It needs to step back in time, not forward in time, to learn from the past.

[Vince Mcmahon]

That was a quote from HHH in his interview with Bruno Sammartino. So my question is this:

Should the wwe go back to the fundamentals and try to put the genie back into the bottle. A sort of destroy and rebuild for the future and next 50 years of the organization. If so, what can the business do for its future?

[UltimateSavior]

I would love to see them put more of an emphasis on the athleticism of their talent, and less focus on storylines and ridiculous gimmicks and connect them with the larger MMA fanbase.

Based on UFC's success, people don't really care for Vince's 'entertainment' anymore, or at least in mass quantities. They need to be more serious.

In short? WWWF.

Controversial, I'm sure.

[Miss HHH]

Well they already have to a certain extent. They are much more focused on the wrestling matches now than they were back in the Attitude Era.

You always have to look back though, to be able to progress forward. You look back at the good things but also at the mistakes made to be able to improve.

[The Champ]

I don't think going back to how they did business 20 and 30 years ago is what Triple H meant by that, although I didn't read the interview.

[Old School Coco]

I would love to see them put more of an emphasis on the athleticism of their talent, and less focus on storylines and ridiculous gimmicks and connect them with the more larger MMA fanbase.

WWE has very few real storylines any more. Just a slew of random attacks.

[Vince Mcmahon]

You always have to look back though, to be able to progress forward. You look back at the good things but also at the mistakes made to be able to improve.

I agree completely with this. This leads me to this. I think the company could really study itself and its history to understand why things worked the way it did or didn't work. It's just where to start and end with the analysis to add it to the current product for its betterment.

I would probably say it should either be from January 23, 1984 or the original WrestleMania where the company was still in the transition days of Bruno/Backlund and the Hulkamania/WrestleMania Era. The business was still not completely exposed and the national expansion began where the company laid the foundations for going bigger than it ever did in a scope. I know Toronto and New York use to be really big in terms of giving the business mainstream press for its house shows and big events like Mania. Those two cities were foundation for the company going way back.

I think this is a good topic since its the 50th anniversary of the company and later this year a DVD on its history is being released, so the company at least would be looking at its history by default this year anyways. Might as well learn from it.

I posted this in another thread, but here is WrestleMania coverage in 1985 about Hogan/Mr. T against Piper/Orndorff.

In the headlines right at the start there is a blurb about Mania and then at 42:00 mark during the sports segment is coverage of Mania. This kind of coverage grew up until 1989 and the breaking of kayfabe although Toronto still covered WM VI, but other big cities stopped covering it slowly. I think there are a lot of things which caused the business to really fall off(the steroid and sex scandals were big, but there are others things I believe that I will get into which I also believe was repeated to the downfall of the attitude era too).

[Todd]

The biggest problem nowadays is over-saturation. There's WWE for three hours on a Monday (Raw), one hour on a Wednesday (Main Event), two hours on a Friday (SmackDown), one hour on a Saturday (Saturday Morning Slam), four hours one Sunday a year (WrestleMania) and three hours eleven Sundays a year (other PPVs), as well as NXT on Hulu every Wednesday and Superstars internationally every Friday.

The last time the company boomed fully was in 1998, when they matched supply with demand. There wasn't a hell of a lot demand for the product until 1998 because WCW was so popular, so all WWE broadcast was two hours of Raw every Monday as an A-show, one hour of Shotgun or Livewire every Saturday as a B-show, three hours five Sundays a year (the main PPVs) and two hours seven Sundays a year (In Your House PPVs).

That allowed the product to grow organically. Absence makes the heart grow fonder in wrestling. 90% of top wrestlers' will cite the biggest pop of their career as their return pop. The biggest attractions in the wrestling game are guys who wrestle once or twice a year. The one guy that has been plastered over WWE almost non-stop for eight years is perhaps the single most vocally rejected babyface pro wrestling headline act of all-time, John Cena.

