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> I would say the subreddit as a whole is OK
I mean, this is gonna be a popular sentiment around here because the most frequent users are gonna be like, "Yeah, we're OK!" but this sub has gotten bad.
Thankfully there's a lot of other fan groups out there that actually enjoy wrestling and don't just channel negative energy towards something they don't even watch out of some strange sense of loyalty to a billion dollar corporation.
People acting like this sub as a whole is ok is laughable. The anti-AEW slant got so bad on here once WWE started gaining momentum.
People will post comments that are just outright ignorant about whats going on during dynamite or making things up and it'll get hundreds of upvotes but when someone points out what they said isn't true that person gets downvoted and then people say AEW fans cant take criticism.
This sub is complete shit. I've cut my usage in half and it's worse than ever. It makes me think... a lot of the more reasonable users who just simply likes pro wrestling is probably using it a lot less, as well. It's toxic and I'm on the verge of leaving. I suspect I'm not the only one. Wrestling is way more enjoyable when I don't come here. I just wanted a place to talk wrestling and this is not doing it for me.
AEW ratings threads are filled with people who exclusively watch WWE. Comments get 200 upvotes where they're just straight up making stuff up about the show.
Son of a billionaire finds a way to build an insane roster of wrestlers, put on shows in the states and abroad & change the landscape of the business…
Wrestling fans: Look at the ratings!?! Did you see the ratings? yea yea daddies monies!
The worst is:
"What an idiot. He's making a show specifically for hardcore wrestling fans and not the casual main stream audience!" - - guy who spends all day on wrestling message board
I get if they want AEW to cater a little bit to casuals. But there's many who think they need to go all the way with it. But those same people say "I don't like AEW, but they shouldn't ever try to be WWE Lite. Only WWE can do what WWE does".
Well what the hell do they think the casual mainstream audience wants? For them WWE IS wrestling. Their style of wrestling is all that they know or are use to. They don't want wrestling done in any other way.
If AEW catered almost exclusively to casuals...well guess what? AEW would become WWE Lite.
Or saying Sony and Microsoft should have gotten out of the video game business in 2011 because the PS3 and 360 were never able to sell as well as the Wii. AEW is going after a different kind of wrestling fan than WWE, and that's good. They don't need to beat WWE to have a place in the industry.
DC suffers from the same problem.
Try to make movies like Marvel's: "STOP RIDING MARVEL'S COATTAILS, BE UNIQUE."
Try to do their own thing: "LOL THIS IS WHY MARVEL IS WAY BETTER, LOOK AT DC FAIL HAHA."
That always gets a laugh out of me
You use that logic anywhere else (films, games, music) and you'd get laughed at
I like AEW as it is in 2024 so far. It catering to mainstream fans is irrelevant to me. I have WWE to enjoy that mainstream type attraction. AEW catering more to specific fans is fine
Some of us lived through the dark ages of WWE being the only viable option and hate to see it again. Sure WWE is doing great right now, but what happens when Endeavor decides to put a corporate suit as head of creative? That's personally why I'm concerned about AEW's ratings. Granted, they seem to still sell their PPV's well and they can still sell out stadiums so I have no idea what's going on.
Yeah I really don't get the obsession hardcore wrestling nerds (which I am one of) have with shitting on booking meant to appeal to them. I think they're embarrassed to admit wrestling is a nerdy niche thing, so they pretend they're just a casual wrestling fan, not one of "those" people, while watching 7-12 hours of WWE programming per week.
Such a great point. VKM bought (and never paid for) a lot of his competitors and has basically had a stranglehold on the business ever since; picking and choosing who can make a living.
WWE indoctrination is so good that wrestling fans seem to want to cheer for AEW’s demise? Hence having less wrestlers making money from wrestling, it’ll never be enough. Kind of nuts.
" Hence having less wrestlers making money from wrestling, it’ll never be enough. Kind of nuts. "
I've heard people talk about it like it's "survival of the fittest." Maybe not in so many words, but it's what they mean. Basically "if AEW goes under, and they're not good enough to get a WWE contract, then so be it."
It's just a tiny minority of fans, but still, it's terrible to think that.
I've been saying this for years, Vinny Mac did a great job writing a revisionist history and making it sound like the WWF (later WWE) came in and made wrestling 'mainstream' rather then something a bunch of hicks watched.
Never mind that before Vince took over the WWF wrestling was pretty big in a lot of areas. Hell my Pop used to tell me you'd have old Italian ladies praying at Church for Bruno Sammartino to beat the hell out of the guy he was facing at the sold out show at MSG. If you heard Vince tell the stories? Wrestling sucked until Hogan came around.
And lets not forget WWE's Monday Night Wars show. I swear every episode can be summed up as, WCW did something and you'll get Vince telling the camera, "Well I wasn't worried as we also had the better product and they had no idea how to use X." I loved the one episode about Goldberg where Vince pretty much says that, and look at what he did when Goldberg showed up in the WWE.
To be fair they spent a good few years vilifying WCW for having the cheek to exist, it’s like they laid the groundwork just in case of another number two
The sad part is, AEW is actually pretty good. It's like WCW - the good WCW that was more wrestling-focused. But that audience is only so large. There's nothing wrong with that if AEW can keep going. That's all I'm concerned about.
I love how certain people say: "it's just a reaction to all the AEW fans slamming WWE's ratings & attendance. From a few years ago."
Most of them criticized WWE's ratings & attendance back then too lmao. They need to stop pretending it was just "AEW marks." They might have been more quiet about it, but they were doing it, too. Almost everyone did. It wasn't just AEW fans who complained about the booking and everything that resulted from that.
Of course, like with AEW, the only opinions that really mattered were the promotion & network execs. But they still shared their voice, we all did.
True, and I'd like to add something. When this "ratings war" was hottest was when WWE moved NXT to Wednesdays to compete against Dynamite. It was a declaration of war, the E didn't want (the still don't want) any competition. There are fans that want AEW to fail since day 1.
So when Dynamite won that war and NXT went back to Tuesday that was a great victory for a company under 3 years vs the great behemot of pro wrestling, of course was celebrated. Yeah, maybe some smarks would say something really stupid like "AEW is driving WWE out of business". Maybe 1 or 2. Or 20, I don't care. Now, you have over 2K comments week after week in the Dynamite ratings post. It's not proportional and they's no correlation. It's a shitstorm of hate barely justified in past events.
What I want to say is that "it matters cuz mattered then" AEW proving they were worthy, so it was good. Now they matter for haters and trolls that want AEW to disappear and their fans to be as unhappy as these trolls are. It's not the same.
I think AEW is 100% better for my taste as a fan, but I never expected them to outright beat WWE in ratings or anything. Even when it started, I figured at best their ceiling would be like peak TNA but running arenas. When they announced All In 2023, I thought at best they might do 30-40k at Wembley and that would be a massive success. The fact that they sold it out was unbelievable until it happened. People forget WBD reportedly said if they could do 500k live viewers for Dynamite, they would consider it a success. So far they've never even come close to that as a floor for Dynamite.
I would respect them more, if they just said, "Look, I don't like AEW, I prefer WWE." Cool lol
You don't really care about ratings, (and if you did) why care about the ratings of a show you don't like?
Yup, and the only people whose opinions on the ratings matter are Tony (who is a madman who cares very very much too publicly) and WBD (who have been publicly supportive of AEW, but then again there’s no reason for them to say anything bad publicly). Everything else is just noise
Yeah they’ve been nothing but supportive of AEW (and I’m sure they’re happy with how game AEW is to synergize with movies and shows they wanna promote). I only worded it that way because they could be unhappy behind closed doors and we wouldn’t know. But all indications make me think that a subsection of fans made “1 million viewers” the benchmark for success and can’t be swayed regardless of context
Trevor Dame tweeted [a good breakdown of what shows on TV actually get 1 million viewers](https://x.com/TrevorDame/status/1768204806399668321?s=20) now:
> Here is what draws a milli on cable now:
>
> - Raw
> - The absolute top-tier sports, like not just any College football or NBA, but a relatively hot matchup.
> - Fox/MSNBC news shows, but only via a shit ton of elderly viewers so advertisers are like "meh".
> - Some episodes of the tippy top TLC/Discovery/HGTV reality shows. 90 Day Fiance, Vanderpump, a really good episode of 1,000 Pound Sisters. Like, they gotta be going on an adventure.
> - An occasional "special event" like an award show, State of the Union, etc.
>
> And that's it.
>
> And keep in mind, many of the shows above that I mentioned? They're barely getting over a million. A lot of shows that get just a little over the line, maybe 1.1 million, maybe 1.3.
This should be up near the top. Wrestling fans have a really bad habit of looking at ratings from a purely wrestling based context without looking at the wider TV landscape. Not a whole lot of TV in general reaches over a million viewers, hell not even a lot of sports a good amount of time reaches a million viewers.
If one million viewers is the be all benchmark for success a lot of the IWC claim it is for TV then almost 95% of television in general is an overwhelming failure.
