[The-Rock-Says]

Starbucks father is pretty cool. I've talked to him a few times.

He's a 42 year old pro wrestler turned COO. He's got a giant nose too.

[Starbuck]

Originally Posted by The-Rock-Says

Starbucks father is pretty cool. I've talked to him a few times.

He's a 42 year old pro wrestler turned COO. He's got a giant nose too.

How do you know that!!! Fuck. I've been found out. Damn. Dad is gonna bury me now. No WWE title for me.

[Loudness]

Trying to look at WWE from a distanced view (casual), what reason do non-hardcore WWE fans have to tune in? They have two storylines going, Punk/Heyman and Team Hell No, everything else is so downplayed in importance by the booking, effort in writing or mic effort/time that it doesn't even matter to most regular viewers, let alone fans who barely watch. Why should the TV viewers care, if WWE themselves, and their commentators ironically make most feuds sound like filler material, talking about unrelated things during matches or half the roster getting jobber entrances nowadays.

If they wanted to gain more mainstream popularity, they will have to try to make every character and storyline as worthwhile as possible, watching three hours of stagnation minus the ME and one Tag Team isn't going to cut it. By worthwhile, I also mean presented as a big deal, rather than an unimportant feud.

As for individual draws, there's very few (if none at all) that unconditionally draw regardless of how much effort was put in the storyline, who they feud with and where that storyline is placed card wise apart from John Cena. But then you compare the way Cena has been booked for years with full-force (or any other wrestlers that ever became big draws) with the start-stop philosophy and the random burials after somebody gets over (Bryan at WM, Ryder and others) and you can see why nobody appearing like such a big deal anymore.

[Starbuck]

The fact that not one segment got over a 3.0 this week is very disturbing. Is there a big MNF game on next week too? I wonder if they can bounce back. I guess the only good news is that when you fall this far, the only place left to go is up....unless they keep going down lol.

[dan the marino]

Originally Posted by Falkono

So then Sheamus quarter was higher then Punks main event. Says it all.

His gain came from the regular 9:00 slot. A lot of people don't even give a shit that RAW starts at 8 now and continue their schedule of tuning in at 9: I know I did for the longest time until just a few weeks ago. Not to mention it's just hard to watch 3 hours of any show sometimes, nevermind RAW when it's like it was last week.

You can't blame Punk and you can't blame one person for this mess. It's the product at the whole and overall, it's bad. I don't think it's worse than 2009's RAWs yet but if they continue with shows like last weeks it will get there fast.

Which is odd as the week before was pretty great (the first two hours, at least). What a drop in quality.

[JY57]

http://www.lordsofpain.net/news/wwe/..._RAW_Punk.html

- We noted earlier this week that Vince McMahon was seen upset at Monday's RAW. By the time the night was over, it's said that he was in a much better mood for the Jim Ross Appreciation Night stuff that happened after RAW. One of the reasons Vince is in a bad mood these days is because USA Network officials aren't happy with the way things are going with three-hour RAW shows.

Partial source: PWInsider

yeah if this keeps up. I say going back to 2 hours will eventually happen

[Cack_Thu]

As seen on the Online slang list .

Raw is Le Punk : a far more deadly phenomenon than Gustave ,Quicksand,Bermuda Triangle, that makes people mysteriously disappear .

[The-Rock-Says]

You can't blame one man for a whole rating of a show. We go by what they do in their segments and matches. Not the overall rating.

The overall rating projects how good the product is. And this product sucks.

[Mister Hands]

I feel like they should try two months of Raw as written by the guy who wrote the Anger Management stuff, along with Trips and his NXT team.

[roadkill_]

Originally Posted by Loudness

Trying to look at WWE from a distanced view (casual), what reason do non-hardcore WWE fans have to tune in? They have two storylines going, Punk/Heyman and Team Hell No, everything else is so downplayed in importance by the booking, effort in writing or mic effort/time that it doesn't even matter to most regular viewers, let alone fans who barely watch.

One thing Russo got right was: He said that every wrestler must have a story, or something going on. It wasn't just violence that made TAE good, it was the undercard having something on the burner, however stupid it was. For that reason I even enjoyed watching HEAT back in the day, it was like a mini-Raw. And at the time, J.R. would section his commentary. So if Al Snow was doing something stupid in the first quarter, J.R. would mostly stick to that angle and sell that wrestler. Now, its shit all over and Cole just plugs the 1-2 angles kept for later right from the start.