I think the business should be repositioned. Cut down on the number of house shows, especially this idea that they have of shoving a run of shows on in large metropolitan areas. If you cut the number of shows, it will isolate the demand and before you know it, arenas will be full again. I would chop at least six of the PPVs down to $30, leaving the big ones at $45 and WrestleMania at $55. Price according to the demand in line with the brand. WrestleMania is bigger than the Rumble, SummerSlam, Survivor Series, is bigger than the others. Price it this way.

Also, make PPVs feel special again. Don't give away Jericho vs. Punk on Raw. Don't give away Del Rio vs. Big Show on SmackDown. Give these guys auras again. Little matches against enhancement talents, intense promos, make them feel like 'superstars' in the real sense of the word. I absolutely feel that they should go back to the way they did it in the Hogan era. Wrestlers were idolised and big matches felt HUGE because they were genuinely rare.

And I would go back to ONE A-show and ONE B-show. I would drop SmackDown. Given the network it's on in the US, it would barely be profitable, certainly not a profit worth saturating the product for. SmackDown was only introduced in 1999 when the demand was enormous for the product and WWE had to satisfy it. It isn't there anymore.

And lastly, they need to fully embrace going global. Shane has been a loss as far as this is concerned, he overlooked early impressive growth for this segment of the business.

And rant over.

[Emperor]

Brilliant post, Todd. I agree with all your suggestions. Sadly I can't rep you at the moment. I think they should not cut down the price of the lesser PPVs, but get rid of them completely. Have somewhere between 6-8 PPVs a year. That would make the big matches become more significant and reduce the need for constant schmoz finishes or other lazy-booking methods to artificially lengthen feuds.

I have a couple more suggestions:

WWE should stop being so rigid with their match formulas. It's the Raven-approved match formula of "initial face shine, prolonged heel beatdown, fiery comeback, false finish spam, go home". Every single match. No exceptions. Admittedly, it works, but I think more variety in match structures would really spice up the product. At least for me. As an aside, was there ever a point when WWF didn't use this match structure as a rule? I know Hulk Hogan used the formula every single match, but is that true of undercard matches in the 80s/early 90s?

I also think WWE should be more about the sport than the entertainment. Obviously it's impossible to go back to the pure kayfabe model of the 80s and before, but there should be less focus on the entertainment side of things. By that I mean, no more breaking the fourth wall promos. Stuff like Big Show turning heel because Vince forced him to act like a clown when he was a face, and wrestlers turning heel because they decide they don't like the crowd. I think there should be more promos like the first Rock/Punk interaction. Two guys that hate each other and want to beat the crap out of each other. That is ultimately what wrestling is all about. Being the best wrestler. That's something from the past WWE should incorporate.

I'll stop here, I've spent over half an hour on this post; can't articulate myself well at all because I'm so tired. Hopefully I made my points clear enough

[Justin Valuable]

I think the business should be repositioned. Cut down on the number of house shows, especially this idea that they have of shoving a run of shows on in large metropolitan areas. If you cut the number of shows, it will isolate the demand and before you know it, arenas will be full again. I would chop at least six of the PPVs down to $30, leaving the big ones at $45 and WrestleMania at $55. Price according to the demand in line with the brand. WrestleMania is bigger than the Rumble, SummerSlam, Survivor Series, is bigger than the others. Price it this way.

Couldn't agree more. It's news nowadays when RAW is a legit sell out. There's no reason why every RAW shouldn't be a sell out every week. The Smackdown attendance has been horrible for years and part of the problem is the fact that WWE treats SD on a level below RAW. Smackdown simply does not have that "anything can happen at anytime" feel. So it's hard to attract fans to the taping when it's more likely that nothing significant will happen. I agree that they should eventually phase Smackdown out. WWE doesn't view Smackdown as a top priority anyways; it comes across like the show is a burden to them to produce.

