Random ROH Thoughts Thread

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famicommander
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by famicommander »

Even if Meltzer does get inflated numbers from the ROH office, are we to expect that it's any different with NJPW, WWE, Impact, CMLL, or AAA attendance figures he reports? Where do those numbers come from if not from the respective offices of those companies? And are they not just as well incentivized to inflate their numbers as ROH? And if that's the case, those are the promotion we're comparing ROH to in the first place, so what's the problem?
Big Red Machine
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

famicommander wrote: Sun Dec 17, 2017 6:18 pm Even if Meltzer does get inflated numbers from the ROH office, are we to expect that it's any different with NJPW, WWE, Impact, CMLL, or AAA attendance figures he reports? Where do those numbers come from if not from the respective offices of those companies? And are they not just as well incentivized to inflate their numbers as ROH? And if that's the case, those are the promotion we're comparing ROH to in the first place, so what's the problem?
With WWE in particular he seems to go to more of an effort to refute officially reported numbers, and on occasion with New Japan as well (certainly more than I ever remember him doing with any indy or overseas promotion or even TNA), so maybe it has more to do with availability of sources about the numbers?
Big Red Machine
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

ROHfan2002 wrote: Sun Dec 17, 2017 5:48 pm
A couple hundred more fans as a lie told by the ROH office doesn't do anything positive for the promotion, so what would be the point. This isn't saying 93173 when only 78,000 plus were there. It's adding a couple hundred to an indy show. Why would they lie?
Same reason WWE would lie: no one wants to look like they're not doing as well as people might think they should be. Adding a few hundred definitely makes ROH look good if it's somewhere like Florida or Dallas where those 200 people are the difference between a crowd of 300 and a crowd of 500. ROH definitely has less incentive to lie in an established ROH market like New York, Philly or Chicago, though... unless they're trying to cover up the fact that a major market for them took a big attendance hit.
WHG
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by WHG »

The funny thing is that if anything business is up MORE than reported this year. As rovert pointed out in his follow up posts, there was a period in late 2016 where there were some really weak crowds and a lot of people online disputed Meltzer's attendance or being artificially inflated. There was NONE of that talk in 2017 and with the high percentage of sellouts it's much easier to accurately gauge attendance (and harder to inflate). I actually don't buy for a second that rovert "lost interest" in tracking this in 2017 as he jumped on & or retweeted some of their weak advances on Twitter. In fairness, he did admit that it was less of an issue this year.

As for why the company would lie, I do think that there's a real possibility that if they drew...say 350 to a show...they'd pass a number of 500-600 along to Meltzer just to avoid public embarrassment. What I don't get is why anyone thinks that Meltzer is intentionally complicit. He gets estimated attendance numbers all the time from people and realizes that a difference of 250-300 people actually makes very little material difference to business at that level and it's not worth launching an investigation into or caring about. If they drew 2,000 people and reported 4,000, I'm sure he'd care and validate it.

As someone who tracked and followed attendance much closer here from 2013-2015 myself, I think that there was a peak in the spring of 2015, followed by a gradual flattening and clear decline in 2016. 2017 has exceeded that 2015 peak pretty dramatically.

Say what you want about Cody (I'm not a fan of his work). It's hard to not correlate the attendance bump with his arrival a year ago. The Bucks were under contract the prior year, and while I do think their BTE schtick has made them more popular, Cody moved Final Battle 2016 tickets in New York very clearly and the trend kept up all year.

What's more amazing is that the attendance figures really seem to validate the company's decision to not break the bank trying to re-sign guys like Fish & O'Reilly or even Cole. There's a study to be done here, but the peak attendance periods of the company really happened while Cole was injured and then after he left. Attendance after he regained the title in 2016 was the worst period since late 2013 when he first won the title.
Big Red Machine
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