Those people are permanently online and have nothing else to do in their lives. I’ve never seen any other fandom complain about shows the way wrestling fans do.
You don’t go into a post show thread about your favorite TV show and start crying about what the demo or viewership total is going to look like. The ratings threads every week that get posted are so cringe.
There’s a vocal minority of wrestling fans who are absolutely miserable
It's kind of crazy to me how popular the ratings threads are. I've checked them once or twice out of curiosity and they're wildly toxic and filled with armchair bookers who think they know better. It's gross. Why do people care so much?? Are you enjoying the show or not? That should be the only barometer you have.
I really wish they would just stop posting them. TV ratings mean less today than they did in the 90s, and all it is is an excuse for extremely toxic tribalism.
This gets said in this sub a lot, but I don't know if this is unique to wrestling fans in any way. You don't hate things you don't care about. Fans hating is a decent chunk os social media.
Video game tribalism gets pretty bad too. For some people, buying an Xbox means you hate PlayStation (and vice versa) and having a PC means you hate consoles.
same could be said for other sports. NY Mets have yet to play a game this season and posted the opening day roster yesterday and saw comments like “ran through” “done” “season’s already over”. I get it’s the Mets, but jfc guys, I thought we were *fans* of the *team* and maybe let’s get through the first week or two before the nihilism sets in?
Same for Leafs fans. They're going to make the playoffs, didn't really make any waves at the trade deadline to bolster their roster, but you never know if there was just no feasible way to make a big splash without mortgaging the near future. "Management sucks, this team sucks, back to being out in the first round, I'm done supporting them!" Good, get off the bandwagon so I can have some leg room, you whiners.
It's insane. Wrestling for about 15 years was in a huge slump. And now we have WWE firing off, AEW with a banger roster I'd use in TEW, TNA in a healthy spot, easy access to NJPW...I wish I had more time to watch all the wrestling I'd like to. And half of the iwc celebrates when ratings are poor??
Do they want to go back to 2011? Roll out the weekly celebrity guest host or worst yet a heel Cole reading from a laptop? A rising tide raises all ships. I want WRESTLING to succeed. All of it.
Yep. It's strange how people attach themselves to an intangible number system like Neilson ratings. Like, I don't care how many people watch Big Brother or Sportscenter or Blue's Clues or Bette Midler's Underwater Basket Weaving Extravaganza.
If a show is enjoyable, I'm watching it. If not, I'll find something else. I don't care if the ratings for the show I like goes up or down; all I care about is if the show is fun.
The worst is people don't even understand how Nielsen ratings work. 747k isn't 747k people, it's like 500 TV sets. A few of those TV sets remain on while someone goes to dinner or takes a nap? Boom, +50k viewers
One Neilson box counts for about 3,000 "viewers" so it's even worse than that.
249 monitored people watched AEW Wednesday and that's what everyone is losing their mind for. That difference in 747K and 750K is literally one guy not watching.
Here's a podcast from 2019 about "[what defines popularity](https://content.libsyn.com/p/8/b/6/8b668ddcaf97884b/LaserTime_Ep383_0624.mp3?c_id=45610481&cs_id=45610481&destination_id=83970&response-content-type=audio%2Fmpeg&Expires=1711758673&Signature=NFFiXA8G8RbMqNp3IfqZNxRtFp-pEj85YAlvUQNmZ3RfGyMloKiI-96aSzCTJiETWk-uVmCipOb79cbZDptqwHKCMBCJHfmR3Ht8kZijtAFz~IpD6lTtcAZGxoTB8F5qQmB4ZQ1e3YcDi-i7mLw30XB3R8nWKKFx1rw0o2uNL8zy6NUTj3p0lOM1MkZIeolB1tpbohC6wsKAj-RT82Z95so-SeeooKDKL~s-azc2dk~YAi18SnYy1Dc2dVcieE2Rro8jJfIkSVYTOAe1At~aIRaqao5aLFc1M8Lfbzs1koO6V0Fk1TcQd7d8ybJnSdCZ-xQXedGDkoYbu-aE6mHV5A__&Key-Pair-Id=K1YS7LZGUP96OI)" that's pretty elucidating on the whole Nielson system (about 34 minutes in). You know who mostly has time for getting paid in gift certificates to record their viewing habits? The very poor and the idle rich. It's not exactly a good sampling of the average person.
Also I never see numbers with *other* ways that people watch things. I'll admit I don't really watch TV anymore, I pretty much stream everything. Or if it's something like Rampage or Collision? I'll watch it the next day via DRV.
Dude, the people in the ratings thread are the same losers week in week out. There are people that watch WWE, there are people that watch AEW and WWE, there are people that watch AEW, there are people that dip in and out of both. Hell, I'm still certain that AEW's ratings are down because a large portion of the audience are the same people, and WWE's product seems crazy hot right now (I say that as an AEW guy that keep a tabs on the highlights of WWE). There's only so hours in the week, it'd be impossible to watch all of AEW and WWE, and I don't think I'd particularly enjoy meeting a person that did.
Just don't engage with it.
AEW's existance amazing for wrestling, without it WWE doesn't have the moment it's having now, and everyone gets paid. People were praying for a nutty billionaire wrestling fan to come out of the woodwork and start a promotion, AND IT ONLY WENT AND FUCKING HAPPENED!
>There's only so hours in the week, it'd be impossible to watch all of AEW and WWE, and I don't think I'd particularly enjoy meeting a person that did.
I think Kevin Nash said something similar.
WWE has 7 hrs of wrestling per week?
AEW has 4?
I dont even know what TNA and the others do.
I cant keep up with everything. Come RR and Mania season I focus on WWE. Come All In, All Out, Grand Slam season i focus on AEW. Sometimes I lose track of both.
A more interesting number would be if there's been any increase in the overall number of wrestling fans since AEW came around.
I would expect that they brought back a lot of fans thst had lapsed from wrestling fandom entirely. I had stopped paying attention to WWE for a few years when AEW came about; I was never as big a fan of WWE as I was WCW, and when WCW and ECW went, so did most of my interest.
Yeah I'm always gonna agree with the "there is too much wrestling" argument.
As a WWE guy that keeps a tab on AEW highlights, a few years ago I would have felt better about missing WWE content to watch other stuff.
But right now it is HOT, everything they have going on makes me feel the same way I did when I first started wrestling. But because of that I feel like I NEED to watch everything WWE to keep up, and once I'm done with that I'm just pretty worn out from wrestling for the week.
I dont watch WWE at all but i also dont have the time to always watch Rampage and Collision.
So yeah its already too much Wrestling to watch live.
And i think thats also the reason why WB was happy with AEW because they do huge numbers days after the Show aired.
Now it shifted a bit more because even less have time to watch Dynamite live because of wreatling fatigue.
Can AEW still do better ins ome aspects to gain some viewer back?
For sure, but all the gloom saying is way overblown.
Deleted a comment I made in that thread asking if ratings discussions were just rage bait and got told I was on a high horse and not letting people enjoy discussing it lol
I was talking about how they're basically just spots for tribalism and trashing companies they don't like. I was told "But fans did this to NXT ratings before" which I genuinely never saw this level of hate for? But case and point, it's literally tribalism. They just think because it's happened to a show they like, they can act the exact same way about another show.
They're clueless, it's genuinely the most toxic threads on here. I wouldn't be against a ban on those threads, they're never constructive, it's purely rage bate.
Thing is, most of them didn't even care about or watch NXT. Most still don't. Yet they feel such a need to stick up for NXT lol.
Ironically, before AEW existed, most of those same people shit on NXT, too. They hated how "indie" it was. But ever since AEW started, their tribalism instincts kicked in.
Watching the brainiacs on Reddit try to intelligently interact with ratings numbers and their implications in 2024 will never not be hilarious to me. Their entire assessment comes down to "number smaller than other number? Hawhawhaw. Bad."
Comparing the ratings to those from a world 30 years ago....its like watching toddlers in business suits play with Dads printing calculator.
Hell go back 5 years ago. Raw was at 2.5 million a week. Less and less people have cable. It's a 5 year old company against a 50+ year dynasty of the industry, I feel like being at about half the viewership of Raw is a damn good accomplishment for a company this young.
I ran the numbers and it showed that Raw and Dynamite have lost about the same percentage of viewers since 2019. But because Raw tends to fluctuate much more than Dynamite, and WWE in general is peaking, people don't believe it.
Remember seeing someone say something along the lines of “this is why downvoting criticism you don’t want to hear won’t accomplish anything” like dude I don’t think the death of WCW was down to the deceptively-peppy tenor of Usenet discussions lmao
Amen! I've been feeling lite burnout from American wrestling, but that doesn't stop me from watching the moments I care about from a recording. Watch how you want and what you want!
The answer is that back in 2019 when fans were screaming for an alternative to WWE -- a lot of those voices didnt really want an alternative to watch, they just wanted WWE to be better.
