Is there life after Raw?

[PDecicco]

(like all new threads say, mods merge, move or delete if needed. I promise my feelings won't be hurt and I'll still bring the fruit cake for the holidays.)

I was reading a few articles on the main site as well a few articles on WWE.com today and I had a thought, that a few years ago I never would have had. Is there life after Raw?

800 episodes ago Raw was an adventure Vince McMahon decided he needed to take. And if I'm being fair I've been entertained by most of the episodes that I've seen. And I've watched from the beginning.

But lately the storylines have be lacking story, the superstars have not been super, and for a sports entertainment show...well I'm not being entertained.

And neither is anybody else, if we go by the ratings. And sure its football seasons so Raw is going to take a hit, but still to bring in ratings lower than before the Attitude Era is pretty bad.

There was a thread I just read asking if this will lead to another wrestling boom. I'm posing a different question. Can Raw be cancelled due to low ratings?

Any television program has to bring in revenue and viewers to stay afloat and remain on the air. If Raw continues to drop can it, or more importantly, should it be cancelled?

SmackDown! continues to draw ratings, and its usually pretty consistant. Can SD! become a flagship show if Raw were to be cancelled. Can WWE exist as SmackDown and ECW? Or would ECW be gone as well?

Is there life after Raw for the WWE? As a flagship show, one would wonder if WWE would be in serious trouble if Raw lost its home.

I personally don't think SD! can sustain the WWE. But maybe I'm wrong.

Thoughts?

 

[Dead Kennedy]

The Raw team definitely need to take some drastic changes to do something about the ratings alright. But the ratings aren't at a critical point just yet. I don't see Raw getting cancelled for getting low ratings as that isn't really the case. It still gets millions of viewers. You've got to think relatively here.

Yeah, we all know that WWE's product has dropped in quality in recent years, but then again, it seems that the general demand for professional wrestling has gone down. I think all promotions should really try to make some dramatic changes to get wrestling back in the buzz again, because if it continues like this, a sort of "wrestling recession" if you will, it could easily kill the entire industry of professional wrestling.

But calling the cancellation of Raw is way too early right now. It's just been one week with a panic rating.

 

[PDecicco]

I agree it won't be cancelled just yet, but if the ratings were to contnue to fall, it could be a reality at some point.

The fact is WWE doesn't seem to want to reinvent itself very much right now, and thats what it needs to do.

I just wonder if the WWE or evne TNA for that matter could thrive without Raw.

Raw is the cornerstone of professional wrestling, without it I think all other wrestling in America begins to fail.

 

[Y 2 Jake]

WWE doesn't need to reinvent itself. It doesn't get the best ratings. But they still blow away any other wrestling promotion. I don't know what network they're on in America. But if that company was to drop them then they'd just go to a network where the ratings they get now are good for that station.

 

[Tim]

If Raw was cancelled, I don't think the WWE would survive. For one, SmackDown and ECW cannot be like SmackDown and Raw before ECW. The only way the WWE could survve is if ECW was given a new name and given some superstars from Raw. But this brings up another problem. If they decide to keep ECW as a developmental territory, where would all the Raw superstars go? Sure, a few would go to ECW, but what about the rest? They would just get fired.

With the ratings, I think that it's just a lack of people intrested in wrestling at the moment, the quality of theproduct would affect it a little, but I think people are more interested in sports such as soccer and rugby. There ar more rasons than poor quality for the ratings drops, but the drops are caused by people seeing one bad episode and then just not watching Raw again as they think it will be the same thing over and over again.

 

[KR_Chalice]

At the moment RAW is in a big decline, and mainly this is the fault of the writers and Vince pushing wrestlers who the crowd have no connection with and not knowing when to alter someone's gimmick just enough to keep it fresh. Take John Cena for example, someone who is booed as much as he is cheered in most arenas, sure packaged as he is he makes the company more cash than the vast majority of the locker room but his "Hip Hop Marine" gimmick is growing so stale that if it was bread you could build a high rise out of it.

Admittedly Cena's move pool being limited by creative and VKM doesn't help but giving a darker edge to his character so he was more of a grey that a heel would revitalise him enough, and allow him to expand his move pool so he doesn't have to use the same five moves to win every match. But that's a complaint with creative even if it does illustrate my point about WWE being unwilling to change things that "they" like.

As for what would happen if RAW was cancelled? I think SD would be moved to mondays or they would try to, and ECW might see an hour long extension in time, but then ECW would probably be seen as too much of a liability without the two big brand shows so that would probably fold as well.

So I think the WWE would wind up in dire straights unless Vince came up with some idea out fo the blue that would save the WWE or the WWE might wind up in a similar position to TNA which would be bad for the wrestling industry in general unless it drives a rocket up VKM's ass like WCW did back in the attitude era.

 

[ChrisJerichoFanYTWOJAY]

I agree with the fact that the WWE really does need to "shake things up a bit" but how? I say if they are going to keep the brand seperation than keep them seperated. Stop letting people from smackdown wrestle on raw and vice versa. It would be interesting if you didnt see ECW people on smackdown and raw each week and raw people on smackdown etc . . . then when all of a sudden a smackdown guy shows up on raw it would be a big deal.