[Vince Mcmahon]

Pretty good posts guys and I agree with them. The over-saturation and treating it as more exhibition instead of "entertainment" emphasis are real good points. It is what made the product larger than life. As mentioned absence makes the heart grow fonder. Pull it back and make it harder to see the best of the best. It is a reason why house shows were better attended and ratings hit really high on SNME.

I have already stated the business model for the television shows may be outdated as it was used for winning the Monday Night Wars. There also needs to be more reality based storylines/angles that can be played outside of the "wwe universe". It is more work, but it gets people more emotionally involved when it does click.

[Justin Valuable]

Pretty good posts guys and I agree with them. The over-saturation and treating it as more exhibition instead of "entertainment" emphasis are real good points. It is what made the product larger than life. As mentioned absence makes the heart grow fonder. Pull it back and make it harder to see the best of the best. It is a reason why house shows were better attended and ratings hit really high on SNME.

I have already stated the business model for the television shows may be outdated as it was used for winning the Monday Night Wars. There also needs to be more reality based storylines/angles that can be played outside of the "wwe universe". It is more work, but it gets people more emotionally involved when it does click.

That's one of the problems with the Pipe Bomb from CM Punk. It seems the best storylines/angles for Punk are ones that seem most realistic. CM Punk set the bar so high that main event storylines not involving reality tend to be uninteresting. That's why his feud with Johnny, Daniel Bryan were less than thrilling while his WM angle with Jericho was intriguing. It's not a terrible thing to have a feud that extends beyond the entrance ramp, but those feuds should happen sparingly. The problem is that the feuds not involving reality can't captivate the audience. Take the feud between John Cena and Batista in 2010. Their build to WM was interesting as they used reality from their careers to tell a story. That's a key aspect that was missing anytime John Cena and Randy Orton were feuding. Their backstage issues are well known, yet they were never used in their storyline. This is probably why fans never gravitated to their matches. The quality of those matches were great, but the story was lacking. A potential feud being talked about is Sheamus versus Randy Orton. They've feuded before over the WWE Championship with not much else of a story going on. If they feud this time what's the story? The story will be Randy Orton turning heel, most likely against Sheamus in a tag match. But what's Orton's reasoning for doing this? In kayfabe world it would something simple along the lines of Orton being jealous of Sheamus being the man on Smackdown. That's good, but not great. Why not inject reality into the angle by suggesting that Orton feels Sheamus got to the top because of friendships he forged backstage? That could interject Triple H into the picture. And since HHH will eventually be the figurehead on WWE Television it wouldn't be a bad idea to do this. Triple H was well known in being behind Sheamus' rise. Orton, being a heel, could claim that Triple H never gave him the validation he wanted. This would be a great way to move Sheamus away from comedy and make him serious, even if it's just for this feud. This angle would be based on bitterness and the reality being used would enhance the angle. I'm not saying this is all true, but suggesting this to the fans is beneficial as it would get the fans emotionally involved like VM said.

Reality needs to be apart of WWE's main storylines. However that reality doesn't have to be 100% factual in order to be effective (like the idea given above).

[Emperor]

Why not inject reality into the angle by suggesting that Orton feels Sheamus got to the top because of friendships he forged backstage? That could interject Triple H into the picture. And since HHH will eventually be the figurehead on WWE Television it wouldn't be a bad idea to do this. Triple H was well known in being behind Sheamus' rise. Orton, being a heel, could claim that Triple H never gave him the validation he wanted. This would be a great way to move Sheamus away from comedy and make him serious, even if it's just for this feud. This angle would be based on bitterness and the reality being used would enhance the angle. I'm not saying this is all true, but suggesting this to the fans is beneficial as it would get the fans emotionally involved like VM said.