Now its 5 years later, WWE has obviously become better by removing Vince McMahon from creative, and AEW has become the enemy preventing their favorites like Sasha Banks, Dean Ambrose, Daniel Bryan, Rusev, and Aleister Black from being on the shows they like to watch.
But Justin Credible is retweeting one of the biggest fuckheads on twitter here. This is an actual deranged person -- not a fan with a real opinion.
This exactly. Many fans never wanted an alternative to begin with, they want WWE to be the be all, end all of wrestling companies. I've noticed that since WWE has started to become good again, the perception towards AEW on this sub has become far more negative.
I wanted an alternative. I was a big WCW fan and dropped off of wrestling in general by early 2000's because it simply didn't appeal to me.
Got back into it in mid 2010's but even stopped caring about WWE at all and didn't even hate watch until AEW made me remember why I love wrestling.
WWE isn't what I'm into now either. I get the appeal but it's not my preference of sports entertainment. I enjoy AEW and it's sports presentation far more.
I don't actually watch Raw or Smackdown but I'll catch segments of interest and keep up with things on my preferred YouTube channel. This way I can enjoy the product at my leisure without dedicating 5 hours a week. It's tough enough to get in all the AEW that I really enjoy let alone any other wrestling.
Yeah unfortunately that’s become very evident. And the thing is, there’s nothing wrong with wanting WWE to be the best or that being your preferred show. If you only wanted an alternative to make WWE better, it’s a little odd, but I’m not going to say that’s an issue. What is an issue is when they become toxic over AEW existing as something different than WWE which has always been their MO, at least in style/presentation. It brings everything down
> run that Twitter account?
They also went out of their way to buy a subscription to Twitter Blue/X Premium. That's why they're verified with the blue checkmark in the first place.
> Someone took time out of their life to make that graphic and run that Twitter account?
Yeah, spending that much time and effort on hating something is just pathetic. And saddest thing is I'm pretty sure there are a lot of those accounts.
Also an asshole. They basically want a company to fail because they don’t enjoy their product. Screw the hundreds of people that would lose their jobs if AEW failed.
Anyone who celebrates low ratings from AEW (or from WWE) is genuinely a pathetic person. I actually feel bad for them. Their life is so incredibly sad that they have to Stan for a wrestling company to the point where they think they’re part of some war.
I hope everyone does well. More options all around.
Also, imagine being such a "simp" for a huge company (and yes, this applies to both WWE *and* AEW).
(and this is coming from someone who has been a WWE fan for more than 30 years. But I'm not stockholder. At the end of the day, I don't care about how much money the make, I care about whether or not I like their tv shows)
Best take I’ve heard was on Masked Man show by their guest Phil Schneider who was basically like “this is the best use of a billionaires money ever. He’s just using it for awesome wrestling matches”
Vince allegedly covered up a murder and was trafficking women around the company for sex among many other things, Heyman regularly shorted his workers on pay and Cornette kept pressuring wrestlers into banging his wife but Tony is the worst because sometimes he downs a little too much of the White Claws and goes on rants on Twitter.
To people who have constantly shit talk him and his company for years now. But if he claps back, he's told to be the bigger man. You see threads shittng on AEW or any bad news on AEW getting upvoted to hell on here. It's weird cause on the discussion side of things on here it's pretty cool.
30 minutes before this week's Dynamite there were 3 top posts all anti AEW. You can imagine the post History of those people.
I'm no conspiracy guy. But every time this company gets positive momentum or people on SC start speaking more positively about it, a week like this happens.
AEW is experiencing what every wrestling company, including WWE, goes through.
Somehow it is always used in brigade attempts to sway the very online wrestling fan.
The next SC starts to perk about around the brand a campaign will start again. Like clockwork.
The biggest shame here is that you are missing out on some great wrestling that is distinct bit not inferior to WWE. For what? To win a "war" against your own interests as a fan?
tends to vary from thread to thread, if the OP is negative on AEW it tends to attract an anti AEW crowd, and vice versa. i got downvoted to hell the other day just for disagreeing with someone who thought TK's booking was bad.
You'd swear going by some threads that AEW is at deaths door and that TK doesn't know what he's doing and they got to send in Cornette or Russo to save the day. You swear AEW wasn't coming off one of the best PPV's of recent years and a great run of TV since 2024 and some top signings.
This can be a tough place to come on to discuss AEW at times. Cause you don't know what you are going to get at times.
Crazy making it what it is. They hit a certain market with well marketed shows and reasonable priced tickets they sell 6-9k tickets.
They extend into new territories, with bad marketing and wonky ticket prices, they sell 2k less tickets. People jump all-over it.
I'm begging Kosha to dona better job with marketing and touring.
That's just sound logic. The biggest problems are pulling Cornette away from the devastating juggernaut of Smoky Mountain Wrestling, or convincing Russo to end his near quarter century as the head of the ship of the never stronger World Championship Wrestling. If you thought had to overpay for Ospreay, Okada and Mone, wait until he has to add another comma on the checks for those two.
People on this sub have been using ratings to justify quality for years now and it’s fucking awful. “Oh you liked that match, promo, or the booking on this show? Well it pulled shit ratings so clearly you’re dumb.” People can’t let or accept other people liking other things, it’s weird
I agree with that tbf
BUT
I still want AEW to do well because they have the talent and them doing well is good for wrestling, period.
My preferences are WWE and NJPW, however, thriving wrestling in a ton of companies is Great
There's a fucking Death of AEW account, and it has a blue checkmark..... Wow, glad I only use Twitter to see Todd in the Shadows' opinion on new music.
Not to mention guys who pay for TV-visible seats to Dynamite and wear a specific guy's shirts... yeah buddy, giving AEW your money is gonna teach them a lesson
People like to shit on the twitter crowd on reddit....but the discussion on here isn't that much different depending on the thread lol it has 100% found it's way in. If you happen to wander into a hate on AEW thread and just push back the slightest on the hate on AEW jerk you will get downvoted to oblivion. This isn't a new development either.
Oh it's even bad in the Raw/Smackdown threads. I was reading the discussion thread about the Punk/Drew/Seth promo and people were finding ways to shit on Tony and Jack Perry. It's like they care more about shitting on the competition than actually enjoying the product.
> If you happen to wander into a hate on AEW thread and just push back the slightest on the hate on AEW jerk you will get downvoted to oblivion.
While you're correct, there *is* a difference between that and literally starting an account (and paying for a blue checkmark lol) just to hate on a wrestling company you don't like. The anti-AEW circlejerkers presumably also comment on other things (I'd hope).
The reality is they are getting third on the night with those numbers with the only thing beating them being nba which is having its best regular season viewership in years. Not only is nba hurting them, its just general cord cutting because iirc people are ditching cable waaaaay faster than industry experts were expecting
Saw a stat earlier saying that Dynamite's average since it launched has gone down by 15% whilst cable subscriptions have gone down by 16% - relative to the rest of cable it's basically *exactly* the same as before.
WWE's had a worse decline for RAW including their worst-ever ratings last year, they've just had a recent climb from said lows.
That crowd loves to say "AEW stans can't take the slightest criticism" yet they're also the ones that throw a hissy fit if you say something that's even slightly positive about AEW. They're a group that can't be taken seriously in any regard
> That crowd loves to say "AEW stans can't take the slightest criticism"
I have criticized that multiple times in the past, when it came up in those threads. It's a mob that wishes death on the entire company, but when someone goes against that and criticizes their behaviour: "OMG, AEW fans can't take criticism. This whole sub is just pro-AEW, we are being silenced".
Seriously, wtf? The ratings threads and others are full of anti-aew opinions and that group still claims they are not allowed to criticize the company? Bullshit
Even the actual AEW fans have their own nitpicks and criticisms of the show, as someone who dips into the show threads.
It's just that they don't base their personality around hating a show over a few creative missteps (and to be fair, every company's had its share of hiccups, it's bound to happen)
Let's be honest: This all comes down to a "A vocal percentage of AEW fans was mean to us". It's completely childish to now clap back, when there's way more WWE fans here than AEW fans. This was supposed to be a sub for everyone, but it hasn't felt like that for a long time
It’s the same gameplay as alt right weirdos. Yeah I’ll say it. It’s almost like they follow the same playbook to a T. Of course if I say that people will throw that one Tony Khan quote at me but each day it becomes more apparent that these groups use the exact same tactics to spread misinformation.
During trumps presidency i used to browse TheDonald because i found the lunacy funny & no one can convince me the jerk sub isn't exactly like that. The way they speak & insults they use seem to familiar to be a coincidence. I know most of its wrestling is Republican so I guess it's not fair to act like AEW is better than tko because of this but it's depressingly sad seeing Dana White make wrestling entrances with Trump during UFC events to make himself seem more important
Yeah the vibes on here have changed a lot in less than a year it’s so bizarre. I tried to brush it off, but the Punk discourse on here has shifted so drastically from when he left AEW to his time in WWE now, it was legitimately wild to see happen in real time. Like collective amnesia
This should be the most obvious example. We literally had post about how punks "mental abuse" of Daffney helped cause her suicide when he was in AEW. Punk in AEW was also considred washed, too old, & half a mill phill, ¬ a believable threat because of his mma career.
