Should Wrestling Have an Off-season?

[Thriller Ant]

We see Undertaker taking time off every year. We hear about guys, Kurt Angle for one, who want to take time off for nagging injuries that can't and so on and so on. In other sports, players have some kind of an off-season to help heal their bodies between seasons.

In pro wrestling, however, these guys have to make that time and often times get criticized for it, which I know I am guilty of. And now with more and more high profile stories of wrestlers suffering from addiction to painkillers and/or alcohol, letting these guys take time off to let their injuries heal definitely sounds like a good idea to me.

So what do you think? Should pro wrestling have an off-season? If so, how long? and when? and other stuff?

 

[The People's Peep]

i dont think so. the current system works very well and we are starting to see that now. HBK is gone, undertaker is going to take time off, and so is batista. with some of the older, main eventers taking time off, it gives the younger guys a chance to take some of the spotlight and get themselves into the ME.

if there is an offseason, every season will have the same main eventers and the younger guys will be stuck in the midcard waiting for someone to retire.

 

[LUFC HBK]

I think this is a brilliant idea. If there was an off season from say Wrestlemania to June this would give the wrestlers time to relax, heal their bodies and generally stay away from wear and tear for a couple of months. This in turn would theoretically give the wrestlers longer careers.
Also storyline wise this could be brilliant. Imagine the last Raw before the break or Wrestlemania. If anything big happens on these shows e.g. a betrayal, a sudden unexpected title change etc. You will definitely be watching 2 months later when Raw is back on the air.

 

[Brilliant Human Being]

While I think that an off-season in wrestling would be a good idea, in another its a bad one.
It is a good idea because an off-season gives everyone a chance to recharge their batteries, writers included, as it gives them time to plan for frssh new storylines without the pressure of having to keep up constant deadlines. Furthermore, it would reduce the chance of injuries to the top stars, therefore maxmising potential revenue in merchandising sales.

However, the flip side to that, particularly in relation to my point about revenue and income, an off-season would mean potentially disastrous losses income from TV deals, house shows, ticket sales, etc, and however much the wrestlers will heal in the off-season, if the company is losing money, then there is no point really.
So in conclusion, while in theory the idea of an off-season is a good one, when put in practice for a company like the WWE, it is completely unfeasable.

 

[Dagger Dias]

So what do you think? Should pro wrestling have an off-season? If so, how long? and when? and other stuff?

I don't think that pro wrestling should have an off-season because it would cause the federations to lose money. Assuming that everyone got the summers off and not just guys like Taker. People are often bored during the summer, and watching wrestling is one of the ways some of us fans deal with said boredom. Now we'd have one less thing to do. Also, like The People's Peep said, the older guys taking time off gives the newer guys a chance to be higher up on the card for a bit. That way their characters develop and the federation can see how these guys would do in more important times of the year. I think that the current system works just fine because the guys who get injured during the spring can take the summers off the veterans still there can work with the newer guys, causing many of them to improve and possibly work feuds with the guys on vacation once they come back.

If there had to be an off-season though then I would say maybe for just a couple of months, but the problem is that any time of the year is good for both WWE or TNA to make a lot of money. Although the booking almost always gets worse in WWE from May until Summerslam, so that is probably where I would place the off-season if there had to be one. TNA is tougher to answer the "when" question for since they don't have a string of months where they start to get worse. They can't use the same timeframe that WWE would be in this scenario since Slammiversary, one of their more important shows, is during summer. Maybe start right after Bound for Glory, then begin again at Genesis. That's around 3 months, just like WWE's timeframe would be for their off-season, and it ends right before Genesis, which was a big PPV this year and could continue to be one.

Now the remaining question is what would the companies do during this time to make money if there's no tv tapings or PPV's to make money off of? They would have to come out with lots of merchandising such as shirts or DVD's to rely on to make money. That is why I am still against this idea because WWE and TNA rely so much on tv tapings and PPV's, they need them all year long and the current system works because the young guys get to step up when some of the veterans take the summer off.

 

[gd]

It'd likely be beneficial, but the the company itself was lose out on a ton of money if they take even a few months off. They are already overexposing the product, I don't think they'll take a week off, much less months. It would be to the wrestlers benefit, and even the fans as well, as the product that we'd get upon return would be better than ever, but it won't be happening.

Also, with the whole TNA v. WWE thing going on, there's no way either of those companies is going to take any time off. Doing so would push all of the viewers to the other company, and there's no guarantee they'd be coming back. It's a cool idea, but it's not going to happen.

 

[The People's Peep]

Also, with the whole TNA v. WWE thing going on, there's no way either of those companies is going to take any time off. Doing so would push all of the viewers to the other company, and there's no guarantee they'd be coming back. It's a cool idea, but it's not going to happen.

when you said this, it gave me an idea. what if the wwe did have an offseason and during that offseason, thats when tna was on. just like how other sports go on when others have an offseason, each sport or in this case, company, wouldnt have to worry about the other. they can coexist. not likely, but just sayin

 

[HBK-aholic]

The reason professional sports have an off-season is that there's only one 'first team' and if you have a majority of those players needing a break, or recovering from injuries you're going to seriously damage your teams win/loss record and probably title wins.

With professional wrestling, sure, The Undertaker, HBK and Batista can take a break now, but the show isn't going to be affected in any way. The WWE has more talented wrestlers than they know what to do with, and some could argue the older wrestlers taking a break is a good thing as it allows younger stars to take their place.