WWE Hall of Famer Dusty Rhodes will be on Monday Night Raw tonight to take part in the Goldust and Stardust storyline that has been going on for the past few weeks.
Last week, the ‘American Dream’ wrote on Twitter that he will be attending Raw to check up on his boys. “It’s hard times for the Rhodes family. This Monday on Raw I will settle things with both my Boys,” he wrote.
It’s been a while since Rhodes appeared on WWE television, with the last time he was on pay-per-view being at the Battleground show where his two sons defeated The Shield.
TNA wraps up their five day live event set of television tapings at Universal Studios Back Lot Stage 20 tonight with six hours of wrestling.
This particular tour was to tape eight special One Night Only pay-per-views as well as Xplosion matches catered for International markets. Each day – except for the first one back on Thursday – was pretty full with approximately six hours of television.
TNA returns to Universal in March and April for Impact Wrestling tapings.
First it was Seth Rollins, now it’s Cesaro as the Swiss’ Twitter account was hacked by a disgruntled fan who’s had enough of the way WWE is treating Cesaro. But this time thankfully there were no nude photos posted.
“You know what? I’m sick of Vince McMahon and his bullshit. I don’t even get a chance to get the tag titles with Kidd now,” the first tweet said before going on an attack on Vince McMahon.
“I hope that old man gets cancer, I would of been one of the best for sure in the WWE. But that old washed-up has been has no idea,” the rant continues. He then addressed what McMahon said on Austin’s podcast about Cesaro lacking charisma.
“I lack charisma? Yeah right I’m the Swiss superman everybody cheered for me at WM. And why did they give me this gimmick and this awful theme music? They’re constantly burying me.”
The tweets were made to look like Cesaro made them when in fact the account was hacked and all messages were deleted afterwards, something that the hacker acknowledged by the end of his rant.
Several other tweets were sent saying that this was not an attack on Cesaro but purely him getting his “anger out at WWE on Cesaro’s behalf.” He urged fans to use the #PushCesaro hashtag, and it was trending worldwide just a few minutes later.
“Okay I’m gonna give this back to Cesaro now. Thanks for the fun. Cesaro, your new password is the same just with a 1 at the end,” the hacker said.
Episode 16 of season 3 of Total Divas, titled All Hail Brie Mode, airs tonight on E!
The synopsis of the show reads, “Brie and Paige take the UK by storm making Nikki worry Brie’s extreme behavior will jeopardize their performance in the ring. Meanwhile, Nattie resorts to asking TJ for help with a family disaster and Alicia falls apart when confronted with her ex-boyfriend.”
The second half of season 3 has been doing particularly well in the ratings and it’s almost a safe bet that the series will be renewed for another season by E!
Milwaukee’s NBC affiliate station TMJ4 conducted an interview with UFC’s CM Punk at the Roufusport MMA Academy which is located in Milwaukee, and 90 minutes away from CM Punk’s residence.
The interview is mainly regarding the switch from professional wrestling to mixed martial arts. His coach, Dick Roufus, said that at 36 years of age, Punk is impressing him and he can already see a couple of fights for Punk in the UFC.
When asked by the interviewer if he thinks about professional wrestling, Punk didn’t hesitate to say no, not at all. Speaking of wrestling, in the additional text interview accompanying the video, Punk said that Brock Lesnar has offered all his help already.
“I’ve talked to him and he’s offered all his help, even if it’s just bug him with a stupid question. It’s cool to know he supports me. He’s a good guy to know, I think,” Punk said.
You can see the video interview below and the rest of the interview at JRN.COM/tmj4
Earlier this week, Wrestling Observer’s Dave Meltzer reported that Vince Russo was in talks to join El Rey’s Lucha Underground and had meetings with executive producer Eric Van Wagenen.
On his website, Russo completely denied this, saying that Meltzer is either “an an absolute liar, just looking to stir up his readers by attempting to marry my name with Lucha, so the haters can come out and take their free cheap shots at me, or, one of Meltzer’s ‘reliable sources’ is lying to him.”