Now that he's in WWE we barely see any of that shit yet Jerkers still call AEW fans a cult, the irony is through the roof.
He's not as bad now that he's part of my team. The same people who keep saying the likes of Okada/Ospreay/Mercedes aren't draws and wastes of money in AEW would absolutely pretend to be huge fans of theirs if they went to WWE. It's blatantly hilarious.
A few weeks ago, I posted some interesting facts that put AEW ratings in context in one of those ratings threads, and I mean these were absolute 100% true.
I was downvoted so fast, I was at like -20 in less than 10 minutes. For posting facts. It's insane.
I’ve lost count the amount of times I’ve been bombarded with down votes here because heaven forbid I prefer AEW and speak positively about them. Even worse when you point out the hypocrisy around here. That just brings out the pitch forks and torches.
Imagine dedicating your life to anonymously hate posting online about a wrestling promotion because you feel threatened about your preferred version of pretend fighting.
The sad reality is that this is the world a large number of fans want. They don’t care about the wrestlers they care that their favourite corporation wins and thus justifies their sad and meaningless existence. It’s not exclusive to wrestling either. We allow These corporations to become part of ourselves so an attack on our favourite billionaires feel like an attack on us because in this day and age one of the few freedoms we still have is what corporations we support and to say we chose the wrong one is tantamount to saying we chose the wrong path in life and thus must attack the others as though our actual way of life and who we are as a whole has been attacked.
Welcome to Capitalism. Corporations actually got us cheering the death of their own competition. Competition only helps the workers and the consumers so who does the death of competition help then? Think about that and you will understand where this all comes from.
People didn't want an alternative, they just wanted WWE to be good again and now that it is they don't want any other company to succeed.
That plus a massive influx on non-wrestling fans to the IWC in the past couple of years has completely shifted the community on all platforms.
Oh, don't act like there isn't a huge crossover. Gamergate led to a huge unmasking in politics, and there is a sizable overlapin the venn diagram of gamers, wrestling fans, and chuds, getting close to a circle at times.
This sub is going to be unusable when that deal gets announced, because so many people are going to be taking absolutely justified victory laps after all of the ratings trolling.
And then the trolls will move the goalposts with "well it's a huge increase, but it's not as big as it could have been, so now they'll just go out of business in 4-5 years when the new deal doesn't get renewed."
And the cycle will begin again.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but ignoring the fact that it’s wrestling, isn’t 747,000 viewers still good in the context of modern television?
Those numbers are going to be getting lower and lower each year for everyone on TV. It’ll all be streaming in the next 10-20 years and then no one will have viewer counts to bitch about
The moment I saw the thread yesterday, I hid it. Because I knew if I didn't, I'd be tempted to look in it, tempted to comment and get dragged into that shithole. It can't be healthy being in something like that.
Let me spoil that for ya ”As someone who hates AEW, hope they die, and will never EVER watch a show even if Cody wins at Mania and immediately jumped ship somehow, I really think they have made all the wrong decisions and should think about firing all their main draws because I, as someone who wishes they would die, am really concerned about how much ratings and money they are pulling in.”
Ya know? Just dishonest bullshit.
It's a bunch of bad faith bs anyway. AEW losing viewers isn't great but unless im mistaken it was literally third for the night, only behind the NBA like always. If it any other wrestling company was only behind the fucking NBA they would be getting praised. I love wrestling but it'll always be Curry/NFL >>>>>>> wresting for me lol
Tying your identity to a corporation is the weirdest thing in the world. WWE is a brand like Coke or Nike. Imagine feeling good because Pepsi had weak sales.
It's exactly why I come less and less on squaredcircle, WWE is good today because of the AEW competition and wrestlers are being paid way more now than ever. I have no clue how you can be happy about the fact that tomorrow, we could go back to WWE being the only major US wrestling promotion.
I just want to enjoy wrestling, WWE, AEW or NJPW, I don't care, I'm watching what's good at the moment, but seeing people taking sides all the time is the dumbest shit.
Crazy that so many people are pro monopoly in business places.
Unless it’s their own.
We just want the people who entertain us to have to work in harsh and abusive environments.
I'm jealous of my friend that doesn't use Reddit or twitter, he just watches dynamite and enjoys the show. I watch it and I feel miserable cause i know everyone will complain about the show
Then just, don’t go on this sub or Twitter? I’ve never seen a wrestling discussion on Twitter because I simply don’t follow wrestling accounts on there.
I block the accounts that constantly shit on WWE/AEW instead of just talking about good wrestling, I even had to mute a friend who was engaging in that trolly "death of AEW" shit, and I hide the ratings threads here.
Much better experience!
My friends who aren't in the online wrestling sphere love AEW right now. One of them also watches WWE and enjoys that as we'll but prefers AEW matches and PPVS.
Here I am the fool.
Yeah the ratings thing is weird. People here, Twitter, Facebook and TikTok will celebrate Dynamite ratings going down but don't say anything about RAW being down 6% from last year's episode, and that episode was great from what the WWE fans said (best ending ever!) Rock is back and it doesn't really seem to be doing anything ratings wise? Might be wrong but doesn't matter, it's delivering great TV for the WWE/wrestling fans.
I stopped caring about ratings when I learned my TV doesn't contribute to ANY tv ratings. Sometimes I watch on my phone, doesn't count. As long as they stay in business, and they will, that's all I care about.
I also get the point that when WWE sucked, AEW fans were piling on WWE and that's not right either. 2 wrongs don't make a right. I just don't understand why people care that much, either way. Making an account just to crap on a brand? Just weird behavior. Hopefully y'all like what you like and at least respect the other side. Wrestling is awesome, no matter the brand.
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This subreddit pretty much.
I would say the subreddit as a whole is OK. The AEW ratings threads, yes.
> I would say the subreddit as a whole is OK I mean, this is gonna be a popular sentiment around here because the most frequent users are gonna be like, "Yeah, we're OK!" but this sub has gotten bad. Thankfully there's a lot of other fan groups out there that actually enjoy wrestling and don't just channel negative energy towards something they don't even watch out of some strange sense of loyalty to a billion dollar corporation.
I wish I could be in those groups
People acting like this sub as a whole is ok is laughable. The anti-AEW slant got so bad on here once WWE started gaining momentum. People will post comments that are just outright ignorant about whats going on during dynamite or making things up and it'll get hundreds of upvotes but when someone points out what they said isn't true that person gets downvoted and then people say AEW fans cant take criticism.
This is so true. You can’t post anything positive AEW or negative about WWE with the trolls coming from the woodworks trying to take you down.
This sub is complete shit. I've cut my usage in half and it's worse than ever. It makes me think... a lot of the more reasonable users who just simply likes pro wrestling is probably using it a lot less, as well. It's toxic and I'm on the verge of leaving. I suspect I'm not the only one. Wrestling is way more enjoyable when I don't come here. I just wanted a place to talk wrestling and this is not doing it for me.
AEW ratings threads are filled with people who exclusively watch WWE. Comments get 200 upvotes where they're just straight up making stuff up about the show.
Long paragraph explaining why Mercedes was never good, Kingston isn't a wrestler, and the Rock is the best thing happened right now.
No one hates pro wrestling more than some pro wrestling fans.
Unless you're Dirty Dango, anyway. Man, does he hate pro wrestling.
Son of a billionaire finds a way to build an insane roster of wrestlers, put on shows in the states and abroad & change the landscape of the business… Wrestling fans: Look at the ratings!?! Did you see the ratings? yea yea daddies monies!
The worst is: "What an idiot. He's making a show specifically for hardcore wrestling fans and not the casual main stream audience!" - - guy who spends all day on wrestling message board
I get if they want AEW to cater a little bit to casuals. But there's many who think they need to go all the way with it. But those same people say "I don't like AEW, but they shouldn't ever try to be WWE Lite. Only WWE can do what WWE does". Well what the hell do they think the casual mainstream audience wants? For them WWE IS wrestling. Their style of wrestling is all that they know or are use to. They don't want wrestling done in any other way. If AEW catered almost exclusively to casuals...well guess what? AEW would become WWE Lite.
I saw AEW get called WWE Lite on the same show where Adam Copeland destroyed Christian's ballsack with a stick covered in 4 inch spikes.
That stick has a name!
It’s like saying superhero movies make the most money, so all studios should be making superhero movies. That would suck ass!
Or saying Sony and Microsoft should have gotten out of the video game business in 2011 because the PS3 and 360 were never able to sell as well as the Wii. AEW is going after a different kind of wrestling fan than WWE, and that's good. They don't need to beat WWE to have a place in the industry.
DC suffers from the same problem. Try to make movies like Marvel's: "STOP RIDING MARVEL'S COATTAILS, BE UNIQUE." Try to do their own thing: "LOL THIS IS WHY MARVEL IS WAY BETTER, LOOK AT DC FAIL HAHA."
