NXT is always a popular show and brand for hardcore wrestling fans, for good reason. It’s a fresh, quality product. It is in many ways the best case scenario of WWE, showing what Raw or SmackDown could be like if talent was better used. It’s what WWE as a whole would look like, if it were more in-tune with it’s fanbase.
And ever since the move to USA in particular, the weekly NXT show has been a big hit critically. This was needed, as they were gearing up for a full scale war with AEW. The shows which have been going up against Dynamite have continued the pace. Exciting matches in front of passionate fans. On some level, they’ve had better shows than AEW, though arguable.
But they’ve been losing the ratings war, and losing big. Dynamite drew 1.4 million viewers for their debut, up against a 891k viewers for NXT. Week 2, as expected, they both suffered losses but Dynamite still won pretty decisively. Dynamite had 1.1 mil across TNT and TruTV vs. 790k for NXT.
As WWE’s own statement a little over a week ago will tell you, it’s a marathon not a sprint. Even though they tried to turn it into a sprint by getting the headstart and overloading Week 1 with a Takeover-esque card, limited commercial breaks, advertised overrun, big star returns and all… nevertheless, it’s true that this is only the beginning.
But the reason they call it a marathon is because they’re aware of what a long road is ahead of them.
The most distressing thing for the decision makers in NXT about Week 1 is that it was a stacked, overblown kind of NXT that they can’t do every week, as they’d run through their big match-ups too quickly. Whereas Dynamite’s Week 1 was much more indicative of the kind of show AEW could do on a weekly basis.
I suspect AEW’s upcoming show in Philly to do bigger ratings than last week with a relatively major card all it’s own. But even if that doesn’t happen, odds are good NXT will lose this week again. And the next, and the next…
500k viewers behind for their first ‘normal’ battle. It’s gonna be a while before they can make up that kind of ground. They’re a long way from even equaling them right now, let alone surpassing them.
Just so you don’t get me wrong, these numbers are very good for NXT. Especially up against a competing wrestling show that has such a similar hardcore rebel appeal to it. If anything it shows they should’ve made this jump a long time ago, as who knows how big it’d be by now if they did it a year ago?
But you don’t go into a war to perform admirably. You go in to win. And that brings us to the major crux that’s holding them back right now in the eyes of the mainstream…
It’s time for NXT to get out of Fullsail.
Listen. I love Fullsail more than most. Sometimes they’re more quiet than others but it’s generally been a very good home base for NXT over the years. It was a very good system for them for a while because it was clear the people at these shows also went to the live events. There, they saw the young up and comers that weren’t shown off on TV. As a result, when then-nobodies like Chad Gable or Blake & Murphy made their televised debuts, even in non-featured spots, they were already getting reactions. That’s a pretty big deal. To say nothing of their clear knowledge and love of the indies, helping make every indy darling that walked through seem like a major star right off the bat.
I’m all about loyalty to a home base and I’d never endorse a full break from the place. But on a weekly televised basis, there’s just no argument for staying there. When you’re in a 400-seater going head-to-head with a show with 14,000+ in the building, each with equally passionate fans… there’s just no getting around that. To the most die hard of wrestling fan, maybe that doesn’t matter so much. But what do you think the casual (read: new) viewer sees when they compare the two? NXT can’t help but look a little low-rent when they’re doing this.
It serves as proof that this was all done at the last minute.
I love Triple H these days. I’m a big fan of him as a head booker or whatever you want to call his position with NXT. He gets his audience and knows how to appeal to them, which is really all you need.
But when he acts like it was always the plan for NXT to go to USA in September, like it was always gonna be staying on Wednesdays when it went to a live two hours, as if this was all intended from the start of the year, AEW or no AEW… he’s lying to you.
I wholly believe that if they had this set to occur months and months in advance, NXT would’ve been running full-scale arenas for the last few weeks, regardless of competition. (They also probably wouldn’t have done that bizarre deal of splitting the first hour on USA and the second on the WWE Network, but that’s another story.) The whole idea would be to show NXT is a rising show, so it’d only make sense to go for bigger venues. Atleast something in the 5,000 seat range that you can then shoot to look bigger.
But there was one key problem. AEW Dynamite didn’t have a day announced until July 24th. Up until then it was widely speculated what day the show would fall on, between Tuesday and Wednesday. That’s an issue as it pertains to booking venues, NXT couldn’t book their own until they knew what AEW was doing. This left WWE with basically two months to respond. August 20th was the day they announced the move to USA, starting September 18th.
It’s all very short notice and when you have a budding brand like NXT, it’s probably not too easy to book a venue at the last minute. I don’t know if delaying the announcement of the day was strategic on AEW’s part or not. But I do think it had a hand in keeping NXT in Fullsail for the short-term. And that’s a problem, largely because of one simple fact…
NXT can’t play the underdog here.
The whole concept of NXT is to essentially be an alternative to WWE, that happens to also be a WWE show. It’s built itself as the little-engine-that-could rebellious counter-culture answer to WWE’s main brands. It’s territorial indy-sized home base was a big part of that image. And that’s totally worked out for it thus far in making it stick out from other WWE brands.
But therein lies the rub. That only works when positioned as an alternative to Raw or SmackDown. In comparison, yeah, it’s a fresh new upstart from humble beginnings. A grassroots wrestling revolution that’s easy to fall in love with.
You can’t really do that with NXT when you’re competing with an actual brand new upstart revolutionizing the wrestling landscape. At the end of the day, this is still a WWE show. They’re owned by the corporate apex of pro wrestling that’s trying it’s damnedest to hold on to a monopoly. Now that it’s on USA especially, it’s hard for them to go around doing a PWG cosplay. They have all the resources in the world and they’re not going to fool anyone into thinking otherwise.
What this means is that Fullsail really doesn’t give them any sort of advantage to play off of. They can’t position themselves as the ECW in this situation, sticking it to McMahon and Bischoff. That just won’t fly.
And yet, that image is important.
The real problem here is that this rebel attitude isn’t something they should be discarding either. The last thing they should want to do is make NXT feel like Raw or SmackDown, and eradicate it’s cool factor.
See, WWE’s main demo is the over 50 crowd. You can make any conclusion or jokes you want out of that, but it’s a fact and has been for a fairly long time. Even with NXT, it’s the one demo they beat AEW in.
But make no mistake, this is the one WWE show that desperately wants to aim itself at the teenagers. I think the younger viewers will have a much easier time gravitating towards it than the old. With their Slipknot theme, gritty visuals and unconventional wrestlers, that much seems apparent.
Hence the balancing act. They have to promote themselves as the big money promotion they are whilst still maintaining that youthful appeal. Triple H himself actually made the apt comparison of an underground band signing a major record deal. How do you rise and keep your street cred at the same time? How do you embrace this new status and simultaneously avoid looking like you’ve sold out?
And how do you keep yourself a believable manufactured rebel alternative when a legitimate one is right across the airwaves from you?
That’s the issue that they face. It’s a problem they will absolutely have to tackle if they want to take the lead in this war.