Russo claims that he never heard of Van Wagenen’s name before – a producer who worked on The Amazing Race, The Contender, WWE Tough Enough, The Apprentice, WWE Legends House, and others. Russo also wanted a retraction of the story from Meltzer.
Former NXT champion Sami Zayn will not be appearing on NXT television for the next four episodes to sell the beating he got at Takeover: Rival, at the hands of the new champion Kevin Owens.
Zayn – whose real name is Rami Sebei and parents are from Syria – however joined the WWE crew on their tour of the United Arab Emirates over the past three days in Abu Dhabi. He wrestled Tyson Kidd in the second day of the tour and spoke Arabic to the fans to a nice ovation from the crowd telling that while he’s born in Canada, his blood is from Syria.
The tour wraps up today with the final show at the Zayed Sports City Tennis Stadium.
It was a good day for WWE investors today as stocks soared 15% during trading hours, ending the day at $16.56 each, an increase of $2.20 per share.
Stocks reached a high of $16.91 during the day after starting at $14.39. In two days, stocks increased 22% following the Q4 2014 and year end results which was released yesterday.
Wall Street seems like it was encouraged by the lower overall losses than projected and the increased in Network subscriptions WWE managed to pull over the past few months.
In the latest quarter and year end financial report, WWE disclosed the exact number of buys for their three pay-per-views that the company produced in the last quarter of 2014.
Hell In A Cell in October did 83,000 buys, down from the 228,000 of the previous year. Survivor Series did 100,000 buys, down from 177,000 of 2013, while TLC did 39,000 buys, down from 181,000 of 2013. In 2013 there was no WWE Network which is why there was a big drop in buys for 2014.
The 271,000 buys of last quarter were all from those who opted to buy the show on traditional pay-per-view for the price of $54.95 instead of subscribing to the Network. WWE did $3.9 million from these 271,000 buys, a decline of 62% from 2013 thanks to the introduction of the WWE Network.
Two former WWE Superstars – Rhyno and Brian Kendrick – returned last night during the NXT television tapings at Full Sail University in Winter Park, Florida.
Rhyno participated in a quick match in the first set of tapings which will air on the Network next Wednesday. The former ECW champion hasn’t appeared on WWE television since June 2005, where he wrestled Sabu at the ECW One Night Stand pay-per-view. He then went to TNA for five years where he held the NWA World title once.
Brian Kendrick worked the second set of tapings which will air on February 25 on the WWE Network. He wrestled Finn Balor in the main event of the show. Kendrick last wrestled for the WWE in July 2009 and then also went to TNA for a couple of years before going to New Japan Pro Wrestling.
Kendrick was backstage at the NXT Takeover: R Evolution event last year and was given a tryout as a trainer at the WWE Performance Center.
Destination America issued a press release announcing its best January ever in Primetime household delivery thanks to TNA’s Impact Wrestling.
Among the records broken, the Wednesday, January 7 debut show of Impact on the network ranked as the best Wednesday evening in network history for delivery of M25-54. The show also ranked as the 6th most social television program for the evening with #DestinationIMPACT reaching a collective 73M impressions on Twitter.
For the month of January, Impact Wrestling ranked as the #9 series in ad-supported cable for delivery of M25-54 on Friday nights. Throughout the same month, Impact Wrestling posted record-breaking numbers, delivering an average of 276K viewers among P25-54.
Since premiering on the network in January 2015, 4.2 million unique viewers have watched Impact Wrestling on Destination America.
Forbes is carrying an article on their website with the title ‘WWE And Vince McMahon Are The Future Of Sports,’ mainly focusing on the WWE Network and how they are reaching their fans.
“Give McMahon credit for having the guts to go against conventional wisdom and critics who wanted WWE to stick exclusively with its pay-per-view model,” Forbes staff writer Mike Ozanian wrote. “McMahon has looked Joseph Schumpeter‘s creative destruction theory in the eye and smiled right back. It takes you know what to take a profitable business model and rip it apart, but that is exactly what McMahon has done.”