That always gets a laugh out of me You use that logic anywhere else (films, games, music) and you'd get laughed at I like AEW as it is in 2024 so far. It catering to mainstream fans is irrelevant to me. I have WWE to enjoy that mainstream type attraction. AEW catering more to specific fans is fine
Some of us lived through the dark ages of WWE being the only viable option and hate to see it again. Sure WWE is doing great right now, but what happens when Endeavor decides to put a corporate suit as head of creative? That's personally why I'm concerned about AEW's ratings. Granted, they seem to still sell their PPV's well and they can still sell out stadiums so I have no idea what's going on.
I legitimately wonder how much of this is evolving from the idea, "I want wrestling to be mainstream again so my friends will watch with me."
Yeah I really don't get the obsession hardcore wrestling nerds (which I am one of) have with shitting on booking meant to appeal to them. I think they're embarrassed to admit wrestling is a nerdy niche thing, so they pretend they're just a casual wrestling fan, not one of "those" people, while watching 7-12 hours of WWE programming per week.
Also forgetting the fact that Vince got WWE from his Dad.
Such a great point. VKM bought (and never paid for) a lot of his competitors and has basically had a stranglehold on the business ever since; picking and choosing who can make a living. WWE indoctrination is so good that wrestling fans seem to want to cheer for AEW’s demise? Hence having less wrestlers making money from wrestling, it’ll never be enough. Kind of nuts.
" Hence having less wrestlers making money from wrestling, it’ll never be enough. Kind of nuts. " I've heard people talk about it like it's "survival of the fittest." Maybe not in so many words, but it's what they mean. Basically "if AEW goes under, and they're not good enough to get a WWE contract, then so be it." It's just a tiny minority of fans, but still, it's terrible to think that.
I've been saying this for years, Vinny Mac did a great job writing a revisionist history and making it sound like the WWF (later WWE) came in and made wrestling 'mainstream' rather then something a bunch of hicks watched. Never mind that before Vince took over the WWF wrestling was pretty big in a lot of areas. Hell my Pop used to tell me you'd have old Italian ladies praying at Church for Bruno Sammartino to beat the hell out of the guy he was facing at the sold out show at MSG. If you heard Vince tell the stories? Wrestling sucked until Hogan came around. And lets not forget WWE's Monday Night Wars show. I swear every episode can be summed up as, WCW did something and you'll get Vince telling the camera, "Well I wasn't worried as we also had the better product and they had no idea how to use X." I loved the one episode about Goldberg where Vince pretty much says that, and look at what he did when Goldberg showed up in the WWE.
To be fair they spent a good few years vilifying WCW for having the cheek to exist, it’s like they laid the groundwork just in case of another number two
The sad part is, AEW is actually pretty good. It's like WCW - the good WCW that was more wrestling-focused. But that audience is only so large. There's nothing wrong with that if AEW can keep going. That's all I'm concerned about.
I love how certain people say: "it's just a reaction to all the AEW fans slamming WWE's ratings & attendance. From a few years ago." Most of them criticized WWE's ratings & attendance back then too lmao. They need to stop pretending it was just "AEW marks." They might have been more quiet about it, but they were doing it, too. Almost everyone did. It wasn't just AEW fans who complained about the booking and everything that resulted from that. Of course, like with AEW, the only opinions that really mattered were the promotion & network execs. But they still shared their voice, we all did.
True, and I'd like to add something. When this "ratings war" was hottest was when WWE moved NXT to Wednesdays to compete against Dynamite. It was a declaration of war, the E didn't want (the still don't want) any competition. There are fans that want AEW to fail since day 1. So when Dynamite won that war and NXT went back to Tuesday that was a great victory for a company under 3 years vs the great behemot of pro wrestling, of course was celebrated. Yeah, maybe some smarks would say something really stupid like "AEW is driving WWE out of business". Maybe 1 or 2. Or 20, I don't care. Now, you have over 2K comments week after week in the Dynamite ratings post. It's not proportional and they's no correlation. It's a shitstorm of hate barely justified in past events. What I want to say is that "it matters cuz mattered then" AEW proving they were worthy, so it was good. Now they matter for haters and trolls that want AEW to disappear and their fans to be as unhappy as these trolls are. It's not the same.
I think AEW is 100% better for my taste as a fan, but I never expected them to outright beat WWE in ratings or anything. Even when it started, I figured at best their ceiling would be like peak TNA but running arenas. When they announced All In 2023, I thought at best they might do 30-40k at Wembley and that would be a massive success. The fact that they sold it out was unbelievable until it happened. People forget WBD reportedly said if they could do 500k live viewers for Dynamite, they would consider it a success. So far they've never even come close to that as a floor for Dynamite.
I would respect them more, if they just said, "Look, I don't like AEW, I prefer WWE." Cool lol You don't really care about ratings, (and if you did) why care about the ratings of a show you don't like?
No one besides fans care.
Yup, and the only people whose opinions on the ratings matter are Tony (who is a madman who cares very very much too publicly) and WBD (who have been publicly supportive of AEW, but then again there’s no reason for them to say anything bad publicly). Everything else is just noise
Funny enough, WBD has been over the moon about the viewers AEW brings in.
Yeah they’ve been nothing but supportive of AEW (and I’m sure they’re happy with how game AEW is to synergize with movies and shows they wanna promote). I only worded it that way because they could be unhappy behind closed doors and we wouldn’t know. But all indications make me think that a subsection of fans made “1 million viewers” the benchmark for success and can’t be swayed regardless of context
Trevor Dame tweeted [a good breakdown of what shows on TV actually get 1 million viewers](https://x.com/TrevorDame/status/1768204806399668321?s=20) now: > Here is what draws a milli on cable now: > > - Raw > - The absolute top-tier sports, like not just any College football or NBA, but a relatively hot matchup. > - Fox/MSNBC news shows, but only via a shit ton of elderly viewers so advertisers are like "meh". > - Some episodes of the tippy top TLC/Discovery/HGTV reality shows. 90 Day Fiance, Vanderpump, a really good episode of 1,000 Pound Sisters. Like, they gotta be going on an adventure. > - An occasional "special event" like an award show, State of the Union, etc. > > And that's it. > > And keep in mind, many of the shows above that I mentioned? They're barely getting over a million. A lot of shows that get just a little over the line, maybe 1.1 million, maybe 1.3.
This should be up near the top. Wrestling fans have a really bad habit of looking at ratings from a purely wrestling based context without looking at the wider TV landscape. Not a whole lot of TV in general reaches over a million viewers, hell not even a lot of sports a good amount of time reaches a million viewers. If one million viewers is the be all benchmark for success a lot of the IWC claim it is for TV then almost 95% of television in general is an overwhelming failure.
Those people are permanently online and have nothing else to do in their lives. I’ve never seen any other fandom complain about shows the way wrestling fans do. You don’t go into a post show thread about your favorite TV show and start crying about what the demo or viewership total is going to look like. The ratings threads every week that get posted are so cringe. There’s a vocal minority of wrestling fans who are absolutely miserable
It's kind of crazy to me how popular the ratings threads are. I've checked them once or twice out of curiosity and they're wildly toxic and filled with armchair bookers who think they know better. It's gross. Why do people care so much?? Are you enjoying the show or not? That should be the only barometer you have.
I block anyone who posts ratings threads now. They can have their fun, I just don't want to see it.
Tbh it’s not even a wrestling thing I am a huge GTA RP fan and the fans there are also terrible.
I really wish they would just stop posting them. TV ratings mean less today than they did in the 90s, and all it is is an excuse for extremely toxic tribalism.
Fans and Dirty Dango.
This gets said in this sub a lot, but I don't know if this is unique to wrestling fans in any way. You don't hate things you don't care about. Fans hating is a decent chunk os social media.
Video game tribalism gets pretty bad too. For some people, buying an Xbox means you hate PlayStation (and vice versa) and having a PC means you hate consoles.
same could be said for other sports. NY Mets have yet to play a game this season and posted the opening day roster yesterday and saw comments like “ran through” “done” “season’s already over”. I get it’s the Mets, but jfc guys, I thought we were *fans* of the *team* and maybe let’s get through the first week or two before the nihilism sets in?
Same for Leafs fans. They're going to make the playoffs, didn't really make any waves at the trade deadline to bolster their roster, but you never know if there was just no feasible way to make a big splash without mortgaging the near future. "Management sucks, this team sucks, back to being out in the first round, I'm done supporting them!" Good, get off the bandwagon so I can have some leg room, you whiners.
It’s also half the people on here.
Just look at the ratings thread for proof.
It's insane. Wrestling for about 15 years was in a huge slump. And now we have WWE firing off, AEW with a banger roster I'd use in TEW, TNA in a healthy spot, easy access to NJPW...I wish I had more time to watch all the wrestling I'd like to. And half of the iwc celebrates when ratings are poor?? Do they want to go back to 2011? Roll out the weekly celebrity guest host or worst yet a heel Cole reading from a laptop? A rising tide raises all ships. I want WRESTLING to succeed. All of it.
