Official Raw thread

[The Q]

Rollins has been pretty good as of late. He's doing great as the Monday Night Messiah.

some people are just natural heels.

 

[RobToxin]

The build up for McIntyre/Lesnar has been absolutely fantastic so far.

well done, creative.

According to the "dirt sheets", McIntyre was chosen by Lesnar to do this with. Lesnar has a huge liking for Drew and wanted this angle.

 

[DefCONNOne]

According to the "dirt sheets", McIntyre was chosen by Lesnar to do this with. Lesnar has a huge liking for Drew and wanted this angle.

Careful now....Q is a little sensitive when the dirt sheets are brought up.

 

[The Q]

According to the "dirt sheets", McIntyre was chosen by Lesnar to do this with. Lesnar has a huge liking for Drew and wanted this angle.

From everything I've heard about Brock, he's the anti-HHH.

Just makes me love him even more.

I get his schedule sucks for the viewers. But man, he seems like a great guy.

 

[RobToxin]

From everything I've heard about Brock, he's the anti-HHH.

Just makes me love him even more.

I get his schedule sucks for the viewers. But man, he seems like a great guy.

That doesn't bother me. I come from a time when the NWA Champion was on your chow maybe once a month, usually less. So you had territory champions and, in truth, the territory titles meant more to the fans than the World Champion did.

Having the World Champion as a special attraction and not a weekly occurrence made his appearances a bigger draw.

Ah, the good old days of territory wrestling.

 

[The Q]

That doesn't bother me. I come from a time when the NWA Champion was on your chow maybe once a month, usually less. So you had territory champions and, in truth, the territory titles meant more to the fans than the World Champion did.

Having the World Champion as a special attraction and not a weekly occurrence made his appearances a bigger draw.

Ah, the good old days of territory wrestling.

there is something to be said about the scarcity model of business and marketing...

 

[RobToxin]

there is something to be said about the scarcity model of business and marketing...

Supply and demand. The very basics of economics.

 

[The Q]

Supply and demand. The very basics of economics.

yup.

plus the haters watch hoping for him to lose.

that was me for hhh and hbk lol.

 

[RobToxin]

yup.

plus the haters watch hoping for him to lose.

that was me for hhh and hbk lol.

This again was the strategy of the NWA and the territories. Have a heel champion. Build up a babyface. Sell tickets to people wanting to see the babyface winning the championship.

The problem was when they finally pulled the trigger and put the title on the babyface, ticket sales went down.

The WWF, however, was always different with the babyface champion (Bruno, Hogan, Macho Man) able to sell more tickets than a heel champion would.

 

[The Q]

This again was the strategy of the NWA and the territories. Have a heel champion. Build up a babyface. Sell tickets to people wanting to see the babyface winning the championship.

The problem was when they finally pulled the trigger and put the title on the babyface, ticket sales went down.

The WWF, however, was always different with the babyface champion (Bruno, Hogan, Macho Man) able to sell more tickets than a heel champion would.

until the attitude era...when heels became faces....and the world went crazy.

Bret was always right. He didn't change...the fans did.

 

[RobToxin]

until the attitude era...when heels became faces....and the world went crazy.

Bret was always right. He didn't change...the fans did.

And it was the best business move in the history of wrestling when Vince realized that and adapted the product accordingly.

It would be impossible to do that today. You can't please today's wrestling fan because today's wrestling fan doesn't want to be pleased.

"96 minutes of Raw last week was incredible but let's spend all our time bitching about that 8 minute segment that sucked."

 

[The Q]

And it was the best business move in the history of wrestling when Vince realized that and adapted the product accordingly.

It would be impossible to do that today. You can't please today's wrestling fan because today's wrestling fan doesn't want to be pleased.

"96 minutes of Raw last week was incredible but let's spend all our time bitching about that 8 minute segment that sucked."

I talk about both.

Some stuff is great...other stuff....will leave me scratching my head.

but to be fair, there will ALWAYS be something that leaves you scratching your head.

 

[RobToxin]

I talk about both.

Some stuff is great...other stuff....will leave me scratching my head.

but to be fair, there will ALWAYS be something that leaves you scratching your head.

Absolutely!

People always love nostalgia. The truth of the Attitude Era though is....

Most of it was not good.