The WWE Network is still technically losing money and it won’t be profitable until around 1.4 million subscribers are reached. Is it impossible? Not at all. WWE did reach over a million subscribers last month and with WrestleMania coming, and the launch in the Middle East and North Africa coupled with the extended reach in Canada, that soon can be a reality.
Yesterday, following the encouraging Q4 2014 results, WWE stocks went up 7% and today it’s up another 11% at time of this writing.
The Latino-Review.com website broke the story earlier today that former WWE champion Dave Bautista is going to play the role of The Kurgan in the Highlander movie reboot.
In the original movie, the barbarian role of The Kurgan was played by Clancy Brown while Christopher Lambert played the leading role of Connor MacLeod. No word yet on who will play the lead role.
Bautista is currently filming the role of the assassin Mr. Hinx in the latest James Bond movie titled Spectre. Ever since playing Drax The Destroyer in Guardians of the Galaxy, Bautista has been a very busy man in Hollywood.
The Stone Cold Steve Austin live Unleashed podcast on the WWE Network were a massive hit with fans and for the company as well.
George Barrios, WWE’s Chief Strategy and Financial Officer, said that the two podcasts with Vince McMahon back in December and with Triple H earlier this month were two of the most watched shows on the WWE Network since the service launched in February of last year.
Barrios added that they are working on adding more live specials and content such as talk shows which will continue to grow the Network. Having Austin host his live podcast on the Network with VIP guests is certainly an option but those VIP guests will eventually run out.
Considered one of the boldest moves in sports entertainment, the WWE launched their online streaming service the WWE Network a year ago. With much uncertainty around the service many naysayers didn’t give the channel much of a chance.
But it takes a brave person to question Vince McMahon’s business acumen. Let’s face it; he’s proved the wrestling community wrong on numerous occasions with his various innovations. When the Network launched in 2014 it originally forecasted targets of 1 million subscribers to the $9.99 monthly service but it fell woefully short in the first two quarters, which subsequently meant that the WWE’s share prices also fell dramatically. There was also talk that company had incurred huge losses because of the outlay the WWE made to put this service in place.
However, like all visions that McMahon and the major players in WWE have, things are never done with just the short-term in mind. McMahon launched this service with longevity in mind and to help the WWE keep ahead of its competitors. You only have to look at the UFC, which launched its Fight Pass service months after to see how the company keeps ahead of the veritable curve.
On live television, Vince declared on SmackDown, January 29, 2015 that the company had finally reached their forecasted target. They had successfully obtained 1 million subscribers to the WWE Network.
To celebrate this monumental achievement the WWE is offering free subscription for the month of February to entice further customers to this revolutionary service.
But what are the other variables that have helped the WWE Network prosper in an already competitive landscape? Aside from its myriad of content, and its large budgets, the ability to access all the video and content on smartphones and gadgets has seen the Network become the go-to resource for over 1 million wrestling fans over the last 12 months.
Of course, the addition of many of the previous pay-per-view events to the service has helped draw in many WWE fans but its flexibility is the real key to its success. Because everything can be accessed via mobile, consumers see this as an efficient way to view and consume content. With the service benefiting from the increased number of consumers using smartphones according to EMarketer. The Internet penetration has also increased to these gadgets with the makers of successful portal BubbleBonusBingo claiming that 17% of the world can now access the Internet via their smartphones.
All this points to a more digital future, where subscribers will want content readily accessible via a myriad of different platforms. And this is fundamentally why the WWE Network is seen as the trailblazer in the sports entertainment landscape.
Although the company is yet to release its forecast for the next 12 months, with the continued increase in Internet penetration, smartphone usage and improvements with the Network, experts are predicting that WWE will look to hit 1.5 million subscribers by 2016.
Former NBA MVP and All-Star Karl Malone called out WWE Heavyweight champion Brock Lensar yesterday in an interview on America’s Pregame on Fox Sports 1!
When Malone was asked about a rematch with Dennis Rodman, Malone said that he’s still waiting for that call from WWE but if he’s coming back, he wants Brock Lesnar.
