News

DeMarco’s WWE Raw Rating Analysis (5/20/19): Raw #4-6 Behind NBA

Some obvious (and not so obvious) changes to Raw last night–did it work?

Published

5 years ago

May 21, 2019

Greg DeMarco

Greg DeMarco chimes in with your WWE Raw Rating Analysis for the May 20 episode, as Raw faced stiff NBA competition.

The WWE Raw Rating is in for the May 20 edition, and it’s another tale of WWE dominating everyone not named NBA:

Hour 1: 2.681 million viewers, .93 rating in the important 18-49 demographic (#4 ranked hour)
Hour 2: 2.583 million, .90 in the 18-49 demo (#5 ranked hour)
Hour 3: 2.29 million, .80 in the 18-49 demo (#6 ranked hour)
- 14.6% drop in viewership from Hour 1 (8 PM) to Hour 3 (10 PM)

For comparison, here is last week:

Hour 1: 2.576 million viewers, .90 rating in the important 18-49 demographic (#1 ranked hour)
Hour 2: 2.391 million, .81 in the 18-49 demo (#2 ranked hour)
Hour 3: 2.080 million, .70 in the 18-49 demo (#3 ranked hour)
- 19.3% drop in viewership from Hour 1 (8 PM) to Hour 3 (10 PM)

(Available via ShowbuzzDaily)

But what does the WWE Raw Rating really mean, Greg?

Let’s take a look at that Top 5: Raw came in at #4, #5, and #6, behind the NBA Western Conference Finals. The game on ESPN came in at #1, followed by their NBA Courtside coverage, followed by the SportsCenter that followed (may have included some of the overtime from the game). The rest of the Top 10 was rounded out by Love & Hip Hop Atlanta 8 (you guys watch this?), Vanderpump Rules, and two more instances of NBA Playoff coverage.

The biggest argument I got into yesterday with some idiots on Twitter was about the NBA vs WWE. NBA Playoff Basketball, much like Game Of Thrones on Sunday, doesn’t present programming 52 weeks per year. That’s a threat, which from a business analysis perspective means it’s a external factor negatively impacting your success that you cannot control.

But since everyone loves to focus on viewership, Raw’s went up. So did their share (the .93 for hour 1 is an example of this), which is more important than viewership as it represents a percentage of the households utilizing television. Hour 2 from this week beat Hour 1 from last week in the ratings, and Hour 3 from this week was within 100k viewers from Hour 2 from last week. And remember, Raw occupied the Top 3 last week.

WWE definitely employed a strategy with Hour 3 this week, as all three major elements of that hour (Mick Foley introducing the WWE 24/7 Championship, The Miz vs. Drew McIntyre with Roman Reigns involvement, and Seth Rollins & Kofi Kingston vs. Baron Corbin & Bobby Lashley), were built and promoted throughout the show. This strategy was also used with much success during the Attitude and Ruthless Aggression Eras. It showed some immediate benefits, as Hour 3 saw 14.6% drop in viewership this week against a 19.3% drop last week. WWE also changed the presentation for Hour 3, with Mick Foley’s promise of a dirtier product being accompanied by a different arena lighting package and a darker theme to the standard Raw graphics package. The show as a whole followed Money In The Bank’s theme of a more physical product rooted in more reality. Everyone online is leaning towards the obvious changes (lighting and graphics), but if you look closer you’ll see that the show actually built to all three major elements of Hour 3–and THAT is the real change.

But if color changes are your game, here’s an example:

We’ll have 24-hour YouTube numbers on Wednesday, and we’ll see how it compares.

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Let us know what you think on social media @ChairshotMedia and always remember to use the hashtag #UseYourHead!

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Chairshot Wrestling News Shuffle: RAW Chaos, Impact Looking For A New Home, AEW Signing and More! (5/22/19)

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AEW Coverage

Mitchell’s AEW Continental Classic Update! (11/27/23)

What a start to the tournament!

