AS I SEE IT
Bob Magee
Pro Wrestling Between the Sheets
PWBTS.com
Friday night's Smackdown featured a 25-minute self-indulgent
Orleans Parish Community Theatre level performance that
overturned Wrestlemania and took time away from other
wrestlers advertised for a week on television, starring a
delusional corporate heel character seeking Cody Rhodes's
"soul".
Delusional corporate heels are hardly the thing we need to
be reminded of right now in our escapist wrestling products,
especially one coming from a company whose COO associates
himself publicity with the current Administration in
Washington.
With all that, it's even more important that fans have a
major nationally televised wrestling alternative.
Two weeks ago, we saw a campaign of engagement farmers,
trolls, and bots, jumping on a Reddit post regarding AEW's
Grand Slam Australia that claiming that "many" fans in
Australia were upset at AEW about the show and "felt
cheated" claiming to have been "promised a PPV and gotten an
episode of Collision".
It spread to Twitter and other social media, even to the
point of Dave Meltzer claiming this Reddit post represented
some large group of dissatisfaction. But despite all that, a
successful Grand Slam Australia took place last Saturday
with the third highest gate in AEW history.
(Side note: the original Reddit poster that started all
this later posted how great the show was....a point not
repeated by the many websites and social media accounts that
ran with the original claims).
Grand Slam Australia Collision, which began airing on
TNT/MAX at 10:52 pm ET, following the NBA All-Star Saturday
Night event, saw 502,000 viewers (up 115,000 viewers) from
the last episode with an 0.21 rating (up .11 from last week)
in 18-49 cable. The first quarter (Omega/Ospreay vs.
Takeshita/ Fletcher) topped 1 million.
The show had the highest viewership and 18-49 rating for
Collision since December 21, 2024, which was the episode
with the lead-in from the NCAA college football playoff
game. Grand Slam Australia had the lead-in from the NBA All
Star Saturday Night event on TNT, which averaged 2,998,000
viewers and a 1.09 18-49 rating from 8:00 pm to 10:52 pm. It
ranked #4 for that night on among cable in 18-49 (with two
college basketball games on ESPN with start times in
primetime ranked #2 and #3 for the night ), and besides the
Kansas vs. Utah college basketball game on ESPN (976,000
viewers and an 0.28 rating), it was the highest rated show
on all of television in the time slot.. While viewership
data does not include viewing on MAX, staff from MAX
indicated that in their opinion Grand Slam Australia
"performed well".
Warner Brothers Discovery has said publicly that AEW is
among the best-performing live sporting events on MAX,
(which includes NBA, NHL, MLB, USWNT and USMNT soccer).
Since they're doing well for WBD, that matters more than the
opinions of SiriusXM podcasters or engagement farmers.
Further proof that they're doing well came from a press
release sent out by Warner Brothers Discovery late this past
Thursday, which in part indicated that WBD will be expanding
the AEW PPV and specialty shows available on MAX this coming
Saturday, March 1, including content from 2020-2024.
The release lists new content:
AEW Special Events, 2020A (2020)
AEW Special Events, 2021A (2021)
AEW Special Events, 2022A (2022)
AEW Special Events, 2023A (2023)
AEW Special Events, 2024A (2024)
The names of the specialty shows and PPVs aren't yet
specified, but "AEW special events" so far have included
major themed shows such as Fight for The Fallen, Fyter Fest,
as well as PPVs. Despite what many wrestling sites reported
, it does not seem to be the full list of events for each
year (witness the "A" following the item). A staffer from
MAX himself confirmed this on social media Friday.
Since the Grand Slam Australia Collision episode following
NBA All-Star Saturday Night, gave Collision its highest
ratings in months, Warner Brothers Discovery press release
also broke that AEW Collision will get two major post-sports
prime slots for Collision after NCAA March Madness second
round coverage on March 22 and 23 with:
Saturday March 22
NCAA March Madness 3pm
#AEW Collision 11pm (estimated, at completion of March
Madness coverage)
Sunday March 23
NCAA March Madness 3pm
#AEW Collision 11pm (estimated, at completion of March
Madness coverage)
In other AEW/MAX news, it was verified that MAX is planning
to offer non-subscribers a full price rate for AEW PPVs, but
offer them at a discount for subscribers. Once all the
details are fully ironed out, and the function is tested,
then fans will get a press release on the date and details
of MAX PPV premiere.
If you'd like to contact me, you can do so at my
bobmagee1@hotmail.com account or to through Facebook
Messenger at https://www.facebook.com/bob.magee.180, direct
message me at https://twitter.com/BobMage70323520, or
contact me at BlueSky at
https://bsky.app/profile/bobmagee940.bsky.social
