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WWE considering doing a "small" brand split?

18K views 197 replies 135 participants last post by  MR-Bolainas 
#1 ·
In his latest Hotline, Wade Keller explained that WWE saw how well the New Year's show with half the roster went, so they are now preparing to make certain talents Raw and SD exclusive. The brands won't be completely split, but there will be key talent that is exclusive to each brand. The goal is to get SD ratings back up to a consistent 2.5 and they believe a well-defined split could do the trick.

Also: http://wrestlechat.net/report-wwe-considering-bringing-back-the-brand-extension/

I hope to god they do a full brand split soon IMO.
 
#48 ·
I know I will get shit over for this but I don't see how this will solve anything. They will still have shitty writers, Vince still having the last word in what goes, the character will still have lack the debth from within themselves. Hell look at the roster. The roster is so thin right now that it won't also help the current issue. Plus I doubt this would even happen either. To me this is just fantasy shit.
 
#151 ·
Another brand split is not the answer, totally agree here. At the end of the previous brand split SD was already viewed as the inferior show and now that perception would be even worse.

If they WWE wants to have a couple story lines going at a time that would be SD specific I am OK with that, in fact I think that would be a good idea, but officially splitting the roster into 2 separate "brands" again would be a terrible idea IMO.

Better idea just make the shows better under the current format, and like I said earlier if you want to have a couple story lines going at a time that are mostly Smackdown specific that would be ok, and the Superstars in those story lines can vary that way none of the superstars are just stuck on Smackdown exclusively, long-term. You want Smackdown to have better ratings, first step has already been taken. moving it back to Thurdays, now all you have to do is make it a better show, and something more than just a replay of Raw.

Plus the WWE already has a 2nd Brand, its NXT.
 
#87 ·
Although I prefer one roster and one show look at this list

Cena
Orton
Bryan
Reigns
Rollins
Ambrose
Wyatt
Ziggler
Sheamus
Ryback
Cesaro
Rusev
Zayn
Neville
Devitt
Kenta
Steen
Sandow



Literally all those guys could be world champ if used right. Plus with Uhaa Nation just getting signed. Adam Cole hopefully soon your looking at a roster that is WAY to big for one show only. Isnt it better if you have to stacked shows rather then one show where a mainevent talent is used as a lower midcarder?



Smackdown
Bryan
Cesaro
Orton
Devitt
Ziggler
Zayn
Neville
Kenta

Raw
Rollins
Ambrose
Reigns
Wyatt
Cena
Sheamus
Ryback
Rusev
Steen
Corbin
Sandow


Thats just the mainevent level talent. Then you can fill out with vets like show,kane and henry. Big E,Barret,Miz etc. Theres def a way to create two amazing shows.
 
#160 ·
I am an Ambrose mark, but please no return to the split titles. It damages both of them and the WWE as a whole to not have one, definitive champion.

Consolidating the titles is about the only thing the WWE have done lately to make the championship feel special again.
 
#81 · (Edited)
If they bring back the WHC, and Wyatt and Ambrose get put on SmackDown without Cena, Reigns or Orton, there may still be hope for this company.

I won't hold my breath. Of course they'll be held back on Raw.

Of course the fact that he didn't even mention the WHC also terrifies me, as they might just keep SmackDown talent without a title at all.
 
#83 ·
I really dont think there should be two world championships. It will always be a question of which is the top title then and they always made the raw one the top title.

Create a Smackdown championship and a raw championship that are the top titles on each brand then have the wwe worldheavyweight champion only defending on ppv and wrestling on ppv. He can appear on both shows via satelite or sometimes even there cutting a promo. It would make the championship look important and not overexposed. Two championships has always been ridicolous imo. The champ can be out promoting the company and wrestle on ppv only.
 
#193 ·
Great Idea. send all the technical wrestlers and indy midgets to SD. Keep the larger than life guys and talkers on RAW. Everyone is happy.
 
#47 ·
Upper midcard? Are you fucking kidding me?
 
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#72 ·
If you actually treated the whole roster like stars, and not just the top 3% of your company, you could do a brand split easily, and each shows would have a distinct feel. With the way things are now, you only have 4 or 5 guys people care about, while everyone else is booked like a jobber. To split those 4 or 5 to each shows would kill Raw, especially because it's a 3 hour show.

That problem is remedied easily, put guys into mid card feuds where the have mic time and a coherent story. It doesn't have to be anything too glamorous, just give them something serious to work with, a little bit of mic time, have the guys work on making the feuds, have clean finishes etc. It's really not THAT hard. Let's just say in a hypothetical scenario you split the shows up. You have a lot of guys that are SO talented, they are just presented like geeks. What the fuck is the point of that? Instead of making 1 or 2 stars, why not make 10 or 15 stars? Obviously at different levels, you have your main event stars, and then mid card stars, but just because they are a mid carder doesn't mean they have to be a geek.
 
#73 ·
Exactly fucking this, what I was getting at in my post.