“I want Brock Lesnar, I’m calling him out. I want Brock Lesnar,” Malone said while laughing.
Malone, who is a big wrestling fan, worked for WCW in 1998 and made several Nitro appearances and even wrestled in the main event of Bash at the Beach that year teaming up with Diamond Dallas Page taking on Hulk Hogan and Dennis Rodman.
DDP frequently put over Malone in interviews later throughout the years citing his enthusiasm and will to learn how the business works.
You can see the short segment on Fox Sports below.
Rogers Communications today announced that it has reached arrangements for the WWE Network with multiple television providers, expanding the Network’s reach in Canada.
Six new providers will carry the Network, all launching before WrestleMania 31 giving Canadian fans the ability to watch WrestleMania on the Network rather than the more expensive pay-per-view offering.
TELUS Satellite TV and Videotron will launch the Network on February 25, while Cogeco Cable Canada will launch on March 26. TELUS Optik TV, Shaw, and Shaw Direct will announce their March launch dates in the coming weeks.
Rogers has a 10 year deal with WWE for the WWE Network and now apart from the traditional television channel, subscribers can watch all the WWE Network programming online through their desktop or laptop via a browser.
By the end of 2014, WWE Network had a total of 816,000 subscribers, with 772,000 in the United States and 44,000 International, bringing in $23.3 million in revenue for the quarter.
WWE kept increasing the number of subscribers per quarter, starting with 495,000 by March 31, 700,000 by June 30, 731,000 by September 30, and 816,000 by December 31.
On January 27, WWE hit 1 million subscribers after the launch of the Network in the United Kingdom and Ireland. In November, WWE gave the Network for free for new subscribers and the promotion attracted a total of 242,000 subscribers. George Barrios, WWE’s Chief Strategy and Financial Officer said that approximately 70% of those 242,000 kept their subscription in January 2015.
Barrios also noted that the United Kingdom and Ireland has become the second largest market for the Network behind the United States as soon as it launched in the area last month.
During the conference call with investors, Vince McMahon was asked about the #CancelWWENetwork movement that built up after the Royal Rumble. McMahon said that it was a “vocal minority” and the controversy was good publicity for the WWE.
With the earnings release comes the department numbers which shows which WWE businesses are doing well and those which are not doing so well. The below numbers are all compared to the same quarter of the prior year apart from the WWE Network which obviously was not launched back then.
Those who are in the black: WWE Network generated $23.3 million in revenue; Television revenues increased 20% to $50.5 million; Home Entertainment increased to $7.8 million from $5.1 million; Live events increased 6% to $26.9 million thanks to higher attendance and a few more events in the quarter; Licensing increased 26% to $9.1 million due to WWE video games; Venue merchandise was up 6% to $3.6 million from $3.4 million; WWEShop.com also increased, up 28% to $7.7 million up from $6.0 million and a 39% increase in orders.
Those who are in the red: Pay-per-view revenue did $3.9 million with 271,000 buys for three events, down 62% due to the WWE Network; Digital Media went down to $4.0 million from $7.0 million due to lower advertising; WWE Studios went down to $2.9 million from $5.0 million.
WWE today announced its 2014 Q4 and year end results with revenues for the quarter increasing 19% to $140.5 million from $118.4 million in the fourth quarter last year. For the quarter, the Company reported a Net loss of $1.6 million, or $0.02 loss per share, as compared to a Net loss of $7.9 million, or $0.10 loss per share, in the prior year quarter.
The revenue increase was driven by the Network and television rights fees.
“During the quarter, we remained focused on growing WWE Network, which surpassed 1 million subscribers in January 2015, just 11 months after launch. Subscriber growth was driven by a successful free November promotion, the launch of the service in the UK and the strength of our Royal Rumble event,” stated Vince McMahon, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “We believe that our 2015 road map provides significant opportunities for growth, as we continue to execute well, innovate faster and expand WWE Network, the single greatest opportunity to transform WWE’s business model.”
