Hello and welcome to the WrestleTalk News - I’m Oli Davis. Press the thumbs up and
leave a comment down below because I’ll be replying to them for the first 15 minutes
after this video goes live! But actually if I really want to get all the
comments, I should try to get some the cheap heat.
Hey, YouTube comments section…...your local sports team isn’t very good.
Nailed it.
But not as much as Elias and Kevin Owens did on Monday night.
In one of the most sustained crowd reactions in WWE history, the Seattle crowd intensely
booed them both for six straight minutes after Elias had joked about the town’s beloved
SuperSonics basketball team leaving the state back in 2008.
The reaction was so extraordinary, mainstream news outlets like CBS, UpRoxx and Deadspin
ran with the story. But despite all that coverage, and just how incredible the Seattle crowd
were, Big Dave Meltzer isn’t impressed. Because Big Dave has stats:
“The single most lengthy and loudest cheap heat segment in years was on the least-watched
hour of Raw in 21 years. Remember that as far as long term lessons about the industry
when people try and BS you.” The Elias and Kevin Owens segment came in
the third hour of Raw, which turned out to be the least-watched hour of the show in over
20 years. After getting its lowest rating ever last Monday with 2.35 million viewers,
Raw topped it - or, rather, went underneath it - this week, by pulling in just 2.29 million
viewers; with that last hour being dangerously close to falling beneath the 2 million viewer
mark at just 2.08 million - leading Meltzer’s Wrestling Observer tag partner Bryan Alvarez
to make a prophecy of doom: “Looking like a RAW hour under 2 million
viewers is inevitable this fall.” The low rating came even with WWE promoting
Ronda Rousey wrestling, Shawn Michaels in the main event, and the teased go-home angles
for Saturday’s Super Showdown. For context, until last year a rating under
3 million viewers was seen as worrying. Raw has only stayed above that threshold number
once since May. It’s a shame, as I thought this week’s
episode was the best of the year - with me giving it the rarer than a shiny Krabby In
Awe rating. I was in the minority, though, with 44% thinking the episode was 4 out of
5 with Cor, and 35% giving it AvRAWge.
Mixed Match Challenge isn’t doing much better, with this Tuesday’s episode 3 managing a
peak viewership of just 42,800 people on Facebook Watch - down a fifth from the Season 2 premiere.
Nobody really cares about Mixed Match Challenge - not even WWE at times, it seems. I just
included that story to transition into the next one.
Maybe to boost those ratings, John Cena and Nikki Bella could be a team.
You Can’t Segway.
Ahead of Cena making his WWE return at Super Showdown on Saturday, WrestlingNews.co are
reporting “despite what has been said publicly, John and Nikki are still together.”
Pro wrestling couple does fake break up storyline? I’m as shocked as you are.
After Cena proposed to Nikki at WrestleMania 33, the couple were due to get married on
5th May this year. But just several weeks before the date, they released a joint statement
announcing they had split. Cena then made a public plea on the Today
Show in an attempt to win her back. Which all coincidentally happened in the build to
their new season of Total Bellas. Which also did record low ratings.
Nikki still maintains in interviews the couple are no longer together, recently telling Entertainment
Tonight: “He’s doing him and I’m doing me.” But according to WrestlingNews.co Cena
has flown back to Tampa this week - where they both own a home - and was at a BirdieBee
party with Nikki in August. The site speculates footage of Cena and Nikki reuniting ‘for
the first time in months’ will be filmed backstage at Super ShowDown for Total Bellas.
As a special treat for the SWAFT Nation, if you visit WrestleCrate.co.uk and use the discount
code WTTV, you’ll get a free Scott Hall autograph in your first box! WrestleCrate
is a monthly mystery box full of loads of wrestling goodies, which has items from the
biggest promotions in wrestling. Will Triple H beat The Undertaker? Find out
mine and Luke’s Super ShowDown predictions by clicking the video onscreen now! And give
us a subscribe to keep up to date with all the latest professional wrestling news. I’ve
been Oli Davis, and that was wrestling.