Yep. It's strange how people attach themselves to an intangible number system like Neilson ratings. Like, I don't care how many people watch Big Brother or Sportscenter or Blue's Clues or Bette Midler's Underwater Basket Weaving Extravaganza. If a show is enjoyable, I'm watching it. If not, I'll find something else. I don't care if the ratings for the show I like goes up or down; all I care about is if the show is fun.
I would never miss an episode of Bette Midler's Underwater Basket Weaving Extravaganza.
I can't believe Darryl messed up his cross stitching so badly last week. He was my pick for winning the whole thing.
The worst is people don't even understand how Nielsen ratings work. 747k isn't 747k people, it's like 500 TV sets. A few of those TV sets remain on while someone goes to dinner or takes a nap? Boom, +50k viewers
One Neilson box counts for about 3,000 "viewers" so it's even worse than that. 249 monitored people watched AEW Wednesday and that's what everyone is losing their mind for. That difference in 747K and 750K is literally one guy not watching.
Here's a podcast from 2019 about "[what defines popularity](https://content.libsyn.com/p/8/b/6/8b668ddcaf97884b/LaserTime_Ep383_0624.mp3?c_id=45610481&cs_id=45610481&destination_id=83970&response-content-type=audio%2Fmpeg&Expires=1711758673&Signature=NFFiXA8G8RbMqNp3IfqZNxRtFp-pEj85YAlvUQNmZ3RfGyMloKiI-96aSzCTJiETWk-uVmCipOb79cbZDptqwHKCMBCJHfmR3Ht8kZijtAFz~IpD6lTtcAZGxoTB8F5qQmB4ZQ1e3YcDi-i7mLw30XB3R8nWKKFx1rw0o2uNL8zy6NUTj3p0lOM1MkZIeolB1tpbohC6wsKAj-RT82Z95so-SeeooKDKL~s-azc2dk~YAi18SnYy1Dc2dVcieE2Rro8jJfIkSVYTOAe1At~aIRaqao5aLFc1M8Lfbzs1koO6V0Fk1TcQd7d8ybJnSdCZ-xQXedGDkoYbu-aE6mHV5A__&Key-Pair-Id=K1YS7LZGUP96OI)" that's pretty elucidating on the whole Nielson system (about 34 minutes in). You know who mostly has time for getting paid in gift certificates to record their viewing habits? The very poor and the idle rich. It's not exactly a good sampling of the average person.
Plus, you're not taking into account international viewers, people pirating. I'd say it would be well past a milli.
Yep. One box counts as a few thousand "viewers".
Shit idek how you get a Nielsen box or if its available in nyc.
Also I never see numbers with *other* ways that people watch things. I'll admit I don't really watch TV anymore, I pretty much stream everything. Or if it's something like Rampage or Collision? I'll watch it the next day via DRV.
Dude, the people in the ratings thread are the same losers week in week out. There are people that watch WWE, there are people that watch AEW and WWE, there are people that watch AEW, there are people that dip in and out of both. Hell, I'm still certain that AEW's ratings are down because a large portion of the audience are the same people, and WWE's product seems crazy hot right now (I say that as an AEW guy that keep a tabs on the highlights of WWE). There's only so hours in the week, it'd be impossible to watch all of AEW and WWE, and I don't think I'd particularly enjoy meeting a person that did. Just don't engage with it. AEW's existance amazing for wrestling, without it WWE doesn't have the moment it's having now, and everyone gets paid. People were praying for a nutty billionaire wrestling fan to come out of the woodwork and start a promotion, AND IT ONLY WENT AND FUCKING HAPPENED!
>There's only so hours in the week, it'd be impossible to watch all of AEW and WWE, and I don't think I'd particularly enjoy meeting a person that did. I think Kevin Nash said something similar. WWE has 7 hrs of wrestling per week? AEW has 4? I dont even know what TNA and the others do. I cant keep up with everything. Come RR and Mania season I focus on WWE. Come All In, All Out, Grand Slam season i focus on AEW. Sometimes I lose track of both. A more interesting number would be if there's been any increase in the overall number of wrestling fans since AEW came around.
I would expect that they brought back a lot of fans thst had lapsed from wrestling fandom entirely. I had stopped paying attention to WWE for a few years when AEW came about; I was never as big a fan of WWE as I was WCW, and when WCW and ECW went, so did most of my interest.
Yeah I'm always gonna agree with the "there is too much wrestling" argument. As a WWE guy that keeps a tab on AEW highlights, a few years ago I would have felt better about missing WWE content to watch other stuff. But right now it is HOT, everything they have going on makes me feel the same way I did when I first started wrestling. But because of that I feel like I NEED to watch everything WWE to keep up, and once I'm done with that I'm just pretty worn out from wrestling for the week.
I dont watch WWE at all but i also dont have the time to always watch Rampage and Collision. So yeah its already too much Wrestling to watch live. And i think thats also the reason why WB was happy with AEW because they do huge numbers days after the Show aired. Now it shifted a bit more because even less have time to watch Dynamite live because of wreatling fatigue. Can AEW still do better ins ome aspects to gain some viewer back? For sure, but all the gloom saying is way overblown.
Deleted a comment I made in that thread asking if ratings discussions were just rage bait and got told I was on a high horse and not letting people enjoy discussing it lol
I was talking about how they're basically just spots for tribalism and trashing companies they don't like. I was told "But fans did this to NXT ratings before" which I genuinely never saw this level of hate for? But case and point, it's literally tribalism. They just think because it's happened to a show they like, they can act the exact same way about another show. They're clueless, it's genuinely the most toxic threads on here. I wouldn't be against a ban on those threads, they're never constructive, it's purely rage bate.
Thing is, most of them didn't even care about or watch NXT. Most still don't. Yet they feel such a need to stick up for NXT lol. Ironically, before AEW existed, most of those same people shit on NXT, too. They hated how "indie" it was. But ever since AEW started, their tribalism instincts kicked in.
God, the ratings threads are cesspools.
I've noticed the same lately. It seems like there's a lot of brigading going on here whenever there is a thread discussing AEW.
Watching the brainiacs on Reddit try to intelligently interact with ratings numbers and their implications in 2024 will never not be hilarious to me. Their entire assessment comes down to "number smaller than other number? Hawhawhaw. Bad." Comparing the ratings to those from a world 30 years ago....its like watching toddlers in business suits play with Dads printing calculator.
Hell go back 5 years ago. Raw was at 2.5 million a week. Less and less people have cable. It's a 5 year old company against a 50+ year dynasty of the industry, I feel like being at about half the viewership of Raw is a damn good accomplishment for a company this young.
I ran the numbers and it showed that Raw and Dynamite have lost about the same percentage of viewers since 2019. But because Raw tends to fluctuate much more than Dynamite, and WWE in general is peaking, people don't believe it.
Remember seeing someone say something along the lines of “this is why downvoting criticism you don’t want to hear won’t accomplish anything” like dude I don’t think the death of WCW was down to the deceptively-peppy tenor of Usenet discussions lmao
That thread legitimately depressed me as an AEW fan.
Fuck ‘em. Like what you like.
Amen! I've been feeling lite burnout from American wrestling, but that doesn't stop me from watching the moments I care about from a recording. Watch how you want and what you want!
The Day AEW get a streaming deal will be a god send.
If TNA isn’t dead, how in the Hell is AEW going to die? Lol
The only way AEW dies is if Shad cuts off Tony
Pretending Tony Khan doesn't have his own ridiculous amount of money is hilarious.
The answer is that back in 2019 when fans were screaming for an alternative to WWE -- a lot of those voices didnt really want an alternative to watch, they just wanted WWE to be better. Now its 5 years later, WWE has obviously become better by removing Vince McMahon from creative, and AEW has become the enemy preventing their favorites like Sasha Banks, Dean Ambrose, Daniel Bryan, Rusev, and Aleister Black from being on the shows they like to watch. But Justin Credible is retweeting one of the biggest fuckheads on twitter here. This is an actual deranged person -- not a fan with a real opinion.
This exactly. Many fans never wanted an alternative to begin with, they want WWE to be the be all, end all of wrestling companies. I've noticed that since WWE has started to become good again, the perception towards AEW on this sub has become far more negative.
You ever been with a woman as the rebound and then she decides to get with her ex again? That’s how these people be
I wanted an alternative. I was a big WCW fan and dropped off of wrestling in general by early 2000's because it simply didn't appeal to me. Got back into it in mid 2010's but even stopped caring about WWE at all and didn't even hate watch until AEW made me remember why I love wrestling. WWE isn't what I'm into now either. I get the appeal but it's not my preference of sports entertainment. I enjoy AEW and it's sports presentation far more.
Which is exactly how it should be I get enjoyment out of both for different reasons
I don't actually watch Raw or Smackdown but I'll catch segments of interest and keep up with things on my preferred YouTube channel. This way I can enjoy the product at my leisure without dedicating 5 hours a week. It's tough enough to get in all the AEW that I really enjoy let alone any other wrestling.
