Smackdown Moving

[NEW_WWE_OWNER]

Press Release:

After a successful decade of "SmackDown" on both UPN and The CW, World Wrestling Entertainment and The CW have agreed to conclude our partnership. Since The CW's exclusive negotiation period ran out as of last Thursday, January 31, we have been contacted and have been in negotiations with other networks. "WWE SmackDown" will continue to air on The CW until the conclusion of the 2007-08 broadcast season. We are grateful to Les Moonves, Dawn Ostroff, and their entire organization for bringing "WWE SmackDown" to millions of viewers for so many years.

What does this mean for the WWE and for Smackdown? Where will they go? Is this the first step to maybe putting Smackdown on NBC so three NBC television channels can have a WWE program on every week?

 

[crazy88]

With the WWE announcing that Smackdown is leaving the CW network, it certainly does pave the way to move the show to a network owned by GE, NBC's parent company. With RAW on USA and ECW on Sci-fi, it just makes good business sense for Vince & Linda to have all three of their brands under the same umbrella.
If WWE's aim is to try to put on NBC Friday night, they really need to tweak Smackdown quite a bit.
1. Infuse some talent into Smackdown- Back in 2005, when Smackdown was pulling in its highest ratings, Smackdown's roster was loaded with. Guys like Eddy Guerrerro, Chris Benoit, JBL, Randy Orton, Bobby Lashley were making Smackdown their stomping grounds. Now the only real draws on Smackdown are Edge, the Undertaker, Batista, and to a lesser extent, Rey Mysterio. That's not gonna cut it.
2. Get those ratings up!- Smackdown's ratings have been slipping in the last couple of years. That's a fact. NBC is not going to take on a show that's pulling in a 3.5 rating. WWE needs to get that rating up.
3. Get creative- Use new storylines. Put new guys into new situations. Put the right guys into place. Use your talent in the best way. But make sure not to push the envelope to much.
If WWE does intend to try to get Smackdown on NBC, it certainly would be a great idea. But it's very risky. Vince needs to make sure everything is in its right place before moving to a major network like NBC.

 

[Mighty NorCal]

My first thought upon hearing this, was SD! going to NBC, and that this COULD end up being a positive thing.

First, why NBC. SD! is already the most network friendly show there is, and they wouldnt reeeaally need to tighten things up a whole lot more. Hell, they could add Cena, and make it TOTALLY kid centric. They have the relationship with NBC from Saturday nights main event, which is were I could honestly see SD! being moved to. The only drawback I can see, is that NBC already has American Gladiators, which is sorta veiwed in the same light, or genre by the general public I belive. Well, im not totally sure WERE it could go if not NBC, maybe USA, just on a friday or saturday night depending on whats already in those slots, and what types of ratings they get.

The reason I think this could be very positive, is, at least for the short term, they may be forced to infuse SD! with a little more star power. I think it could cause some major talent to switch to the show from RAW (since they can use ECW guys neway) maybe Cena, like I said, if they are gonna stay the network TV route. They already have UT and Rey, to appeal to the kids, and Cena is THE most appealing guy for the network TV crowd. I think he would even recieve a more positive response from the SD! crowd. They could make Cena into more of the Character they envision on SD! I belive. They would need to do things like this to boost ratings quite a bit, at least for a short term, to get Networks interested. I think if they could aquire at least 3.5-3.8-4.0 that would get some networks attention. More starpower could help that to happen, and in turn, make SD! a better show than it already is.

 

[Krippler07]

I was reading some details on the WWE and CW split and appearantly everyone who tuned in to watch SMACKDOWN never watched anything else on CW network. So I guess SMACKDOWN was bringing in all the ratings to that network. CW was whining cause everyone was watch SMACKDOWN and nothing else on their shitty network, well guess what CW, now no one is gonna watch your network at all cause you got rid of the only show that brought viewers in.

 

[NYSandman]

I was reading some details on the WWE and CW split and appearantly everyone who tuned in to watch SMACKDOWN never watched anything else on CW network. So I guess SMACKDOWN was bringing in all the ratings to that network. CW was whining cause everyone was watch SMACKDOWN and nothing else on their shitty network, well guess what CW, now no one is gonna watch your network at all cause you got rid of the only show that brought viewers in.

Perhaps my pot smoking days have damaged my brain so I can't understand this, but why the HELL would you cancel the ONE show that generates ratings!?!?

If the only things in my store selling are my hamburgers, why would I stop making them?

That station is the shits anyhow. I, honestly, cannot think of another good show on there.

I don't watch Smackdown much, mainly because it is geered towards a younger audience, but I still think it's the best show UPN has to offer.

I agree they should move to NBC, and have everything with one company.

Also, basically everyone, even on welfare, in this country has cable. Just move that shit to a cable network. They would also have less restrictions on cable, however getting too raunchy might turn off parents.

