WWE Off Season; What can be done & becoming reality?

[Mad Metal]

Here is something I'm sure many are thinking about and that is if the WWE will have an "off season" which, of course, this isn't the case for the indy side or Total Nonstop Action seeing they have things under control and the issue really is only in the WWE currently.

Of course many are thinking if the WWE pushed their talent to go on the road 300 days a year for decades, what would make them stop now especially seeing it will lose the WWE some money. This subject is starting to be talked about more and more in a serious manner to the point where this could very well become reality.

With the discovery of Chris Benoit's brain which indicates he had severe brain damage which many are assuming it's from a very tough working schedule which this could very well be something else Congress can and possibly will look into not only the drug use in professional wrestling, but the strong schedule some may view as an abuse to the human body/bodies.

It really seems as if an off season is becoming a serious discussion nowadays which with everything that's going on now can and will straighten out many problems including creativity, time to rest and be with the families, etc.

My idea would be for an off season would start after the WrestleMania event, take off some months and things can continue on time for SummerSlam which would give everyone three or four months to rest up. When you think of it, does anything good really happen after WrestleMania and before SummerSlam?

If you look at it, this move can also be good for the fan base in a way. I can't speak for anyone else, but sometimes I feel if I take a break from wrestling or the WWE for a good period of time, it can help me to stay interested in their product. This is good to come up with good ideas that starts from SummerSlam up through WrestleMania because sometimes there's no time for the writers to come up with anything good what so ever and a little review by taking the time to actually use some brains will help as well and of course after a long hiatus, it will be a good way to hype up the fans and keep them interested in the product.

Like I said, I felt that this is a discussion that's more and more likely to be viewed as reality more than ever and is an idea to take serious. Will this actually happen? Only time will tell.

 

[shua08]

i think that an off season would be great, as wrestling fans we all hear about all the injuries and problems with wrestling nowadays and this would be a great relief for all th wrestlers. I suppose on the business end of it they would probaly lose out on money but what if they still ran a show every week but have it like a best of kinda show. i mean maybe have a best of tag team show, then best of cruiserweight show, etc they would still bring in money from those shows, just an idea.

 

[MonsterMash]

I think it's a great idea because it would give guys time to rest and would cut down on serious long term injuries. But from a business/financial standpoint, it would not make sense.

You'd have two/three/four months with little to no revenue but you'd still be paying downside guarantees for wrestlers in addition to regular wages for legal/finance/administration staff. No money coming in and a lot of it going out.

Secondly, will all promotions be regulated to have the same off season? If not, when WWE has theirs, fans may flock to TNA. That would be like saying "Okay, no more new TV from us, go watch them. But please watch us again when we have new episodes." The last thing you'd want to do is drive your fan base to watch the competition.

Again, great idea to protect the health of the wrestlers, but in the end, WWE and TNA are both businesses who are in it to make money. As harsh as this may sound, wrestlers are like assets and there's no doubt that some of them are considered expendible. The only way I could ever see an off season happening is if it was federally regulated.

 

[Mad Metal]

I think it's a great idea because it would give guys time to rest and would cut down on serious long term injuries. But from a business/financial standpoint, it would not make sense.

You'd have two/three/four months with little to no revenue but you'd still be paying downside guarantees for wrestlers in addition to regular wages for legal/finance/administration staff. No money coming in and a lot of it going out.

Secondly, will all promotions be regulated to have the same off season? If not, when WWE has theirs, fans may flock to TNA. That would be like saying "Okay, no more new TV from us, go watch them. But please watch us again when we have new episodes." The last thing you'd want to do is drive your fan base to watch the competition.

Again, great idea to protect the health of the wrestlers, but in the end, WWE and TNA are both businesses who are in it to make money. As harsh as this may sound, wrestlers are like assets and there's no doubt that some of them are considered expendible. The only way I could ever see an off season happening is if it was federally regulated.

Well the thing is the WWE doesn't see TNA as serious competition nor are they in reality. It's not as if iMPACT! is on Mondays, Tuesdays or Fridays where people will all have an only option to watch TNA's program on a WWE night but on the other hand, some people can get a little too "lonely" and needs to watch some type of wrestling.

As things seem to look, it really seems as if TNA can, they would have a travel schedule like the WWE's. Their goal is to move every PPV show in different locations and slowly TNA is holding more and more house shows. Maybe eventually the same can be implied with TNA if they continue to try to expand the way things are looking to be.

 

[chesswiz77]

What WWE should do is get serious about the brand extension! Bring in wrestlers to help fill out the Raw and Smackdown rosters. Get rid of ECW, and incorporate their wrestlers to either Raw or Smackdown. Then they should arrange it with both networks, The CW and USA, to come up with a seaons for both brands. Raw would go from October to Late March early April, from No Mercy to WrestleMania(6 PPVs), December would be a limited schedule. Smackdown would then take over from after WrestleMania, from April to September, from Backlash(or another ppv name) to Unforgiven (6 PPVs). This way WWE programming would still run all year, and the wrestlers would have an easier schedule, as long as the brand extension is not broken.