In the early 00s they had a good 10-15 stars, not all mainevent talent but all talent the fans cared about. They had good mic time, a good storyline and back drop and worked good matches and were booked to their strengths.

We get none of that nowadays.
 
#24 ·
^^^yeah. If they really want to trust Reigns, give him the reigns 8*S of Smackdown. Have him be the draw to the show. That way they can determine if he's actually fit to be the face of the company.
 
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#37 ·
Its kind of hard to belive how bad they utilize 3 hours of RAW every week.
However, this is great news, even though its not a full split, they will be testing it out to see if its worth doing. The product was getting way too overexposed, we don't need to see top superstars more than once a week.

Matches like Wyatt vs Ambrose, which could be a top feud one day, looks like shit now based on the no story-line feud and the amount of times we've seen them fight. We need to save these match ups, or at least give them proper booking, not garbage like a christmas street fight.

Either way, stars will get a chance to shine on smackdown instead of being lost in the shuffle on RAW. I still firmly believe that they should bring back the World title and have it equal with the WWE title, meaning the World title will be the main event of some PPVs. This will make inter-promotional matches a big attraction, when it happens on big PPVs.
 
#54 ·
I find it hilarious how people on here think having a Brand Split will fix the problem of having the same matches every week on RAW and SmackDown. I guess people forgot that splitting your roster increases the chances of seeing the same matches over and over again as opposed to WWE having a one huge roster they could work with.
 
#59 ·
I am skeptical this is legit. I think it is just usual Dirt Sheet BS. But who knows.

WWE can't really do a full on brand split right now. The roster is not big enough (the reason we see the same people wrestling over and over is not entirely because of WWE being lazy bookers) and I doubt WWE would go on a hiring frenzy when they lost so much last year and cut their budget. I guess they could call up a bunch of NXT stars, which would be interesting, but would also mean upping their pay which would likely go back to the money problems.

The brand split is not the savior people would think it was anyway. Nostalga has built up the split as being much better than it was. Smackdown was well written when Heyman was the head booker on it. But for the most part it never really worked.

It confused casual fans and drove fans off of some shows who were previously watching both. They gave up having brand exclusive PPV's almost entirely after a couple years because no one roster could sell the PPV's well enough. And it was during that time that WWE's popularity and ratings started to gradually decline. People blame it on the lack of competition, which is not completely wrong, but the brand split was part of the problem too.

WWE gradually started to go from a draft lottery once a year changing a handfull of wrestlers to constantly shuffeling people back and forth and then doing Super Shows before scrapping the brand split because ratings were not holding with half the roster off each show. It was not really about WWE becoming lazy as much as people like to say.

The brand split was not without it's benefits. During the early years when the roster truly did stay on one show or the other and only interact during Survivor Series and the Rumble it did make the PPV's and especially the big PPV's feel more special. Also was the only time since making the Rumble winner main event Mania that the winner was not such a given.

It also gave them a chance to build more wrestlers. I do agree people like Guerrero, Edge, and to an extent even Batista benefitted from having less competition for main event slots. But commerically and ratings wise it didn't have a lot of success. And it also cost WWE a lot of money to fund 2, and later 3 rosters, that they don't have due to WWE's ratings and popularity going down.

I think WWE might benefit from having some storylines carried out exclusevely on one show of the other. But any kind of brand split I don't think will work.

It was a product of the time and never really a huge success some remember it as. Don't know what the answer to them turning things around is. But it is not IMHO reviving something that barely worked years ago.
 
#61 · (Edited)
You must have skipped the Main Event this week that Swagger lost on, thanks for the spoiler though I can skip his match when I watch it. Competing on Superstars and Main Event is not an indication of success love. In a few years time if he doesn't DUI again he might make it to the mid card and put over some new talent.
 
#64 · (Edited)
You must have skipped the Main Event this week that Titus lost on, thanks for the spoiler though I can skip his match when I watch it. Competing on Superstars and Main Event is not an indication of success love. In a few years time if he doesn't DUI again he might make it to the mid card and put over some new talent.
:swaggerwhat Don't even know the difference between ME and Superstars and you expect to critically discuss a brand split?

Claiming Swagger would elevate Titus on the C and D show and then claims it means nothing in the next breath. :swaggerwhat

What are you even going on about? :swaggerwhat


RAW:

John Cena
Randy Orton
Sheamus (turn him heel)
Roman Reigns
Big Show
Kane
Rusev
Bad News Barrett
Bray Wyatt
Dean Ambrose

Smackdown:

Daniel Bryan
Dolph Ziggler
Seth Rollins
Luke Harper
Erik Rowan
Antonio Cesaro
The Ascension
Rhodes Brothers
The Usos
Jack Swagger

Looks good to me.

I can already see some good potential feuds from this brand split configuration.
Legitimately would probably skip RAW most weeks if it was like this, too.

Problem is the rosters would be way too small. I feel like WWE needs at least another go 10-15 regular talents before they think of splitting the roster again.
 
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