But the shit that was good was so damn good that it made up for the Beaver Cleavage and Giving Birth To A Hand nonsense.

 

[The Q]

Absolutely!

People always love nostalgia. The truth of the Attitude Era though is....

Most of it was not good.

But the shit that was good was so damn good that it made up for the Beaver Cleavage and Giving Birth To A Hand nonsense.

It also helped that WCW shit the bed after that idiot referee botched Starrcade 97....

 

[RobToxin]

It also helped that WCW shit the bed after that idiot referee botched Starrcade 97....

And then the Finger Poke of Doom.

On the same night they gave away Mick Foley winning the title from the Rock.

 

[The Q]

And then the Finger Poke of Doom.

On the same night they gave away Mick Foley winning the title from the Rock.

I get what they were trying to do there.

I'm honestly kinda surprised it didn't work considering the "no spoilers" culture we live in now.

Bischoff has talked about the FPOD on podcasts before. Again, it made sense in theory. But the fans definitely didn't like it. What people fail to mention, is WWE did the same thing with HHH and HBK for the European title and everyone seemed to think it was brilliant.

 

[RobToxin]

I get what they were trying to do there.

I'm honestly kinda surprised it didn't work considering the "no spoilers" culture we live in now.

Bischoff has talked about the FPOD on podcasts before. Again, it made sense in theory. But the fans definitely didn't like it. What people fail to mention, is WWE did the same thing with HHH and HBK for the European title and everyone seemed to think it was brilliant.

I think it was doing both on the same night (Foley spoiler plus finger Poke of Doom).

There are several differences between the WCW version and the WWF version.

1. In storyline, Hogan and Nash were enemies while Triple H and HBK were teammates.

2. HBK was WWF champion dropping the European title. Nash was World Champion dropping the world title.

I think had they done the Foley spoiler and not done the Finger Poke, they could have gotten away with it.

Had they done the Finger Poke but not the Foley spoiler, they could have gotten away with it.

But they did both. And the fans were left saying "you are going to shit on their title change and then give us that?"

That was their biggest mistake.

 

[The Q]

Absolutely!

People always love nostalgia. The truth of the Attitude Era though is....

Most of it was not good.

But the shit that was good was so damn good that it made up for the Beaver Cleavage and Giving Birth To A Hand nonsense.

I mean, I talk about the good and bad of today's product. Why shouldn't we?

Yes, Nostalgia is a GREAT seller.

The reality of the attiutde era is that there was just so much legendary talent...it made it easy to have great stuff.

I mean just off the top

Taker (probably the GOAT)
The Rock
SCSA
Kane
HHH
HBK
Jericho
Big Show

how can you have bad cards when that is your base?

There's always going to be misses. Beaver Cleavage was pushing the envelope to such extreme levels that it made Goldust nut job act look tame.

To be fair, Vince and WWE also got absurdly lucky during this time. Everyone says Bischoff did a stupid thing firing Austin over the phone, but they don't have the whole story.

Bret couldn't afford to pay bret, and being a giant grade A douche bag paid off.

The Kliq does something stupid and selfish...and the punishment to HHH helps sky rocket the attitude era.

It's just wild stuff to think about.

 

[The Q]

I think it was doing both on the same night (Foley spoiler plus finger Poke of Doom).

There are several differences between the WCW version and the WWF version.

1. In storyline, Hogan and Nash were enemies while Triple H and HBK were teammates.

2. HBK was WWF champion dropping the European title. Nash was World Champion dropping the world title.

I think had they done the Foley spoiler and not done the Finger Poke, they could have gotten away with it.

Had they done the Finger Poke but not the Foley spoiler, they could have gotten away with it.

But they did both. And the fans were left saying "you are going to shit on their title change and then give us that?"

That was their biggest mistake.

That's fair. Again, I was so young that to me it just seemed like a long term play by the main players of the NWO to pull something like that.

Plus I wasn't a foley fan at the time (I appreciate his work more now as an adult) so having HIM take the belt off the Rock was patently absurd.

 

[iowajerms]

According to Wikipedia, Raw has had 1,396 episodes as of 2/24/20. That is 1,398 as of today.

Has there been a Monday night when WWF/E has not had an episode? If they have had an episode every Monday since the pilot, when which episode will be the last consecutive? Will they make it to 1,400 straight Mondays (given they haven't missed any and Wikipedia is right).