 

[R G]

Off Season = great idea. WWE doesn't need to cancel television in off season either. Maybe for the two weeks leading up to the off season break, they can record house shows and show those on TV for, ehh 2 months? Then, during the regular season, cut down on house shows. Wrestlers are usually only at their homes 3 days a week. It should be extended to 4. That means one less house show per week, giving extra rest and reduces chance of injury by just that much.

That's what i would do.

But really, the off season is a win win situation. Not only does it give wrestlers much needed breaks, it takes them off of pain killers, steroids, and will get the Congress of their ass that much more. And also, when something is wrong with the wrestler, don't make them fight though it a. la. Bobby Lashley. He had a nagging shoulder injury for about 2 months, and fought through it in about 3 pay per views, and he ended up having a serious rotator cuff tear. Not good.

With all of the recent steroid and drug allegations, this would be perfect timing for the WWE to add an off season, which has been needed for so many years now.

 

[RikRaines]

Does the WWE need an off season? Yes, well kinda. I would keep the brand split, but I would reduce it back down to two brands (Raw/Smackdown!). Take the ECW roster and divide the few guys there are between the two brands. Here's an example of the tour schedule that could be done, involving both brands along with Major Pay-Per-Views:

• January: Raw/Smackdown! - Royal Rumble
• Febuary: Raw/Smackdown!
• March: Raw/Smackdown! - Wrestlemania
• April: Raw
• May: Raw
• June: Raw
• July: Raw/Smackdown! - Summerslam?
• August: Smackdown!
• September: Smackdown!
• October: Smackdown!
• November: Raw/Smackdown! - Survior Series
• December: Raw/Smackdown!

So in a set-up like this, both brands work nine months and recieve three months off. You can keep all Major Pay-Per-Views in place; minus Summerslam, which you move to July. We would also then get Six Dual Brand PPVs and Six One Brand Only PPVs. If during one brands downtime, the other brand starts to hurt from injuries and such, you can call a wrestler to come in from another brand to work in their place OR even better, call up some development talent.

Reduce the amount of titles in general. Basically combine the belts, so that you have:

• WWE World Heavyweight
• WWE Intercontinental
• WWE World Tag Team
• WWE Crusierweight
• WWE Woman

The titles can easily be switched back and forth between brands, you could even have a champion stick around a little longer to drop a title to the other brand before they take their vacation.

A set-up like this would allow workers (Wrestlers, Ring Crews, Road Agents, etc) three months off to recoup, spend time with their family, and just enjoy life in general. Something like this is drastically needed in the wrestling industry right now and even more in the WWE.

 

[Moon Knight]

So in a set-up like this, both brands work nine months and recieve three months off. You can keep all Major Pay-Per-Views in place; minus Summerslam, which you move to July. We would also then get Six Dual Brand PPVs and Six One Brand Only PPVs. If during one brands downtime, the other brand starts to hurt from injuries and such, you can call a wrestler to come in from another brand to work in their place OR even better, call up some development talent.

And that brand will die out. The wrestlers who already don't make much lose 3 months worth of pay, with the fact they already can't make the brand split work the ratings would go farther down as people who don't like one brand will go 3 months with no wrestling. New talent doesn't have any drawing power and other talents will get spoiled and refuse to work in their OFF TIME...So no, it won't work.

Reduce the amount of titles in general. Basically combine the belts, so that you have:

• WWE World Heavyweight
• WWE Intercontinental
• WWE World Tag Team
• WWE Crusierweight
• WWE Woman

The titles can easily be switched back and forth between brands, you could even have a champion stick around a little longer to drop a title to the other brand before they take their vacation.

A set-up like this would allow workers (Wrestlers, Ring Crews, Road Agents, etc) three months off to recoup, spend time with their family, and just enjoy life in general. Something like this is drastically needed in the wrestling industry right now and even more in the WWE.

No it isn't need. 1 brand and better storylines are needed. Vince better be ready to double pay to make up for the pay wrestlers who aleady get paid low will lose. Having titles go from show to show is confusing and talent loses momentum if they take off for months, very few wrestlers have pulled that off. It just won't work.

 

[FoleyIsGod]

I think it would be best for the WWE to have 2 weeks off at Christmas(say the 15th to the 28th) This will give the stars time off to heal up and have decent time with their family.

Granted, they cant really have an off season as its not just America who demand live events. Its the rest of the world, notably the UK(they are always running events over here) and throughout Europe.