Most parents probably let their 2 month old watch RAW anyhow, so what does it matter?

Dumb move by a dumb network!

They're going down. Remember the bullshit USA did when RAW moved to Spike? This will be the same.

After the ratings tank, they'll come back and bend down in front of Vince to get the show back.

 

[Joeybsmooth]

Well they can not movie to to Fridays on USA , they have shows like Monk and Pysch that do pretty well. They may have to move it to a Saturdays. If it goes to USA, or NBC for that matter, what would that have to compete with them.

 

[blickdaddy]

I agree that the CW network used some really bad logic in telling the WWE to take a hike. They were hoping that Smackdown would bring viewers to watch other shows on their network but that isn't the case and from what I have heard they had to cancel the show because the can't afford to keep SD on the network anymore. I have heard a lot of banter of SD going to one of the NBC channels but the latest news that I have heard has stated that at this point MyNetworkTV which was formally UPN is the front runner to broadcast Smackdown.

 

[klunderbunker]

From what I've read the leading candidates are mynetworktv, (what the hell?) and wgn out of chicago. Is this really the best smackdown can do? The main reason smackdown's ratings aren't the best is theyre on a god awful station. I can remember back when the show was on UPN, being followed by the immortal shows battledome and shasta mcnasty. CW is hardly any better, as it regularly cancels its best shows. The only other shows that network has had are Veronica mars, which did good ratings (for that network) and smallville. Kicking smackdown off is just the latest in their string of brillance. It's such a joke and wwe is lucky to get off there, but where else are they going to go? A network that no one has heard of, or a network that tna said wasn't good enough?

 

[TWJC: The Beginning]

Smackdown gets decent ratings, guys, they don't do horrible by any stretch of the imagination, I hate it when people say that WWE's ratings are "low" you DO realize that most shows do good to get a 1.0 right? SD, ECW, and Raw all get well over that.

 

[enigmaticdude]

I really hope that they move SmackDown to NBC because no one really watches MyNetworkTV anymore. Plus NBC is HD ready and WWE didn't waste their time and money for nothing.

 

[Chaze2k1]

I think part of the problem is Smackdown wasn't on a main stream network and wasn't available in every home, In fact just about month ago my CW changed to MyNetworkTV and no longer get to see smackdown. Chances it moving to NBC are slim as its not even WWE main show and you think Vince will let its B show go to the Big Network. WGN isn't available on all cable providers either so that main be a problem as well. It might be time make the ECW/SD! truly one roster and scrap ECW and maybe show FCW in that time slot with some of the upcoming stars of WWE.

 

[elijah ecw express]

so, now its official, smackdown is moving to mynetworktv. But, the one thing that should not be done is moving it to thursdays. there are things that prevent smackdown from pulling in high ratings on every day of the week. thursday is only the most watched day for tv networks, because of smallville, ugly betty and the comedy block on nbc, so thursdays are all booked up for tv watchers. fridays and saturdays, those are going out nights. sundays, have football and fox animation. monday has football and raw. tuesday has house, american idol and then ecw. the one exception is wednesday, it should be seen as the money day for wwe, there isn't s-*& to watch on wednesday, so all who feel like watching tv on wednesday will possibly be willing to stop on smackdown while flippping through channels.

 

[AnthonyMango/NoFate007]

Exactly. Two of the most boring days for TV in the week are Wednesday and Saturday, so they should've taken advantage of that instead of wanting to get even lower ratings (which automatically will happen now that they're on a less distinguishable station). MyNetworkTV is just....well, think of it was "CW-lite", and CW isn't exactly NBC in the first place, so they're already taking a step down. Supposedly, MNTV doesn't even have HD service, so now what? I'm one of the people that - for some reason - doesn't get USA or Sci-Fi in HD, so Smackdown was the only one my Comcast had, and now we won't get that either.

Get ready for a nosedive, I think, lol.

 

[Shocky]

I think it's a good move in the sense, similar to UPN, it's a new young network, and the WWE can grab them by the balls and pretty much get what they want out of them until MNTV gets legs of it's own.

It benefits the WWE, because they could go live on Tuesday Nights if they wanted to (Which they should do if they TRULY believe the internet is ruining wrestling). Thursday night is a tough night, but I think McMahon's ego would love to see if he could knock down CW's two big shows in Smallville and Supernatural.

 

[John87]

Conspicuous Asparagus, WWE television is great and has a chance to "knock down" Smallville, but Supernatural? uh uh. im a huge fan of that show and ill tell you right now, its not happening. not even on WWE's best day. the shows too original and WWE isnt anymore. seriously...John freakin Cena everywhere. no one can go to the bathroom without hearing that guys name. its the same thing lately over and over and Supernatural isnt. so...mcmahon may as well as just compete with one tree hill and hopefully he can cut down that damn tree! ^_^