Daily Update: SmackDown ratings, Pat McAfee, Impact tapings

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This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter

The new issue of the Observer is out, and it’s a big one:

  • The WWE merges with UFC and transitions into TKO, the most in depth look at the changes to be expected and where changes aren’t to be expected
  • Amount of cuts expected to be made
  • What type of people are expected to be cut
  • Nick Khan’s letter to employees before the cuts
  • First major departure
  • How Saudi Arabia investing in PFL affected the stock
  • New board of directors
  • New hierarchy
  • Dana White talks merger and shoots down another exec’s goal for the new company
  • Talk on future television rights
  • Current market value and did it reach projections
  • Biggest financial concerns
  • Crossover promotion
  • Match of the week and performer of the week
  • AEW All in attendance with notes on other stadium shows including actual WrestleMania turnstile counts vs. announced and paid attendance
  • Bryan Danielson’s full-time career winds down, why, how long he’s thought about this and talks candidly about his decision
  • Long-term concerns
  • UFC 293 in Australia with one of the biggest upsets in history. Who’s house? Sean’s house.
  • Future of middleweight division
  • Business notes on the show
  • History of promotional wars, timing, how AEW vs. WWE is the same, how it differs
  • AEW and its decline in live attendance, the key reasons and what can be done, and how WCW turned it around under Zane Bresloff
  • How other companies turned it around and how the circumstances to do that aren’t there in this situation
  • A look at the next major WWE, AEW and NXT shows and early business notes
  • WWE Superstar spectacular in India coverage
  • The unique career of Brett Wayne Sawyer, top singles champion on the most-watched television show in the country at 23, and a career that fell off quickly
  • The early days of the Road Warriors
  • The booking of Ole Anderson
  • The most detailed look at the ratings, weekly and nightly standings, segment breakdowns, comparisons to one year ago in a very important and newsworthy week
  • CMLL 90th anniversary show this week
  • Legends special match coming
  • Stardom PPV notes including one of the week’s best matches
  • Performer of the week and match of the week
  • First time ever for a true rookie in match of the week
  • Major dream match this weekend with Will Ospreay
  • Updates on Jim Duggan
  • Notes on the death of former Carolinas announcer Rich Landrum
  • Notes on the Cassandro movie
  • Pro wrestling star leaves the business for one year, wins a gold medal in the Olympics–this long forgotten piece of wrestling history
  • Bandido returning
  • Impact Hall of Fame notes and notes on Mike Tenay
  • Jade Cargill update
  • Business updates on PPV from All Out, Backlash and All In
  • What percentage of WWE buyers purchased an AEW show in the last few weeks
  • Ticket sales for upcoming AEW & WWE shows
  • International TV ratings
  • Streaming numbers for WWE
  • Ortiz & Santana breakup explained
  • Paul Wight’s name in ESPN story on PED investigation
  • Georges St-Pierre into Canadian Sports Hall of Fame
  • UFC top star leaving the promotion
  • UFC Hall of Famer gets DWI
  • Bray Wyatt funeral
  • Vince McMahon’s return
  • Thoughts on Smackdown and what is the best day for the show if FX gets it
  • Drew McIntyre update
  • Roman Reigns return
  • Lots of comings and goings in WWE
  • WWE and NXT live event coverage

This Week’s Retro Observer Newsletter

Ordering Info:

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If you order by mail with a check, cash or money order to P.O. Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228, you can get $1 off in every price range.

Saturday Update

WWE

  • Last night’s SmackDown averaged 2.44 million viewers in the fast national ratings, up from last week’s fast national average of 1.969 million. The rating in the 18-49 demo was a 0.6
  • WWE uploaded the full 13-minute segment of The Rock’s surprise return on SmackDown. They also uploaded Rock’s backstage segment with John Cena.
  • Cena commented on reuniting with The Rock: “The best nights are the ones when we remember we’re all fans. Welcome home, @TheRock. Thank you, Denver. C U next week #Smackdown! @WWE @WWEonFOX”
  • In a post-SmackDown interview, Pat McAfee said he’s still very confident that he’ll get to work with Michael Cole on commentary again.
  • LA Knight cut a promo on SmackDown saying that he’s coming for championship gold. Knight said it doesn’t matter if it’s Rey Mysterio, Gunther, Seth Rollins, or Roman Reigns that he goes after.
  • Chad Gable was the guest on WWE After the Bell this week. During the appearance, Gable explained having to change his mindset when working as a babyface instead of a heel:
          • I had to shift my mindset. Working as a heel for so long got me in a certain mode … I’ve just learned to do less. To get sympathy, you just do less. People don’t want to see an underdog babyface hitting 10,000 pretty moves and hitting 10,000 fancy dives, and flips, and suplexes all the time.
  • Corey Graves discussed becoming the voice of in-game intros for the Pittsburgh Steelers:
          • The Steelers kick off their home games with the Terrible Towel Twirl. When you’re in Acrisure Stadium, you got 60,000-plus all waving their towels above their head. I had the honor and privilege of being able to lead that this week to really kick off the season. But more than that, I think more exciting personally was the reason I was on the field to begin with was I have the dubious distinction of being the narrator, the voice of this year’s in-game intros for the Pittsburgh Steelers. So for every home game this season when the clock hits zero, the first voice you hear is mine. Give a big, ‘Here we go’ and the video packages and it’s honestly, I wanna say it’s a dream come true but it’s actually more so, growing up, being born and raised in Pittsburgh, lifelong Steelers fan, it’s so cool with WWE and the NFL [having] been working together. Obviously, we got the new championship legacy titles. That relationship has been really cool so to be able to experience that on my home turf, literally, in the city that I love and live in and feel so strongly about was absolutely incredible.
  • Asuka, Bobby Lashley & The Street Profits, and AJ Styles appeared on The SmackDown LowDown.

AEW/Other Wrestling

  • Andrew Zarian of the Mat Men podcast noted that he feels confident to say that AEW will be on Max in 2024 and the promotion will expand to 12 PPVs a year.
  • Tony Khan told Insider that MJF’s “Steiner Math” promo from Wednesday’s Dynamite was MJF’s idea:
          • That particular one was him. Wrestling is all about collaborations and I really enjoy having that connection and the ability to create stories.
          • We were putting down ideas for the week’s shows, and he did say that and it was a great idea. That’s how I like to put stories together. Sit down with MJF and Adam Cole, the three of us, and talk. I’ve shot videos with the two of them and they have this great partnership.
  • AEW is selling Acclaimed trios title belts for $4999 each. Only 10 belts are available.
  • Anthony Bowens explained the price of the belts:
          • For those going crazy, these are the legit belts. Not factory made replicas. Replica belts would take about 9 months to get produced. If something happened to one of ours, they would have been replaced by one of these. Hand crafted by Red Leather Belts. Only 10 are available. So yes this a release for a hardcore collector. We are also working on trying to get toy versions of these as well. Trust me, if it were a commercial release it wouldn’t be 5k haha
  • Trinity is teaming up with Mickie James against Gisele Shaw & Savannah Evans at Impact Wrestling’s TV tapings in Memphis on Saturday, September 23. Josh Alexander vs. Yuya Uemura is also set for that show, which is night two of the tapings.
  • “Speedball” Mike Bailey vs. Samuray Del Sol has been announced for night one of the Impact tapings in Memphis on Friday, September 22.
  • AIW announced that, due to circumstances out of their control, Eddie Kingston won’t be appearing at their JT Lightning Invitational show in Cleveland tonight. Lance Archer is replacing Kingston at the event.
  • Andrade El Idolo was interviewed on AEW Unrestricted.