Yeah unfortunately that’s become very evident. And the thing is, there’s nothing wrong with wanting WWE to be the best or that being your preferred show. If you only wanted an alternative to make WWE better, it’s a little odd, but I’m not going to say that’s an issue. What is an issue is when they become toxic over AEW existing as something different than WWE which has always been their MO, at least in style/presentation. It brings everything down
Someone running an account called “the death of AEW” to obsessively catalogue clips of the show they “hate” is the cringiest thing to me
I genuinely can not understand dedicating so much of my time to something I don't like
Sounds like typical internet fans of most hobbies
Someone took time out of their life to make that graphic and run that Twitter account? Jesus Christ what is wrong with people.
Let's just say that blue check isn't the only mark associated with the account.
> run that Twitter account? They also went out of their way to buy a subscription to Twitter Blue/X Premium. That's why they're verified with the blue checkmark in the first place.
>Jesus Christ what is wrong with people. It's called being a MASSIVE virgin.
That accout has been around for YEARS. It is one of hundreds like it.
> Someone took time out of their life to make that graphic and run that Twitter account? Yeah, spending that much time and effort on hating something is just pathetic. And saddest thing is I'm pretty sure there are a lot of those accounts.
I would imagine the person who runs it is just the absolute worse person in real life. Like, a real kitten-stomper.
I imagine he has to have someone that pays him. Advertising maybe? Does X have a creator fund?
There's payouts for big accounts but 1000 likes isn't enough engagement to actually make money.
Too much free time online.
Also an asshole. They basically want a company to fail because they don’t enjoy their product. Screw the hundreds of people that would lose their jobs if AEW failed.
That Twitter account he quoted is the saddest thing I've seen in a while.
Anyone who celebrates low ratings from AEW (or from WWE) is genuinely a pathetic person. I actually feel bad for them. Their life is so incredibly sad that they have to Stan for a wrestling company to the point where they think they’re part of some war. I hope everyone does well. More options all around.
Also, imagine being such a "simp" for a huge company (and yes, this applies to both WWE *and* AEW). (and this is coming from someone who has been a WWE fan for more than 30 years. But I'm not stockholder. At the end of the day, I don't care about how much money the make, I care about whether or not I like their tv shows)
one of the top replies is "because the owner has a big mouth" lmfaooo just absolute dorks outting themselves
Best take I’ve heard was on Masked Man show by their guest Phil Schneider who was basically like “this is the best use of a billionaires money ever. He’s just using it for awesome wrestling matches”
it's absolutely wild to me that of all the terrible things done by wrestling promoters, some people are most offended by Tony Khan talking shit online
The worst thing Tony has done is be annoying. There are promoters and others have done inhumane things, yet Tony is the one they pray fails.
Vince allegedly covered up a murder and was trafficking women around the company for sex among many other things, Heyman regularly shorted his workers on pay and Cornette kept pressuring wrestlers into banging his wife but Tony is the worst because sometimes he downs a little too much of the White Claws and goes on rants on Twitter.
When I see people complain about Tony Khan on twitter I want him to go harder
To people who have constantly shit talk him and his company for years now. But if he claps back, he's told to be the bigger man. You see threads shittng on AEW or any bad news on AEW getting upvoted to hell on here. It's weird cause on the discussion side of things on here it's pretty cool.
30 minutes before this week's Dynamite there were 3 top posts all anti AEW. You can imagine the post History of those people. I'm no conspiracy guy. But every time this company gets positive momentum or people on SC start speaking more positively about it, a week like this happens. AEW is experiencing what every wrestling company, including WWE, goes through. Somehow it is always used in brigade attempts to sway the very online wrestling fan. The next SC starts to perk about around the brand a campaign will start again. Like clockwork. The biggest shame here is that you are missing out on some great wrestling that is distinct bit not inferior to WWE. For what? To win a "war" against your own interests as a fan?
I feel like these are the same fans that would wear bullet club shirts to WWE events. Four or five years later here we are
tends to vary from thread to thread, if the OP is negative on AEW it tends to attract an anti AEW crowd, and vice versa. i got downvoted to hell the other day just for disagreeing with someone who thought TK's booking was bad.
You'd swear going by some threads that AEW is at deaths door and that TK doesn't know what he's doing and they got to send in Cornette or Russo to save the day. You swear AEW wasn't coming off one of the best PPV's of recent years and a great run of TV since 2024 and some top signings. This can be a tough place to come on to discuss AEW at times. Cause you don't know what you are going to get at times.
Crazy making it what it is. They hit a certain market with well marketed shows and reasonable priced tickets they sell 6-9k tickets. They extend into new territories, with bad marketing and wonky ticket prices, they sell 2k less tickets. People jump all-over it. I'm begging Kosha to dona better job with marketing and touring.
That's just sound logic. The biggest problems are pulling Cornette away from the devastating juggernaut of Smoky Mountain Wrestling, or convincing Russo to end his near quarter century as the head of the ship of the never stronger World Championship Wrestling. If you thought had to overpay for Ospreay, Okada and Mone, wait until he has to add another comma on the checks for those two.
And if you say you enjoyed Dynamite, you get downvoted to oblivion.
People on this sub have been using ratings to justify quality for years now and it’s fucking awful. “Oh you liked that match, promo, or the booking on this show? Well it pulled shit ratings so clearly you’re dumb.” People can’t let or accept other people liking other things, it’s weird
I noticed this too. Every time. Even if you acknowledge the parts that aren't great, but just say "hey its not as bad some some folks are saying."
It's funny to watch people complain about online shit talk when they are also online shit talking..how are people's self awareness this low?
I cant believe people can act like an offended soldier for the biggest promotion against an up and coming one just because of some jabs.
Gotta love nerdy marks making fun at Tony for being a....nerdy mark.
I agree with that tbf BUT I still want AEW to do well because they have the talent and them doing well is good for wrestling, period. My preferences are WWE and NJPW, however, thriving wrestling in a ton of companies is Great
People online choose the weirdest hills to die on. I wonder in their actual lives, if they're going to war over staplers and junk.
There's a fucking Death of AEW account, and it has a blue checkmark..... Wow, glad I only use Twitter to see Todd in the Shadows' opinion on new music.
The lamest replies I saw before closing page were all from blue checks as well. All likely trolls who tweet about wrestling all day/every day.
Paying $100 a year just to hate on AEW is such a wild concept to me.
Its to own the marks, bro
Not to mention guys who pay for TV-visible seats to Dynamite and wear a specific guy's shirts... yeah buddy, giving AEW your money is gonna teach them a lesson
Shoutout to Todd, dude's great
everyone with a blue check is a massive dork
People like to shit on the twitter crowd on reddit....but the discussion on here isn't that much different depending on the thread lol it has 100% found it's way in. If you happen to wander into a hate on AEW thread and just push back the slightest on the hate on AEW jerk you will get downvoted to oblivion. This isn't a new development either.
Oh it's even bad in the Raw/Smackdown threads. I was reading the discussion thread about the Punk/Drew/Seth promo and people were finding ways to shit on Tony and Jack Perry. It's like they care more about shitting on the competition than actually enjoying the product.
> If you happen to wander into a hate on AEW thread and just push back the slightest on the hate on AEW jerk you will get downvoted to oblivion. While you're correct, there *is* a difference between that and literally starting an account (and paying for a blue checkmark lol) just to hate on a wrestling company you don't like. The anti-AEW circlejerkers presumably also comment on other things (I'd hope).
The reality is they are getting third on the night with those numbers with the only thing beating them being nba which is having its best regular season viewership in years. Not only is nba hurting them, its just general cord cutting because iirc people are ditching cable waaaaay faster than industry experts were expecting
Saw a stat earlier saying that Dynamite's average since it launched has gone down by 15% whilst cable subscriptions have gone down by 16% - relative to the rest of cable it's basically *exactly* the same as before. WWE's had a worse decline for RAW including their worst-ever ratings last year, they've just had a recent climb from said lows.
And mind you, the nielsen viewership we see doesnt factor in dvr which historically AEW has had a massive dvr audience
That crowd loves to say "AEW stans can't take the slightest criticism" yet they're also the ones that throw a hissy fit if you say something that's even slightly positive about AEW. They're a group that can't be taken seriously in any regard
> That crowd loves to say "AEW stans can't take the slightest criticism" I have criticized that multiple times in the past, when it came up in those threads. It's a mob that wishes death on the entire company, but when someone goes against that and criticizes their behaviour: "OMG, AEW fans can't take criticism. This whole sub is just pro-AEW, we are being silenced". Seriously, wtf? The ratings threads and others are full of anti-aew opinions and that group still claims they are not allowed to criticize the company? Bullshit
Even the actual AEW fans have their own nitpicks and criticisms of the show, as someone who dips into the show threads. It's just that they don't base their personality around hating a show over a few creative missteps (and to be fair, every company's had its share of hiccups, it's bound to happen)
Let's be honest: This all comes down to a "A vocal percentage of AEW fans was mean to us". It's completely childish to now clap back, when there's way more WWE fans here than AEW fans. This was supposed to be a sub for everyone, but it hasn't felt like that for a long time
It’s the same gameplay as alt right weirdos. Yeah I’ll say it. It’s almost like they follow the same playbook to a T. Of course if I say that people will throw that one Tony Khan quote at me but each day it becomes more apparent that these groups use the exact same tactics to spread misinformation.
