The Wednesday Night Wars

[Jack-Hammer]

Uncle Dave has a juicy piece of "news" floating around for us. According to Meltzer, WWE will begin airing NXT on FS1 on Wednesday nights between 8 and 10 pm est to run head to head with AEW on TNT. According to the report, WWE and Fox finalized this deal sometime in late June or early July WWE hasn't officially announced anything but, according to Meltzer, WWE has been planning to move NXT to FS1 for a while now and, to be fair, there's been quite a bit of chatter about it off and on over the course of this year. It also hasn't been announced when NXT would begin airing and whether or not if would take air at Full Sale University.

The working idea is that NXT will air each week as a live two-hour show. The internal feeling is that a taped show will not work up against AEW, which will air live each week also. WWE officials feel like they have a strong edge over AEW, that being the endless supply of main roster Superstars that they can put on the NXT show whenever they want to. WWE also has another strong advantage and that's being able to promote the show on RAW and SmackDown, as well as other Fox programming. The report states that NXT being frequently plugged on Fox and USA, along with WWE being the more recognized and biggest brand compared to AEW, is something that WWE officials will offset the fact that AEW will air on TNT, which is a more well known and higher rated channel than FS1.

As far as a ratings war goes, I think AEW has a better shot of going toe to toe with NXT rather than Raw or SmackDown. Neither FS1 or TNT have a lot of hit shows, I think TNT only has one show currently drawing over a million viewers each week, and NXT is something more akin to AEW than Raw or SmackDown is.

If this turns out to be accurate, which is probably will be, then I admit that I fear for NXT as this could definitely mean Vince will be taking a much more active role in NXT, especially if NXT isn't blowing AEW out of the water or, worse for them, is losing to AEW in the ratings.

[Jeff Deliverer of Mail]

I hate the thought of Vince turning his gaze on to NXT and frigging it up with Main Roster guys just to boost ratings. AEW is a zero threat to WWE, why they feel the need to step on their neck right away is flabbergasting.

[BestSportsEntertainer]

"Let's ruin the best thing about our company!"

I hate everything about this.

[#AbsoluteUnit]

Sounds like an outstanding idea!

[Jack-Hammer]

I hate the thought of Vince turning his gaze on to NXT and frigging it up with Main Roster guys just to boost ratings. AEW is a zero threat to WWE, why they feel the need to step on their neck right away is flabbergasting.

It's just how Vince's mind works. Remember how Cena was squashed by Lesnar and Vince supposedly got all paranoid and afraid that fans would "stop believing" in Cena? His answer was to have Cena single handedly decimate the Wyatt Family as a means of somehow negating Lesnar's dominance over him. Vince's response to any perceived threat, even if it's only in his own mind, is massive overreaction to such a degree that it comes off as panic or desperation when there's absolutely no need for him to be panicked.

I may be wrong, but I can't recall reading anything suggesting that Vince feels competition is good for WWE. I mean, it's the standard answer that's given by WWE wrestlers when they're asked about AEW during interviews, it's the standard answer Triple H and Stephanie give during media interviews but I don't recall Vince saying it. Vince, in my opinion, doesn't want any remotely perceived competition in any way, shape or form; I believe he's fine with other wrestling companies existing so long as they know their "place", which is not being put into a position that results in growth in terms of TV viewership, live attendance and general revenue all around that gets within a billion miles of anything WWE does.

IF Vince decides to bigfoot NXT and winds up ruining it, then it may be my personal death nail for WWE as it's consistently been the best thing WWE related this decade in my eyes.

[Spidercanrana]

I'll give it a chance, tho it already sounds like there are too many cooks in the kitchen.

['Ravishing' Ned Flanders]

The only reason I still watch NxT is because Vince has nothing to do with it. If that changes then so does me watching it.

I really hope someone tells Vince that this would be a horrible idea. I also really hope the senile old fuck actually listens.

[Big Nick Dudley]

I doubt AEW cares. No one outside of the most hardcore fan cares about NXT. AEW needs one megastar (....CM Punk) and they should dominate Wednesday. Won't be hard with NXT on FSfucking1.

[Jack-Hammer]

Everyone's chief fear seems to be Vince's fingerprints winding up all over the brand. If NXT does go live and expands to two hours, Vince's involvement is going to have an impact on it and probably not for the best.

If they ultimately keep Vince away from it and keep what made NXT strong in the first place, which includes long term storylines that are generally simple and entertaining, building up of new talent, strong in-ring action, not rushing things and not having a PPV every month, then NXT could be significant competition for AEW. IF part of the plan is for NXT to sometimes use well established stars from the main roster sometimes and utilize them with the hallmarks that've made NXT great, then being a viable competitor for AEW only goes up.