WHG wrote: Mon Dec 18, 2017 7:42 am The funny thing is that if anything business is up MORE than reported this year. As rovert pointed out in his follow up posts, there was a period in late 2016 where there were some really weak crowds and a lot of people online disputed Meltzer's attendance or being artificially inflated. There was NONE of that talk in 2017 and with the high percentage of sellouts it's much easier to accurately gauge attendance (and harder to inflate). I actually don't buy for a second that rovert "lost interest" in tracking this in 2017 as he jumped on & or retweeted some of their weak advances on Twitter. In fairness, he did admit that it was less of an issue this year.
If I remember correctly, last year's "down period" was around October, which had not only the typically poor showings in Florida and was the only time last year they went to Florida, but also had the first Chicago show after the non-finish PPV main event, which saw a MAJOR crowd drop, and people were unsure if this was a one-time thing or if the market had been permanently damaged (haven't seen numbers for the 2017 June show in Chicago, and the October show is artificially inflated due to Omega [and, arguably, Suzuki] so it isn't a good gauge unless ROH starts drawing this numbers in Chicago without outside help), plus there was a down trip to Baltimore for a TV taping as well. It was a legitimate low period for a number of reasons, but we didn't have enough data to determine whether it was a one-time thing or a trend... although the thought process in wrestling is usually that the attendance at this show is a response to both the last show in the market and general trends in the company.
The word sellout doesn't mean much because I've seen the same sources report a "sellout" in the same buildings for different shows with vastly different numbers.
WHG wrote: Mon Dec 18, 2017 7:42 am As for why the company would lie, I do think that there's a real possibility that if they drew...say 350 to a show...they'd pass a number of 500-600 along to Meltzer just to avoid public embarrassment. What I don't get is why anyone thinks that Meltzer is intentionally complicit. He gets estimated attendance numbers all the time from people and realizes that a difference of 250-300 people actually makes very little material difference to business at that level and it's not worth launching an investigation into or caring about. If they drew 2,000 people and reported 4,000, I'm sure he'd care and validate it.
Dave's incentive (in theory) is to keep friendly relations with the office and not tweak their nose about something small like this so that he'll get more inside access on any bigger story that might emerge.
WHG wrote: Mon Dec 18, 2017 7:42 am As someone who tracked and followed attendance much closer here from 2013-2015 myself, I think that there was a peak in the spring of 2015, followed by a gradual flattening and clear decline in 2016. 2017 has exceeded that 2015 peak pretty dramatically.
2017 has exceeded 2015 in total, yes, but I don't think it has actually done so in the majority of markets that ROH runs (and especially if you want to factor out overseas trips and New Japan assistance, which ROH has gotten a lot more of this year than just six shows in 2015). For example, I don't think Baltimore or Hopkins or Lockport or San Antonio have done what they were doing during the 2015 peak.
WHG wrote: Mon Dec 18, 2017 7:42 am Say what you want about Cody (I'm not a fan of his work). It's hard to not correlate the attendance bump with his arrival a year ago. The Bucks were under contract the prior year, and while I do think their BTE schtick has made them more popular, Cody moved Final Battle 2016 tickets in New York very clearly and the trend kept up all year.
I think what it is is that fans have either "come around" to the idea of Bullet Club as this goofy babyface/heel "cool heel" hybrid when they hadn't quite made up their mind about doing so in 2016, and a lot of fans then decided that, basically, anything Bullet Club does is gold and they go bonkers for Bullet Club, in any combination, no matter what happens. If you take that t-shirt away from Cody I don't think he draws anything more than a curiosity factor of maybe 50 extra tickets his first time around the loop.
WHG wrote: Mon Dec 18, 2017 7:42 am What's more amazing is that the attendance figures really seem to validate the company's decision to not break the bank trying to re-sign guys like Fish & O'Reilly or even Cole. There's a study to be done here, but the peak attendance periods of the company really happened while Cole was injured and then after he left. Attendance after he regained the title in 2016 was the worst period since late 2013 when he first won the title.
A few things about this:
1. His injury in early 2015 coincides with both Joe's short return and Alberto's short stint in the promotion.
2. As I said above, I'd place most of the blame for Cole's 2016 title reign not drawing well (if we factor out the UK trip and Field of Honor, which we should) on a reaction to the non-finish at Global Wars hurting the Chicago crowd, some pretty poor booking (Bull James, the entire Kevin Sullivan saga, etc.) and once again trying (and failing) to draw big in Florida not on WM weekend. The stuff he was around for that was booked well (like All-Star Extravaganza and Field of Honor) drew quite well (although you could definitely attribute that to the Ladder War or New Japan match-ups rather than Cole ).
Zhuge1
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Zhuge1 »

Random thought/question -- is BJ Whitmer done as an in-ring talent at this point? He hasn't done anything other than some fill-in commentary for the majority of this year.
Big Red Machine
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

Zhuge1 wrote: Wed Dec 20, 2017 9:30 am Random thought/question -- is BJ Whitmer done as an in-ring talent at this point? He hasn't done anything other than some fill-in commentary for the majority of this year.
I'd assume so, barring the odd one-off as an emergency replacement or something.
famicommander
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by famicommander »