I think WWE should be less reality based. Like I said in my previous post, it's impossible to go back to pure kayfabe, but I think the vast majority of feuds should be about the titles, or who is the better wrestler. There doesn't need to be any reality injected for feuds of a more personal nature to work; it can still be completely fictional, just like any other storytelling medium. Including real things into storylines isn't necessarily bad, but I think WWE have gone way too far. It should be the exception, not the rule. Nowadays it seems every feud has to be about more than just two guys wanting to prove who is the better wrestler. There has to be something else such as "I don't like you because you pander to the crowd!" "I don't like you because the fans cheer for you!" I don't think this is necessary. Furthermore I think that having a feud based around backstage politics is taking it way too far. Most fans don't know about that stuff. Why reveal it to them?

[Vince Mcmahon]

Reality needs to be apart of WWE's main storylines. However that reality doesn't have to be 100% factual in order to be effective (like the idea given above).

I agree with you. When I think of reality-based stuff I think more in terms of stuff that can make people go "ahh okay I can buy that". An example would be something like The Mega-Powers story-line where Hogan/Savage become a team because of Elizabeth, but then break up because of Elizabeth. I think when it derails into fairy tale and soap opera land it takes away from the match that the men or women actually want to wrestle or fight each other over the issue at hand. Stuff like Booker T and Edge fighting over a shampoo commercial was silly when a storyline of Edge competing in WrestleMania at Skydome was a boyhood dream like HBK at WM 12. It makes little boys at home relate in dreaming of doing that one day and adults seeing someone live out their childhood dream.

Stuff like what we seen with the boss and Brock Lesnar and the selling of the injury is a thing of beauty for getting people invested because it makes the general audience guess. It creates a mystery to the product instead of just being flat out unbelievable. An example is like Rock/Cena where fans understood Rock came back saying he did so to prove he is the greatest of all-time by defeating Hogan, Austin, and Cena at WM, while Cena was out to prove his last few years dominating meant just as much as anything Rock did. That Cena had to win this match was illustrated. Now the aftermath of it is a different story, but things like that work.

The backstage skits and so on are okay, but let it be realistic and look less planned. Give more of an impromptu feel instead of organic one to the wrestlers in the locker rooms. Basically behave the way people will most likely behave in locker rooms in other sports. This is not to say to take away the entertainment spots with comedy(not too much though), but things that make the guys not look like a joke. An example was Tensai. Sure the excuse is it's "entertainment". What exactly did that do to help the guy? Nothing it just made him look like a joke the next time he is in the ring.

[Big Pete]

Entertainment is the name of the game and if the WWE focuses too much on becoming a sport I can see it just dying out. Not that I personally hate the idea, I believe the company should show more pride and work on fixing the fundamentals with their booking of talent (wins matter, matches actually have heat, no endless rematches etc.). I actually like the in-ring product and if it's shown more respect that will be a huge bonus, but I'd also like to see the WWE pull the curtain back on these stars and let them to show off their personalities. The days of occupational wrestlers is long over so the WWE will have to try and be more genuine with these personalities.

I'd also crap gimmick PPVs and come up with fresh new concepts for wrestlers to prove themselves. As much as I enjoy the Money in the Bank match, the concept itself is stale and is in desperate need of shelving. I'd compromise and come up with a new IYH type model for B shows and reassess from there.

Would also consider completely changing up the roster. Time to shake things up a bit IMO.

[Vince Mcmahon]

I think a good balance of sports and entertainment can be reached. It's just that some of the "entertainment the company gives isn't the entertainment people want to see on a grand scale with the masses. If it is entertaining then it gets drilled into the ground til its not entertaining anymore. Just find a good balance.

[spear]

I believe that wwe need too change soon. Because right now the current product is crap. It isn't right now with the big names on the roster Brock and Rock. And yes wwe is awesome right before mania. But 2 too 3 weeks after mania wwe is complete crap. The big names have gone and there's no decent storylines. Just look at the bullshit after EXtreme Rules when Cena went into a fued with ace. The whole damn abortion off a fued over shadowed the whole roster.
WWE needs too change! E need too focus on creating storylines for the midcard guys. And E need too stop focusing the whole product around one guy. E need too make legit main event stars.
Those are my thoughts on the matter.