If NXT is heading to TV, then it doesn't look like it's happening anytime soon as, from what I've read, NXT's current taping schedule is still on track. My guess is that WWE is going to stake out AEW, get a gander at what they do on TV for the last few months of 2019, strategize and have NXT debut on FS1 sometime early next year.

[Jack-Hammer]

PWInsider is reporting that NXT might be airing on the USA Network as early as October 2, which is the same night AEW premieres on TNT, to officially kick off the Wednesday Night Wars. PWInsider reports that the show will still be a 2 hour live event airing each Wednesday from Full Sail University.

It's looking more and more like NXT will indeed be heading for regular TV. However, if it winds up on USA from Full Sail each week, I think the show could be come stagnant in the same way we saw with TNA's shows airing from the Impact Zone.

[Jack-Hammer]

According to the latest word from Uncle Dave, NXT heading to USA is said to be "a done deal" at this point. He also alleges that Triple H has been dropping hints to people here and there, saying that while he can't tell what's going on, he is saying that people should watch Raw this Monday. As a result, Meltzer believes that the official word about NXT coming to USA will be official sometime during Raw this Monday. The show may also wind up airing prior to the premiere of AEW on TNT October 2, which might mean NXT will make it's debut September 18th or 25th since the final episode for the most recent NXT TV tapings is set to air on September 11. The plan is still for the show to air live between 8 and 10 pm on Wednesday nights, though nothing was mentioned about whether it'll air from different locations each week or if it'll be strictly at Full Sail. Meltzer also stated that Vince McMahon is very likely to be heavily involved in NXT going forward since it's going to "war" rather than just NXT being moved to a TV network to increase it's value and viability to audiences.

The last bit of Meltzer's report is like a kick to the nuts. In the back of my mind, I've always feared that Vince would start taking an active role in NXT and essentially turn it into another sports entertainment fiasco where getting quality consistently was a complete roll of the dice on a weekly basis. If Vince turns NXT into what Raw and SmackDown are, then I think AEW will slaughter it on Wednesday nights; the same old, same old isn't what people want and is a big reason why AEW has been rolling along getting things done at a record pace. At this time 8 months ago, AEW existed on paper only and now they're set to air on a major cable network backed by a wealthy investor that's richer than Vince McMahon.

Well, if Vince is gonna be hands on, then so long NXT and it was a blast while it lasted.

['Ravishing' Ned Flanders]

Well, if Vince is gonna be hands on, then so long NXT and it was a blast while it lasted.
Pretty much my exact thoughts on the matter.

[Jack-Hammer]

It was officially announced today that NXT is moving to USA with the debut episode airing on September 18. It's also been confirmed that NXT will air live each week from Full Sail University. In a move I thought pretty unusual, every episode will also air on tape delay 24 hours later from 8 to 10 pm EST on the WWE Network; so if you don't watch if live Wednesday night, you can catch it on the network Thursday night. So yeah...now you don't necessarily have to choose between NXT or AEW on Wednesday nights as this sort of takes a lot of the "fighting" out of the war.

[Spidercanrana]

Is Meltzer sure this time?

[Jack-Hammer]

I think we've all heard by now that there are reports saying that there aren't expected to be any big changes to NXT. Now, of course, this is comforting news, if true, but the problem is that I don't think anyone is really buying it.

One reason why fans love NXT is because it's so genuinely different from Raw and SmackDown from top to bottom, especially in regards to the creative decisions. That difference is one of the big reasons why so many fans seem to be excited for AEW and even if they won't admit it, I do believe that NXT has been an influence in how they want to do things over there. Just making NXT another Raw and SmackDown defeats the intrigue of NXT and if that is indeed how things turn out, then I'll eventually be switching over to TNT on Wednesday nights.

IF Vince genuinely gives NXT legitimate time to fail or succeed on the merits that made it what it is, and it fails to deliver the numbers that USA feels is appropriate and/or gets its ass royally stomped week in and week out by AEW, then I couldn't fault Vince for stepping in. After all, some financial reports have stated that each hour of NXT on USA will be worth about $2 million and that the deal is said to be for a couple of years; if true, then we're talking about a couple hundred million in revenue on the line and you can't blame somebody for not dicking around with so much money riding. What would be legitimate time? In my opinion, I think 4 to 6 months is extremely reasonable; if Vince keeps his hands off things for that long, allows NXT to be what it was that made it such a phenom on the WWE Network and it's not able to deliver the goods, then I don't think anyone could fault him without looking foolish.