 

[The not-so Great Khali]

I think what the WWE needs is not an off-season but just a few weeks break. This is also very realistic as they won't lose much money from it whereas if they aren't on tv for 3 months or so then they would probably have to fire half of their employees to break even. Right now WWE is on tv for 51 weeks on the year (not counting Christmas specials, i.e. Iraq because it's taped about 2 weeks in advance) and the top stars work about 4/7 days of the week (tv show, house show, PPV). Only have a maximum of 12 PPV's in a year, 1 every month, this also allows for a better build up of storylines. WWE should give their staff 2 weeks off at Christmas and 2 weeks off after Wrestlmania. This can help with the ratings aswell when they return from a break as the fans want to know what's gonna happen?

 

[mabuza]

There`s no need for a brand extension.All they need to do is have wrestlers working for 8months in an overlapping manner.Look how things still survived with Rey,Taker& HHH out of action.They just get guys to work from Jan-Aug and others from April- Dec.We wont notice the diffence.

 

[OHIDONTKNOW]

I think the best way to handle the situation would not be an off-season, exactly, but a scheduled vacation for all of the wrestlers. If they got rid of the brand extension, and combined titles(does it really make sense to have three world champions in one company? I don't think so), there would be plenty of superstars to fill out the roster. That way, while some of the guys are on vacation for a couple months, the others are getting pushed. It would alternate, so, as HHH for example, heads off on his three months off, undertaker is just coming back from his vacation. Every month new guys would be headed for vacation, and new guys would be coming back. Staggering the absences that way would also help to prevent storylines from becoming too stale, because, with everyone rotating, you wouldn't end up getting the same matches on pay-per-view three months in a row. Plus, with a few of the big stars out around the same time, they would have time to push some of the undercard guys, and actually develop them more. I think they should cut down on the number of pay-per-views too, so they can spend more time building quality rivalries instead of ones that seem thrown together at the last minute the way they are now. but that's a whole different topic...

 

[WWF-Attitude-]

i dont really think an offseason is necessary. I would like an offseason to help freshen up the writing staff but I dont think it would work overall tho. Just give the superstars more time off weekly. Just have Raw, the Smackdown/ECW tapings, and a houseshow and give the superstars the rest of the week off. I think that would give them plenty of rest by spreading it out.

 

[RVDgurl]

I don't know that the WWE needs and off season, but giving the wrestlers a little more time off is definately warranted. Those guys have extremely difficult schedules as they are on tour nearly 300 days out of the year. There would probably be less injuries and less burn out if wrestlers were given a week off every month or so. The rosters are deep enough to handle time off. Let's face it, it really isn't necessary for every big name to wrestle every single week on RAW. If John Cena or Triple H were given the week off, it wouldn't impact the ratings that much, if at all. It would give the guys some time to recoop and come fresh for the next week.

 

[a7xoff]

i dont really think an offseason is necessary. I would like an offseason to help freshen up the writing staff but I dont think it would work overall tho. Just give the superstars more time off weekly. Just have Raw, the Smackdown/ECW tapings, and a houseshow and give the superstars the rest of the week off. I think that would give them plenty of rest by spreading it out.

I completely agree. Like word for word. I don't think a off season is exactly nessescary, but if you take a look at a typical weekly WWE schedule you'll see that the majority of the days have some sort of WWE performance. I think limiting house shows, or rotating who performs at them would help. Example: instead of Cena vs Orton for the title at house shows, give some unused talet in place of that. After all it's not like it's going to be televisied, but if your champ you should at least make an appaerence. If I counfused anyone I'll try to explain it better..

 

[SinisterX3]

I think an off season would be good. Maybe just rotate it from a couple of wrestlers every so often. Kinda like vacations. Maybe ease up on the house shows for a month. Not a bad idea at all. Everyone needs a break sometime. I think it would refresh a lot of wrestlers. But Vince just shot the idea down without a second thought.

 

[PocketJokers]

This is an important issue, as I, ever since Eddie died, believed WWE needed an Offseason for a month or two, so that some stars(the stars keeping McMahon a millionaire) could rest up, and be better than ever.

I truly believe that between Sept - Oct should be the offseason, it would be an amazing chance for WWE to put their training feds on the air to help weigh and promote who the fans love, and who the fans hate. Put OVW, FCW on the air for a month, with two shows a week, maybe more depending on how many development areas WWE has at the time, and then hold weekly polls on WWE.com to gauge the fans reactions to heels and faces, and than, with due time they can bump them up, having much more of a fan push behind them. This would help the eventers with a chance to rest, it would help the new comers learn how to handle themselves when their are millions watching. It may, and most likely will bring the ratings down. But it is a punishment that vince should take if he truly cares about the ones that work their a**es off for him.

 

[RKO Evolution]

Now all we need is our opinions to be heard. It seem like majority of us (including me) think that offseason to WWE would be a good thing. It wouldn't have to be so long as in NBA or NFL. Just something like 2-3 months Here's some of my reasons why.