If they want to keep it the way it is just get rid of the brand seperation all together bring the shows together maybe even extend the time slot from two to three hours. Then storylines can really build because the story from monday willl carry to friday which will carry back to monday and so on and so forth. So now story lines can have lets just say 6-8 shows to build between ppv's instead of only 3-4. I don't know what the right way to go to help the ratings situation right now but just like everyone is saying they have to do something and do it quick . . .

oh yeah btw can some one rep me atleast so i can get back to 0 so i can atleast just play games in the arcade lol

 

[jokerbateman86]

Raw will not be canceled. That is too drastic. They will find a way to get back those ratings. The ratings always drop around this time but now they have dropped more because of the exciting playoff race we have right now on MLB.

If Raw were to be canceled or moved, you can kiss the USA Network (the network they show WWE Raw) goodbye. When Raw moved to SpikeTV, USA took a hard hit with the ratings and only survived because (A) they had Monk and (B) they show some decent movies. Now, when Raw came back to USA, SpikeTV plummeted down in the ratings and have never recovered.

A theory of a friend of mine about the ratings is actually one that I believe and he said: The WWE are basically burying themselves here. When they decided to go way more kid-friendly then they already were, they essentially lost their loyal fanbase who love good storytelling, and in return got marks who just want to see their "hero" battle "evil". So, now that they have heels own all the titles on RAW, those kids aren't going to watch anymore because they don't like it when the bad guy wins.

And now, that is more true than ever. The past month or so, I have seen some great Raws. They have been putting out a quality product. What else can you do? Here is one idea, start funding ROH like you funded ECW back in the 90s.

 

[Checkmate]

In all honesty, the WWE could die off like WCW did. It is a company, and this is life. Stuff happens that we don't want to happen and there is very little that can be done about it.

Breaking it down a bit, IF (big if) RAW ratings were to decline continuously, RAW would eventually have to be moved or cancelled. The smart move for WWE would be to cancel ECW and replace it with RAW, as RAW is your flagship show.

What the WWE needs to realize is that it spread itself too thin since the brand split. I'm not saying that every main eventer has to compete on all 3 shows, but the borders put up hurt the development of some new talent.

2 Main event divisions is OK.
2 Mid Card divisions are OK (Upper - IC, Lower - US)
2 Tag Team divisions are too many (Not enough teams = feuds that don't matter)
2 Women's titles are too many (not enough divas with talent)

So, do I think that WWE could live with 2 shows? Yes...

However, I don't see either show pulling the weight that Raw has pulled for the past 15 years. Smackdown on Network TV is doing well, but could be better. ECW won't ever pull in the numbers that WWE wants. RAW needs to live. But with that statement, the WWE needs to change.

 

[I_Heart_Princess_P]

Well the reason why pro wrestling is not drawling like it used is not because of creative issues, not because of Vince pushing wrong wrestlers, and not even because of a lack of a big time draw. Its because of the UFC. Ever since they skyrocketted to fame, the older male fans have abandoned the soap operaish fake fighting and gone to the hard hitting bloody Ultimate Fighting product. Even Japanese wrestling has adopted MMA into their style.

 

[FoleyIsGod]

Make Raw appear more legit. Away with the shit matches, away with the divas. Make the titles mean something again.

Kurt Angle says he is sick of TNA being sports entertaininment, when people are clearly wanting to see mma style sports.

Its not hard, book better matches, get rid of the shit like Snitsky and bring in some workers from ROH/Japan and up from dev. Bring back wrestling, hell, im sure people would love to see NWA sdtyle matches

 

[obsidiana]

I agree with what you have posted. I stopped watching WWE programming myself because it was boring (I thought) and repetitive. I think WWE's problem is they tried to put to much out there. I mean they had just RAW, then they made Smackdown, and now ECW not to mention the smaller programs on the weekends. They should have known from the start that people were not going to buy this brand new ECW. I was very excited about it when I heard Heyman was going to be in charge of it. But the more I watched it the more disappointed I was.

I think if they treated Smackdown like they did RAW it could be just as big too they just need to give it a chance. It doesn't help though when you make the same person champion over and over and over again. Like Triple H, John Cena, Edge, Batista, etc. That gets boring. That is going to happen with any promotion no matter where you are America, Japan, Mexico, etc. If you keep making the same person champion people are going to get bored. Plus the feuds they have now need some work and need to be fresh which they aren't. Shawn Micheals against Chris Jericho? Big deal, they have both been in the business for how many years? well in Micheals case I think it would be centuries lol and having them in a feud is boring.

I actually watched RAW this week well only because my friends were going and they wanted me to see if I could see them on tv and I was excited to see CM Punk but that was about it. Some of it was boring like degeneration x on RAW OMG I couldn't believe it! Geriatric X is back again! Some of it didn't make sense like that Ziggler guy. What purpose does he serve? Confusion? Maybe that could be his new gimmick. The writers need some help and bad, boy has wrestling hit a dry spell here in the states and the rainy season isn't showing any signs of coming soon. Off topic rant I know but dammit it had to come out sometime lol......

 

[Mexican Geek]

As long as the McMahon are in charge, I think RAW will be alive and kicking. Ratings are a problem now, but they will get better eventually. RAW (as SD and ECW) has to evolve sometime and adopt new elements from, for example, MMA; also, there will always be new talent who would bust their asses just to get a spot in the show. So out of that amount of fresh faces, new Jerichos, New HBKs, new Jeff Hardys will rise making the show enjoyable again.