Seems odd to be in such great shape and spend so much time rehabbing from that knee injury to come back and then retire so soon. I hope he still wrestles from time to time because I enjoy his work.
Zhuge1
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Zhuge1 »

famicommander wrote: Wed Dec 20, 2017 1:11 pm Seems odd to be in such great shape and spend so much time rehabbing from that knee injury to come back and then retire so soon. I hope he still wrestles from time to time because I enjoy his work.
Yeah, I'm surprised they haven't found a new role for him, but there seem to be a few of the older guys that there's not much of an in-ring use/plan for at present: Whitmer, Cabana, Coleman, and Daddiego (who has only done a handful of Future of Honor matches this year).
rovert1
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by rovert1 »

ROHfan2002 wrote: Sun Dec 17, 2017 5:48 pm The overarching point of my post? Your numbers are no more accurate than the numbers given to Dave Meltzer. So why waste time out of your life disputing that?
That's false as I've no need to maintain good relations with Joe Koff and Delirious.
rovert1
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by rovert1 »

Big Red Machine wrote: Wed Dec 20, 2017 11:30 am
Zhuge1 wrote: Wed Dec 20, 2017 9:30 am Random thought/question -- is BJ Whitmer done as an in-ring talent at this point? He hasn't done anything other than some fill-in commentary for the majority of this year.
I'd assume so, barring the odd one-off as an emergency replacement or something.
It is an emergency replacement. BJ is making a full-time move to Baltimore and is replacing the role Jeff Jones had. Whether he's completely done with in-ring wrestling I don't know. He'll probably make a cameo or two.
The Dragon Saga
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by The Dragon Saga »

BJ's working in the office. He helps Delirious backstage.
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Big Red Machine
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

rovert1 wrote: Wed Dec 20, 2017 9:39 pm
Big Red Machine wrote: Wed Dec 20, 2017 11:30 am
Zhuge1 wrote: Wed Dec 20, 2017 9:30 am Random thought/question -- is BJ Whitmer done as an in-ring talent at this point? He hasn't done anything other than some fill-in commentary for the majority of this year.
I'd assume so, barring the odd one-off as an emergency replacement or something.
It is an emergency replacement. BJ is making a full-time move to Baltimore and is replacing the role Jeff Jones had. Whether he's completely done with in-ring wrestling I don't know. He'll probably make a cameo or two.
Now I want to see BJ in judge's robes telling people they're "guilty as charged."
dhads7161
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by dhads7161 »

Who should be Delerious's big 2018 project? I wouldn't mind seeing Kenny King molded for a title win at Final Battle.
King of Indy Style
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by King of Indy Style »

Kenny King hasn't really impressed me all that much since his return, except for his title win against KUSHIDA. I'd really like to see Martinez get elevated big in 2018. With some more fine turning I think he could be a top star.
dhads7161
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by dhads7161 »

I think a good heel should take the title off Dalton. My pick for that would be Jay Briscoe. I'd be cool with him having a four month transitional reign to put someone over big at Final Battle.
Big Red Machine
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

Martinez.
dhads7161
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by dhads7161 »

Martinez would be alright. Could make him a Joe/Morishima type monster of a champion. Problem is we still don't really know who he is. We know what he is, he's a big, demonic monster but we still don't know why he's a big, demonic monster. What makes him tick and all that jazz.
Big Red Machine
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

dhads7161 wrote: Mon Dec 25, 2017 1:38 am Martinez would be alright. Could make him a Joe/Morishima type monster of a champion. Problem is we still don't really know who he is. We know what he is, he's a big, demonic monster but we still don't know why he's a big, demonic monster. What makes him tick and all that jazz.
Which is part of what Delirious needs to work on this year to make him connect. Then again, there are other heavily-pushed babyfaces on the roster for whom we still don't know what makes them tick (our ROH World Champion, for example).
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Wilson
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Re: Random ROH Thoughts Thread

Post by Wilson »

dhads7161 wrote: Sun Dec 24, 2017 4:01 pm Who should be Delerious's big 2018 project? I wouldn't mind seeing Kenny King molded for a title win at Final Battle.
- Gresham: to the point of at least being a TV Title contender; give him promo time as well
- Castle: still needs establishing as a main eventer
- KITAMURA: one of these excursion talents should eventually be given a Summer of Punk-like TV Title run
- Shelley: he's still only 34; give him an honest push and see how far it goes
- Cabana: should be treated more effectively as an in-ring talent
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