viability of their business with us, as it now appears the WWE feels they do not need their PPV distributors," DirecTV said in a statement, adding that the audience for its events "has been steadily declining, and this new low-cost competitive offering will only accelerate this trend."

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/cotown/la-et-ct-directv-wwe-clash-ppv-network-20140109,0,2707112.story#ixzz2py6eYAxa

[s@ppisgod]

Let me say that I do think this is a very forward-thinking move by the WWE, and I agree with the direction. But I also think that the days of them getting more than $10 from 80% of their fans are going to be gone now. Why buy any DVD from them for $20/ 5-7 hours of footage when you can get hundreds of hours for 1/2 that? Their attendance has been lackluster for a while now, at least by their previous standards. They tour too much, and that isn't going to stop anytime soon. So they're sacrificing PPVs to the App gods, but I also think they're putting DVD sales at risk. Luckily the kid demo love the larger than life experience, and they put on a good spectacle.

[Warner2BruceTD]

--The 2/27 NXT show will be airing live on the WWE Network, but I'm not sure if it'll be just one hour or the entire four-hour show. This will be part of a free one-week trial for the network from 2/24 to 3/2. WWE has sent a release saying they predict between 1 million and 2 million subscribers to the network by the end of this year. They also said in the release that while they will continue to put PPVs on television, that there is a risk that not all providers will carry WWE PPVs going forward. They also expect lower profits this year as a transition year as they believe the network revenue will not cover the loss of PPV revenue and costs of starting up the network.

[Warner2BruceTD]

Let me say that I do think this is a very forward-thinking move by the WWE, and I agree with the direction. But I also think that the days of them getting more than $10 from 80% of their fans are going to be gone now. Why buy any DVD from them for $20/ 5-7 hours of footage when you can get hundreds of hours for 1/2 that? Their attendance has been lackluster for a while now, at least by their previous standards. They tour too much, and that isn't going to stop anytime soon. So they're sacrificing PPVs to the App gods, but I also think they're putting DVD sales at risk. Luckily the kid demo love the larger than life experience, and they put on a good spectacle.

If they get the 1-2 million subscribers they think they'll get, that's $10-$20M per month off the network alone, and they won't give a flying fuck if that cannibalizes PPV, let alone a comparatively tiny revenue stream like DVD.

120,000 PPV buys times, let's say, $25 when factoring a third party split, that's $3M. That's only 300K network subs to break even on PPV. But then you have to consider WrestleMania's 1.2M buys. That's $30M! Now, they won't lose all of that, because they won't lose every single PPV buy (international, some people will prefer to get the more stable/higher quality TV feed, etc), but you can see where they are needing 1M+ subscribers to make this thing work. That's not even factoring in things like start up costs, the DVD revenue you brought up, etc.

If this thing isn't close to or over 1M by Mania, i'd be shitting bricks. Because Mania is the big hook. If you aren't buying it by Mania, you likely aren't buying it.

[Warner2BruceTD]

Meanwhile, Dana sits back and watches from the shadows.

WWE is essentially out of the PPV game. If you are a crossover fan, this gives you more money per month to spend on UFC, or eliminates the choice, because most people will see $9.99 as essentially $0 in this context.

So this can be a boon for UFC, or it can can be a killer if people get used to this, or clamor for something similar. UFC does much better on PPV than WWE, and unlike WWE it's the prime revenue stream. So they would either need significantly more than 1-2M subscribers, or would have to charge more money. It would be hard to justify charging more than $9.99. WWE went with that because they felt they had to be competitive with Netflix. UFC can't come in higher now. Shit, they are charging the same for FIght Pass now, and offering a fraction of content that WWE offers, both in terms of no PPV, and a tiny library in comparison.

This is the biggest story in the industry in years. It's fascinating to watch it unfold.

[LiquidLarry2GhostWF]

Are you saying it's not a good idea to follow Buff Bagwell, and half the UWF locker room?

Are you asking me if I'd hit? Even in her wax museum state?



Would smash for a few hours, then watch Heat Wave '98, the smash again...just to say I did.