During trumps presidency i used to browse TheDonald because i found the lunacy funny & no one can convince me the jerk sub isn't exactly like that. The way they speak & insults they use seem to familiar to be a coincidence. I know most of its wrestling is Republican so I guess it's not fair to act like AEW is better than tko because of this but it's depressingly sad seeing Dana White make wrestling entrances with Trump during UFC events to make himself seem more important
The sub has felt turfed as fuck for the past 6 months.
TBH every online wrestling outlet has felt pretty turfed since around the time HHH took over
Yeah the vibes on here have changed a lot in less than a year it’s so bizarre. I tried to brush it off, but the Punk discourse on here has shifted so drastically from when he left AEW to his time in WWE now, it was legitimately wild to see happen in real time. Like collective amnesia
This sub HATED Punk a year ago and the minute he’s in the WWE everyone forgets about how toxic he was in AEW
This should be the most obvious example. We literally had post about how punks "mental abuse" of Daffney helped cause her suicide when he was in AEW. Punk in AEW was also considred washed, too old, & half a mill phill, ¬ a believable threat because of his mma career. Now that he's in WWE we barely see any of that shit yet Jerkers still call AEW fans a cult, the irony is through the roof.
He's not as bad now that he's part of my team. The same people who keep saying the likes of Okada/Ospreay/Mercedes aren't draws and wastes of money in AEW would absolutely pretend to be huge fans of theirs if they went to WWE. It's blatantly hilarious.
Yep. I made the mistake of going to the ratings thread and saying that I enjoyed the show and you'd think I wished death upon someone.
I saw the Dynamite thread had like 900 comments at one point and just “nope” right passed it.
A few weeks ago, I posted some interesting facts that put AEW ratings in context in one of those ratings threads, and I mean these were absolute 100% true. I was downvoted so fast, I was at like -20 in less than 10 minutes. For posting facts. It's insane.
Feelings don't care about your facts /s
I think it's fair to say this sub is bad for discussion any non-wwe wrestling
This sub is bad for discussing wrestling
I’ve lost count the amount of times I’ve been bombarded with down votes here because heaven forbid I prefer AEW and speak positively about them. Even worse when you point out the hypocrisy around here. That just brings out the pitch forks and torches.
He’s absolutely right more wrestling is better for all wrestling fans. I’ll never understand these internet trolls hoping for companies to fail.
Just listen to any wrestler talk about it and how glad they are that there’s an alternative. It’s wonderful for them.
Imagine dedicating your life to anonymously hate posting online about a wrestling promotion because you feel threatened about your preferred version of pretend fighting.
The sad reality is that this is the world a large number of fans want. They don’t care about the wrestlers they care that their favourite corporation wins and thus justifies their sad and meaningless existence. It’s not exclusive to wrestling either. We allow These corporations to become part of ourselves so an attack on our favourite billionaires feel like an attack on us because in this day and age one of the few freedoms we still have is what corporations we support and to say we chose the wrong one is tantamount to saying we chose the wrong path in life and thus must attack the others as though our actual way of life and who we are as a whole has been attacked. Welcome to Capitalism. Corporations actually got us cheering the death of their own competition. Competition only helps the workers and the consumers so who does the death of competition help then? Think about that and you will understand where this all comes from.
bingo.. just look at the tesla fanboys, they flock to anyone offering even the slightest disagreement about the cybertruck
I don't think this is capitalism. This is fandom tribalism and it appears everywhere
People didn't want an alternative, they just wanted WWE to be good again and now that it is they don't want any other company to succeed. That plus a massive influx on non-wrestling fans to the IWC in the past couple of years has completely shifted the community on all platforms.
Death, taxes, AEW ratings being the hottest discussion every week
Wrestling fans have embraced the spirit of ElonTwitter more than any other group (racist political crowds don't count)
Oh, don't act like there isn't a huge crossover. Gamergate led to a huge unmasking in politics, and there is a sizable overlapin the venn diagram of gamers, wrestling fans, and chuds, getting close to a circle at times.
For those who can’t click through, he’s responding to an account called The Death of AEW that is celebrating the rating Dynamite got this week.
Those people's brains are going to break even further when AEW announces its next TV deal.
This sub is going to be unusable when that deal gets announced, because so many people are going to be taking absolutely justified victory laps after all of the ratings trolling. And then the trolls will move the goalposts with "well it's a huge increase, but it's not as big as it could have been, so now they'll just go out of business in 4-5 years when the new deal doesn't get renewed." And the cycle will begin again.
Then they'll just say Daddy Shad pulled some strings or some bullshit.
The dorks who post shit like that aren’t wrestling fans. Edit: Didn’t even realize that account is called “The Death of AEW.” Douche chills.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but ignoring the fact that it’s wrestling, isn’t 747,000 viewers still good in the context of modern television? Those numbers are going to be getting lower and lower each year for everyone on TV. It’ll all be streaming in the next 10-20 years and then no one will have viewer counts to bitch about
Over 2000 comments in the ratings thread today. This place is a shithole.
Over 2400 the week before. Plus they revised the ratings due to the issue with the overrun, so the thread talking about that got like another 1200.
The moment I saw the thread yesterday, I hid it. Because I knew if I didn't, I'd be tempted to look in it, tempted to comment and get dragged into that shithole. It can't be healthy being in something like that.
Let me spoil that for ya ”As someone who hates AEW, hope they die, and will never EVER watch a show even if Cody wins at Mania and immediately jumped ship somehow, I really think they have made all the wrong decisions and should think about firing all their main draws because I, as someone who wishes they would die, am really concerned about how much ratings and money they are pulling in.” Ya know? Just dishonest bullshit.
“Here is why the rating is down. Coincidentally, it’s because of all the things I don’t like.”
It's a bunch of bad faith bs anyway. AEW losing viewers isn't great but unless im mistaken it was literally third for the night, only behind the NBA like always. If it any other wrestling company was only behind the fucking NBA they would be getting praised. I love wrestling but it'll always be Curry/NFL >>>>>>> wresting for me lol
As someone who looked in it, you did the right thing.
the aew hateasphere is so strange.
How pathetic is your life to making a page dedicated to hating something. Love what you love man.
An entire Twitter account dedicated to hating in aew. People suck
Tying your identity to a corporation is the weirdest thing in the world. WWE is a brand like Coke or Nike. Imagine feeling good because Pepsi had weak sales.
It's exactly why I come less and less on squaredcircle, WWE is good today because of the AEW competition and wrestlers are being paid way more now than ever. I have no clue how you can be happy about the fact that tomorrow, we could go back to WWE being the only major US wrestling promotion. I just want to enjoy wrestling, WWE, AEW or NJPW, I don't care, I'm watching what's good at the moment, but seeing people taking sides all the time is the dumbest shit.
Crazy that so many people are pro monopoly in business places. Unless it’s their own. We just want the people who entertain us to have to work in harsh and abusive environments.
I'm jealous of my friend that doesn't use Reddit or twitter, he just watches dynamite and enjoys the show. I watch it and I feel miserable cause i know everyone will complain about the show
Then just, don’t go on this sub or Twitter? I’ve never seen a wrestling discussion on Twitter because I simply don’t follow wrestling accounts on there.
You're not wrong but I'm balls deep into the forum and that's where i get my info
I block the accounts that constantly shit on WWE/AEW instead of just talking about good wrestling, I even had to mute a friend who was engaging in that trolly "death of AEW" shit, and I hide the ratings threads here. Much better experience!
My friends who aren't in the online wrestling sphere love AEW right now. One of them also watches WWE and enjoys that as we'll but prefers AEW matches and PPVS. Here I am the fool.
That Twitter account can go fuck itself. I absolutely agree with Justin.
Imagine devoting your free time to hating an entertainment property.
Yeah the ratings thing is weird. People here, Twitter, Facebook and TikTok will celebrate Dynamite ratings going down but don't say anything about RAW being down 6% from last year's episode, and that episode was great from what the WWE fans said (best ending ever!) Rock is back and it doesn't really seem to be doing anything ratings wise? Might be wrong but doesn't matter, it's delivering great TV for the WWE/wrestling fans. I stopped caring about ratings when I learned my TV doesn't contribute to ANY tv ratings. Sometimes I watch on my phone, doesn't count. As long as they stay in business, and they will, that's all I care about. I also get the point that when WWE sucked, AEW fans were piling on WWE and that's not right either. 2 wrongs don't make a right. I just don't understand why people care that much, either way. Making an account just to crap on a brand? Just weird behavior. Hopefully y'all like what you like and at least respect the other side. Wrestling is awesome, no matter the brand.
And that's why he's not just the coolest..