It the WWE continues to book matches, talent and shows like it did last night, a decade or less. Last night, and the week before, was like watching Russo era WCW without the excuse of Russo being there.
It's a legit question to ask now we are in at the transition period of the end of VKM as the leader of the company. Trips and Steph won't take full control backstage, forget what happens on TV, until after at least this coming Mania. It might be a reason why this fabled match between Cena v Rock has been made possible - Vince calling Dwayne for one final favour.
Post Mania, it'll be a WWE without Vince out front, Taker, Rey, Kane and maybe Show will follow Trips in retirement and, Cena aside, there will be few established stars. Now the WWE has always made 'stars' in the past, for better or worse, but it's a generation since such a glut of new talent needed to take the stage. There are guys with potential: Barrett, Seamus, Danielson, Del Rio and of course Punk (plus anyone they bring in from ROH and maybe Tyler Black/Alex Koslov), but that still leaves some pretty big questions. And uncertainty is not what markets like - especially in foreboding times.
WWE may dominate the wrestling universe, but PPV rates still suck and the production of marquee stars from their development programme has flatlined for the past decade. No one in the IWC really knows the state of the finances - they're not terrible, but the share price isn't going to make people come flocking. Under the Levesque/McMahon stewardship there are two real threats (these are just the ones that can be seen, economic disaster could strike without warning): 1. The cliq/politicking management, characteristic of how Levesque got to the top bed could cripple the company. If Trips is hiding an MBA or MA in Business, that would be nice, otherwise the insular structure could lead to ill informed decisions (like hiring Mistico etc) and has already got precedent in the development jobs given to Nash and Waltman. 2. The biggest risk by far is Dana White keeps kicking the company on PPV and allows them to either make 'sports entertainment' irrelevant or, less likely, use the vast capital to buy ROH or TNA etc and invest both money and competent management in the company. VKM with his vast experience, array of superstars and without the handicap of Bitchoff and Russo only just won the Monday Night Wars - could HHH/Steph manage the same with an inexperienced roster and less instinct than VKM win against UFC AND a UFC backed wrestling company? That's a very big if.
In the end, the future of WWE comes down to who succeeds VKM and how much control v creative ability they have and whether UFC steps up it's effort to bitch slap the WWE on PPV or beyond. Of course whether a world without 'sports entertainment' would hurt actual wrestling, well, that's another matter entirely.
WWE will never close, it might merge with another company but for satan's sake the day WWE closes its the day that hell will have frozen over. So in closing WWE will not close.
and other organization's over the year's. I think (hope) that there will always be fans of the WWE regardless of the situation in the future. UFC/MMA might be hot! now, but so was Boxing in it's prime. Eventually people will grow tired of it and I won't be surprised if UFC actually closes shutter's first.