The wrestler would have time to heal. Wouldn't it be better to have all your wrestlers healthy for the "season", making it easier to have more stables and deeper fueds. Now, half of the wrestlers are injured during the "season", limiting all these things (Triple H, Mysterio, Lashley, HBK and so on) There's nothing you can do about injuries but if those come in long term or because of fatigue, that's the problem.

Not so many PPVs. Offseason would limit the number of PPVs. Too much right now.

 

[fed_up_fan]

I agree, an off-season would be a good thing, however from a corporate stand-point, it just would'nt work. Too much lost revenue. WWE should get rid of this "brand extension" crap or at least set up a story line between the three world champs leading to a title unification match at wrestlemania. It would definitely boost PPV buy rates and(if rumors are true) would be a perfect opp. to incorporate Y2J's return. As before, the undisputed champ would have free reign of all three brands as would the womens champ.(and combine the tag belts to but leave the mid-card belts seperate to boost storylines) Eric Bischoff was close with his "one show, one champion" idea, but it should go something like "one company, one champion". The matches would mean so much more.

If WWE were to drop the brand extension, it would give talent who were not working programs the chance to rest and spend time with their families. No one considers the effects of a 300 day schedule on the children which I think is sad.

Vince needs to remember who actully built WWE. The wrestlers, and more importantly, us. To Vince; Listen to US for Christ's sake! We made you, and if you continue ignoring us, we very well could break you. Who could possibly know what the people want better than the people? I think a fan or two should be on the creative team and give imput on what would get over with the entire fan population. Focus groups work for network television, why not pro-wrestling? Anyone agree? Please comment, I would love some feedback on my ideas.

Thanxxx.

 

[Player_1]

An off season might be good. But from a business standpoint, it is not....unless the WWE goes back to the old days of "if you don't play, we don't pay." On top of that, some wrestlers say that time off can be a wrestler's worst enemy not only for the body, but also star power.

 

[DeDan89]

There is no need for a seasonal schedule for the WWE....with the time they have in the presence of Congress and with OVW and ECW, they have all the time and resources they need to do this right, without losing money or losing fans. First things first...Hacksaw, Hardcore Holly, Val Venis and any old school face that just isn't going anywhere, no more action at least on TV. You are now all in charge of talent training and rehabilitation. You are gonna have to have a large roster for this idea, we are talking 70-100 superstars or less due to storyline usage. Money is an issue I understand, but with the time and effort, it will certainly pay-off in the end. Next is scheduling. You will see less of the superstars, but only some, at a time. I'm talking 10-15 or more at a time, 2-3 months off the road completely. No autograph signings or appearances....home with the family. Also with all of the wrestlers losing some size and definition it would be perfect to give them time in the gym and not for an hour a week, on the road. This should be enough time to rest the boys and girls. A full recovery from most injuries not all, but most. This is an industry that needs money to relapse itself every year so you can't just stop. Also, they will need to drive down some of these specialty matches. Now I understand that they are a draw, but at the same time why do you think they are getting injured so easy. They are starting to look like TNA with all these stupid matches. Ease up a bit, the superstars are a resource, but they are still human. With the Benoit case, they should try and set an example and get some shrinks in there just as a precaution. It certainly can't hurt. I love this industry too much to see it shipped to the scrap heap due to ignorance. I think people should make it aware that these guys are human and on occasion are hurt, but unless you are in the 6-7 figure salaries, you have to compete, to feed the family. It is a dream for most of them and it shouldn't be tarnished by the politics of the industry.

 

[kieran_devlin]

I think its only fair to give WWE superstars some time off in no way does this mean months off of tv.

Start with Christmas give them 2 weeks paid off no house shows no nothing then they can start fresh for a new year and this way WWE dosnt lose a lot of money. Perhaps they could do a best of Raw then a best of ECW and a best of Smackdown one week then do something the second week.

Even just one week off paid during Christmas would be great for the wrestlers so they could go on vacation/holiday.

At summer maybe have a month were they only do they main shows eg Raw, Smackdown, ECW but no house shows or events.

Time off dosnt need to be like a month off just lighten the loads around seasonal holidays that way we can still get story development and maybe even with less house shows more fans will go to the main shows like Smackdown tapings ect.

Should be free health checks for superstars monthly and have drugs tests at these monthly check ups that way problems can be diagnosed early and sorted out. If a superstar is having problems they might lighten the schedule.

WWE should train their superstars at least once a week.

 

[Robbzilla]

Why not just rotate people in and out? Have wrestlers work 2 weeks on/1 week off. Every 3rd week, 1/3 of the Raw, SD, and ECW staff is at home with family, while the other 2/3s are working, and then the next week, rotate. The third week, roatate again, and the 4th week, let the 1st weeks guys off again. Simple.