Would an NFL Strike help Raw/WWE?

[cole924]

I'm sure the majority of us wrestling fans are also fans of the NFL. It's the best sport in America. We all know there are some labor issues right now and most likely we will have a strike in the NFL next year. To me, Monday has always been about Monday Night Raw. That's how I've spent my Mondays since 1993.

In the glory days of WCW vs. WWF, wrestling was bringing in about 9.0-10.0 (combined) television ratings. We are lucky to get in the high 3s at this point. One of Raw's biggest competitors on Monday is obviously Monday Night Football. I really think there are about 2.0-3.0 improvements that could be made if the WWE could spark interest and steal viewers away from other sporting events like MNF.

It's a simple thread:

Would the WWE and Monday Night Raw benefit from an NFL strike?

How could the WWE utilize this to capitalize and bring more people in to enjoy their "A" show.

Would a more adult program help bring the ratings back up on Monday if this were to occur?

Could the PG era bring in any additional fans who normally would be tuning into MNF?


***Note: If this is in the wrong section or already been discussed - please just move it***

 

[Fuel The Fire]

This wont make a difference to monday night. They will get the same ratings when football season is off. Football fans and wrestling fans are not exactly the same. Sure there are wrestling fans that like football. But there are alot more football fans then wwe fans.So they wont gain anymore fans because those football fans are not interested in the wwe, So I dont think a nfl strike would effect wwe at all. If anything this will be business as usual for Vince.

 

[Tougie]

My first though was "Of course it would" then i read Fuels comment and credit to him he changed my mind. There really are no guarentee's that a large amount of people would watch Raw instead, especially now that the NHL and NBA seasons are up and running. So if an extra 100 people changed to Raw because MNF wasent on, I'd be shocked.

I don't really see how they could capitalize besides commercials. However if MNF was on NBC, we all know WWE and NBC have a history and I wouldnt be surprised to see an advertisement or two on that network. But with ESPN having MNF I really dont see any room to capitalize. Just another commercial here or there like they have for PPV's.

The product rating wouldnt make much of a difference. Although part of me thinks that with the NFL becomming more protective or its players, that if WWE went back to a really rough and tough style that some fans would check it out.

To sum it up, Football Strike would be no help to them at all. Now if the NFL and NBA both lockout next year either the NHL or WWE will get a lot more viewers, and in America that would be the WWE.

 

[LokiCobain]

Football is only on, what, 17 Mondays a year? What about the other 35 weeks? Raw's ratings aren't different in those 35 weeks as they are in the other 17. That's evidence enough that MNF does not factor into the ratings. Maybe to a small extent (like how after Orton's title win ratings 'went down'), but not to the extent of bringing them up to a 9.0 or 10.0. Wrestling has been a "failing" industry for a while now (pretty much since 2001), and has steadily decreased in ratings over the years. It's hard to say there will be a revival, but at this point, wrestling (whether WWE/TNA/ROH/etc) should take what they can get rather than trying to "expand".

 

[wphchris]

Well, if anything, the NFL owners would lock out the players as the current Collective Bargaining Agreement favors the players. Nonetheless, a work stoppage seems likely.

Raw can capitalize if they have a smart plan to convert some NFL fans looking for "combat action/athletics" to fill their normal Monday nights. Not all of MNF's fans are going to switch to Raw as ESPN would have a plan for supplemental live sports such as expanded late season baseball or preseason NBA (assuming they don't have a work stoppage as well).

If anything, there would be two potential athletic winners from a work stoppage. First is the UFC, who could run Monday night events and/or reruns at will on Spike TV. I assume they would be the biggest winners. The other winner would be MLS, who is putting together a clever marketing campaign to keep Monday Night "Football."

So for Raw, their competition will still be fierce, but it will come from different areas. They should be aware of these possibilities and have the capability and potential to gain a 10-15% ratings increase if MNF doesn't go a full season next year. I just wonder about whether their plan will be too shortsighted and will fall flat.