Published

5 months ago

November 27, 2023

Steven Mitchell

Did your picks win points?

The AEW Continental Classic is underway, with almost everyone competing. Check in here if you haven’t seen the winners and losers of week 1!

Here are your Gold League standings!

Jon Moxley: 1-0, 3 points
Swerve Strickland: 1-0, 3 points
Jay White: 1-0, 3 points
Rush: 0-1, 0 points
Mark Briscoe: 0-1, 0 points.
Jay Lethal: 0-1, 0 points

Here are your Blue League standings!

Brody King: 1-0, 3 points
Claudio Castagnoli: 1-0, 3 points
Daniel Garcia: 0-1, 0 points
Eddie Kingston: 0-1, 0 points
Bryan Danielson: Yet to Compete
Andrade El Idolo: Yet to Compete

My Thoughts:

Nothing too crazy, nothing too wild, this tournament only just got started. The only disappointing point is that they could not get Bryan “cleared to compete” Saturday night. Not sure how much of that is shoot given the bad eye, but this was kinda the problem of wanting him in the tournament over tons of other choices. Bryan wants to face Okada for WrestleKingdom 18, how is Bryan supposed to do that at his best if he’s also gonna be in a round robin, doing five top level matches in about as many weeks? And it takes away from Andrade being able to do something. Also a little surprised we didn’t even hear from Andrade on Saturday.

Now as we heard on Saturday, round two’s matches are set. Gold League will see Mark Briscoe VS Rush, White VS Swerve, and of course, Moxley VS Lethal. Nice variety there, a couple 0-1 guys facing off, as well as two 1-0 guys, and then 1-0 VS 0-1. No offense to Lethal, but he feels like an 0-2 going up against Moxley. Hard to call the other ones but that’s the fun of it. Meanwhile, Blue League sees Brody VS Claudio in a showdown to be 2-0, then Bryan and Andrade finally jump in, Bryan against Eddie and Andrade against Garcia. Sadly, feels like Eddie and Garcia are going 0-2, no way Tony Khan is booking Bryan and Andrade to lose their first shots.

In fact, that could be half the reason they did wait on those two, that’s almost too good for just a first round opener. But I still would’ve done it, same as NJPW does stuff like that for round robins, which this is all modeled after anyway.

Let us know what you think on social media @ChairshotMedia and always remember to use the hashtag #UseYourHead!

AEW Coverage

AEW announces Continental Classic entrants

The C2 is set!

Published

5 months ago

November 22, 2023

Steven Mitchell

Tony Khan Reveals the Blue and Gold “Leagues!”

Originally livestreamed, Tony Khan and Tony Schiavone officially announced the twelve total entrants and divided them into the two round robin blocks known as the “Blue League” and “Gold League.” If you don’t feel like sifting through the almost 30 minute video, the groups are:

Blue League

Bryan Danielson
Andrade El Idolo
Brody King
Claudio Castagnoli
Daniel Garcia
Eddie Kingston

Gold League

Jon Moxley
Swerve Strickland
Rush
Mark Briscoe
Jay Lethal
Jay White

Tony Khan also explains the rules for the Continental Classic:

Every match has a 20 minute time limit
The winner of each match earns 3 points, losers earn 0, 1 point for a draw
EVERYONE ELSE is banned from ringside for true 1v1 action

Eddie Kingston also joined the selection special as his “life’s work” is on the line in this tournament, both the ROH World Championship and NJPW Strong Openweight Championship on the line as part of the modern day North American Triple Crown Eddie, Tony Khan, AEW, ROH and NJPW are looking to create together. Gold League competes tonight on Dynamite while Blue League will have their start this Saturday on Collision. Look for more articles like this one to keep up with the Continental Classic standings over the next six weeks of tournament action!

Let us know what you think on social media @ChairshotMedia and always remember to use the hashtag #UseYourHead!