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Post by hbkbigdaddycool on Feb 9, 2020 13:37:23 GMT -5
Let's say in the year 2000 that WCW flipped the switch and put Nitro to Tuesday night, ending the Monday Night Wars, would the ratings for WCW Nitro have gone up??
I can't help but wonder if WCW would have had more of a fighting chance to stick around if their ratings were up, and then the people at AOL Time Warner may have been okay with letting that company stay on TNT on Tuesday nights.
What does everyone think about this??
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ClassicFan2
Main Eventer
Joined on: Oct 22, 2010 15:25:00 GMT -5
Posts: 3,252
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Post by ClassicFan2 on Feb 9, 2020 14:04:41 GMT -5
I thought about that back then. They had WCW Thunder on thursday and maybe could just combined the two for thurs night as well. Yea any other night of the week woulda helped IMO. It would become WCW night.
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Post by LA Times on Feb 9, 2020 14:29:42 GMT -5
The product was so bad and the company was losing so much money, I dont think it wouldve done anything.
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Post by greenjack1992 on Feb 9, 2020 16:39:37 GMT -5
I think the rivalry for ratings made fans so tribal that a change in night for Nitro would have lead to the argument of being a WCW-fan or WWF-fan disappearing and the buzz around both products going away. The reason the show still even had fans at that point was because of the rivalry with Raw.
So I think we would have seen the sort of stuff we got in the RA era on Raw two years early, and Nitro would have been a lot like 2008-2010 TNA.
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Post by The Brain on Feb 9, 2020 17:35:16 GMT -5
Yeah sadly they were so far beyond saving by that point that nothing they did would've stopped the bleeding.
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Post by MKSavage on Feb 9, 2020 20:41:54 GMT -5
The way Bischoff made it sound was that the AOL people really didn't want anything to do with wrestling, regardless of the ratings, they wanted to get rid of it completely and Ted Turner no longer had final say to keep them alive.
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Post by Nivro™ on Feb 9, 2020 20:50:06 GMT -5
Ratings for Nitro when it closed were still in the mid 2s to mid 3s. It wasnt ratings that were the problem for them it was the fact they were a money pit and AOL/Time Warner wanted to cut ties with anything that was losing the company money.
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Post by Gorilla on Feb 11, 2020 8:33:24 GMT -5
I hated all the interference going on in WCW and WWF. Every finish had cheating or interference of some sort. That's what turned me off wrestling.
I stopped watching in 99.
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Post by warriorlynx on Feb 11, 2020 12:08:57 GMT -5
Probably might've helped, but again AOL Time Warner had no interest in WCW which is why their initial selling price of WCW I believe was around $600 million a year before Vince bought it for a measly few millions bucks. What WCW needed to survive was a new network like Fox but networks were moving away from wrestling as its reputation was tarnished due to being vulgar etc. It could be even the reason why we saw RAW move to TNN from USA in 2000 and ratings took a dip with the network. They couldn't break what they used to do in 1999. 2000 just was the beginning of the end for the second wrestling boom imo.
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jking1979
Superstar
Joined on: Oct 3, 2019 20:00:02 GMT -5
Posts: 754
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Post by jking1979 on Feb 11, 2020 21:00:46 GMT -5
That would have been interesting. I think the fans were ready for new superstars in WCW and less interferences in the matches.
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Post by JokerFC on Feb 13, 2020 7:56:11 GMT -5
Its a fine idea but it doesn't address the issue inside WCW....Vince Russo. The creative direction was f*ckin DIRE. Ratings may slightly have improved because there was nothing on opposite it.
But Vince knew he had them on the ropes....I'm willing to bet he would have put something on opposite them. At this point in time you had Steiner on TV calling WCW creative all sorts. Vince smelled blood in the water....
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Post by HandsomeHollywood on Feb 18, 2020 12:50:45 GMT -5
It might have bought them a bit of time. The problem on AOL's end isn't that WCW was unsuccessful as much as it was that they had no interest in being in bed with pro wrestling.
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Post by HandsomeHollywood on Feb 18, 2020 12:52:29 GMT -5
Its a fine idea but it doesn't address the issue inside WCW....Vince Russo. The creative direction was f*ckin DIRE. Ratings may slightly have improved because there was nothing on opposite it. But Vince knew he had them on the ropes....I'm willing to bet he would have put something on opposite them. At this point in time you had Steiner on TV calling WCW creative all sorts. Vince smelled blood in the water.... Wasn't Russo gone by 2000 and replaced with Sullivan? I'm pretty sure that was he main reason that the Radicals left. They hated Sullivan. Perhaps the ship could have been righted without Russo but I think the bigger issue is that AOL/Time-Warner had no intention to promote pro wrestling. |
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Post by JokerFC on Feb 19, 2020 6:56:42 GMT -5
Its a fine idea but it doesn't address the issue inside WCW....Vince Russo. The creative direction was f*ckin DIRE. Ratings may slightly have improved because there was nothing on opposite it. But Vince knew he had them on the ropes....I'm willing to bet he would have put something on opposite them. At this point in time you had Steiner on TV calling WCW creative all sorts. Vince smelled blood in the water.... Wasn't Russo gone by 2000 and replaced with Sullivan? I'm pretty sure that was he main reason that the Radicals left. They hated Sullivan. Perhaps the ship could have been righted without Russo but I think the bigger issue is that AOL/Time-Warner had no intention to promote pro wrestling. No I don't think so... |
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Post by k5 on Feb 19, 2020 12:32:08 GMT -5
Wasn't Russo gone by 2000 and replaced with Sullivan? I'm pretty sure that was he main reason that the Radicals left. They hated Sullivan. Perhaps the ship could have been righted without Russo but I think the bigger issue is that AOL/Time-Warner had no intention to promote pro wrestling. No I don't think so... they took him off for three months. russo’s plan was for tank Abbott to beat Sid. Sullivan changed that to Benoit. They brought Russo back at same time as Bischoff to try and reinvigorate the brand. |
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Post by JokerFC on Feb 19, 2020 19:16:11 GMT -5
they took him off for three months. russo’s plan was for tank Abbott to beat Sid. Sullivan changed that to Benoit. They brought Russo back at same time as Bischoff to try and reinvigorate the brand. Whoa 🤣🤣🤣 I didn't think he got found out that quickly |
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Post by The Brain on Feb 19, 2020 19:21:20 GMT -5
I'm so glad they didn't have Tank go over Sid.
This however I do approve...
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Post by k5 on Feb 19, 2020 20:30:26 GMT -5
yeah, I feel bad for Tank. used within his capacity, I believe he could’ve been an attraction at least for a good 6 months. Russo circus acted him pretty quickly though.
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