 

[AnthonyMango/NoFate007]

It certainly wouldn't HURT them in any way whatsoever, but as others have mentioned above, it won't suddenly add 7 points to their Nielsen ratings. The problem with WWE's ratings isn't all attributable to MNF - it's something else. Wrestling just isn't as important to the populace right now in comparison to what it used to be, and that, coupled with the variable of storylines/wrestlers (ie, ratings will never go up with Finlay as world champ lol), alongside the impact the internet and alternative forms of entertainment have = WWE having the ratings they're having now. If it were just MNF then once the season was over, you'd see a massive jump up, but that just doesn't happen.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

It couldn't hurt, but there's no guarantee that it would help in any sort of gigantic way. Most times, during football's off season, WWE Raw typically draws somewhere in the mid 3s and I do think that it's a good possibility that Raw's numbers will return to that area when MNF goes on hiatus. Monday Night Football has historically taken a chunk of numbers for WWE and any other programming on Monday nights that has a large male demographic.

However, an NFL strike would do little to propel Raw's ratings up into the 4s or 5s or anything to that degree. Even when football isn't on, Raw still has some heavy competition on Monday nights in general so an NFL strike isn't going to help the WWE in any appreciable way. It definitely wouldn't hurt them, but there's no huge upside to it either.

 

[Mustang Sally]

Football is only on, what, 17 Mondays a year? What about the other 35 weeks?

That's a valid point, but the fact is that NFL fans have never had their sport televised during the other 35 weeks. The fans who made it their habit to gather in front of the TV on those 17 Monday nights have also made it their practice to be doing something else on the other 35. Some of them watch WWE, some watch other programming, and others do something else entirely. If there is a NFL strike, the people who never did anything else on Monday nights but watch football would suddenly be forced to break their pattern and do something different. Some would undoubtedly turn to WWE.....so yes, a strike would help the wrestlers.

My Dad was a big baseball fan and on Sundays (his only day off) he would be in front of the TV, watching the game. In 1994, when MLB was on strike, my brother and I got more attention from our Dad than ever before. Since he couldn't watch baseball, his regular pattern was broken and he fixed it by spending time outside with us. (It continued even after MLB came back. I suspect they lost a lot of fans for a long time because of their damn strike).

So yes, if NFL goes on strike next year, it would behoove Vince McMahon to aim all the advertising he can at the football fans. If they're going to be forced to find new habits, you've got to try to lure them in before someone else does.

 

[ryanwwe]

Minimum increases are possible maybe as much as half a point in the ratings but i would be shocked to see anything in that area or higher. WWE doesn't have that kind of carry over effect to take a large chunk of that NFL audience even when they have no football alternative. They will pick up some fans that would normally watch a football game over Raw whenever their favorite team is playing that night. Basically they lose about 0.2-0.5 range off the rating during the rest of the year when football rolls around so they could get that audience back but anything over the fans they already have would be unlikely.

 

[The Crock]

If there was an NFL strike then Raw ratings would increase, but minimally. The WWE is pulling pretty much the same rating with or without Monday Night Football, so the only reason this would effect them is if some MNF fans started to watch Raw because there was a void in their TV schedule. I mean, aside from that I don't see any other ratings changes. The WWE doesn't cater to guys who watch football anymore, they're PG now, they go after kids. Sure, some old loyal fans such as myself still watch, but a majority of the new fans are children. They're 2 different target markets, which are totally unrelated. Although, Vince could snap up some new fans if he tried to market towards them, especially if the NFL went on strike.

To some fans, who enjoy both, it wouldn't make a difference. See, I watch both MNF and Raw. I'm able to do that because in Utah, Raw is in delay. So this doesn't really apply to me anyway, I'm one of the aforementioned fans. In the end, Raw and MNF aren't related at all, now differences would be seen.

 

[Calderownz]

By fractions, perhaps. But, in the overall picture... no.

Look at it this way. WWE's primary target audience is children. Most children, if they are given the chance to watch football or wrestling (assuming they are into both) will pick what is constant for them. That being; WWE. When the NFL is having it's off-season, WWE's rating aren't very much higher than they are currently. As a matter of fact, the ratings only dip about .3 or some when the NFL has it's big rating games.

Realistically, they are drawing water from two different wells.