Ratings Woes: WWE’s Shrinking Viewership

WWE’s shrinking viewership has been a hot topic all year. Every Tuesday we wait for the ratings and wonder just how low Raw will go. And then on Thursday, we anxiously await who drew more viewers (and in what demographics): NXT or AEW?

As much as we want to blame WWE’s poor booking and nonsensical storylines, we can’t attribute the downward spiral solely to the content. Professional sports organizations adapted their schedules to the COVID-19 pandemic and have aired major games against pro wrestling. Don’t forget the presidential and vice presidential debates during the most heated election season of our lifetime.

However, taking sports and politics out of the equation, what is causing fans to turn off Raw and SmackDown and never return? Does it make sense to use your most promising brand as counter programming for your new competition?

At the dawn of 2020, Raw’s viewership was up over the 2 million mark, pushing more accurately towards 2.4 million. By fall, ratings had plummeted to record lows. Gone are the days where coming off a major pay-per-view would give you a ratings bump the next night. Of course, also gone are the days of booking storylines months in advance, allowing fans to buckle up for a fun-filled ride every Monday night.

Nowadays, nobody knows what to expect from week to week.

WWE started the year by finally dropping the ludicrous love rectangle that was Rusev, Lana, Lashley and Liv Morgan. Going into WrestleMania, we got return of Edge, his assault by Randy Orton, tension between the Undertaker and AJ Styles and the rise of Drew McIntrye. After Mania, things quickly cooled off with Styles moving to SmackDown, Edge getting injured, Brock Lesnar’s contract expiring.

WWE tried to balance things out by bringing in every legend possible for Orton to attack. Par for the course, the legends’ appearances drew for a night or two, but WWE couldn’t sustain the momentum because of its inability to create new stars. (Don’t even argue Retribution.) McIntyre was a great attempt, though, headlining many RAWs and PPVs with the likes of Dolph Ziggler, Big Show, Lashley and Seth Rollins before finally losing the WWE Championship to Orton at Hell in a Cell. Unfortunately, McIntyre’s entire reign came during empty arena shows, so we’ll never know how live crowds would have responded.

Meanwhile, SmackDown was still a semi-fresh product on FOX. It featured “The Fiend” Bray Wyatt as Universal Champion, but he was squashed by a returning Goldberg in Saudi Arabia. We had Roman Reigns poised for another run with the gold, but he walked out of WrestleMania due to his pre-existing medical condition during the pandemic. Therefore, Braun Strowman was crowed at WrestleMania, only to drown in a swamp shortly thereafter. Sami Zayn and Daniel Bryan began a good rivalry over the Intercontinental Title, and then both of them went home, too.

By the end of summer, it seemed like the tide was turning on Friday nights. Zayn had returned, Bryan began his last full-time run and Reigns returned as a heel at SummerSlam, aligning with Paul Heyman before starting a feud with the Usos over who is the head of the Samoan Dynasty. It’s been an up and down year for the blue brand; viewership decreased, but not at the levels of RAW.

And then there’s NXT. Rolling into 2020 with major momentum following a dominate performance at Survivor Series, the brand hit a roadblock by WrestleMania. The TakeOver scheduled for WrestleMania Week was canceled, Rhea Ripley lost the NXT Women’s Championship to Charlotte Flair and AEW routinely beat NXT in the ratings. A couple of COVID-19 outbreaks struck and the roster was hampered by injuries and promotions. One of the young stars NXT looked to build major stories around was a debuting Ridge Holland. He would quickly be thrown into matches with Johnny Gargano (one of which almost ended horrifically as Johnny landed on his head from a botched powerslam) and was set to begin a major feud with Adam Cole and the Undisputed Era. Then, Holland was sidelined indefinitely due to injuries to his leg, ankle and kneecap. Additionally, Karrion Kross, who won the NXT Championship from Keith Lee at the TakeOver before SummerSlam, suffered a shoulder injury during the match and immediately had to forfeit the belt. As for Lee, he was demoted to Raw.

No matter what happens inside the ring, it pales in comparison to NXT’s war with AEW. The brand has failed to capture much, if any, ground in the Wednesday Night War, despite stacking shows against AEW’s special episodes. For example, when AEW had to pivot Fyter Fest into a two-week show on TNT, NXT countered on a week’s notice by announcing the return of the Great American Bash, for those same two weeks. Those weeks featured Sasha Banks and Bayley returning to NXT to defend the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championship and a hotshot storyline where Keith Lee and Adam Cole faced off in a winner takes all match for both the North American and NXT Heavyweight Championships. Lee won but fans were disinterested after the decision was made for Lee to vacate the North American Title one week later. NXT gained another viewership surge by bringing back Halloween Havoc, in which Gargano became the first two-time North American Champion and Io Shirai and Candice LaRae had an amazing Women’s Title TLC match.

NXT got a shot in the arm during the NHL playoffs, when the USA Network moved the show to Tuesdays for two weeks. “NXT Super Tuesday” was headlined by Johnny Gargano, Tommaso Ciampa, Adam Cole and Finn Balor battling in a 60-minute Iron Man Match to crown a new champion. The match would end in a draw for both Cole and Balor, leading to a one-on-one encounter the next week, in which Balor won. Both Tuesday shows scored higher ratings than usual as fans didn’t have to choose between NXT or AEW. Despite fans clamoring for the Tuesday move to become permanent, Triple H decreed that NXT would stay on Wednesdays.

The debate will continue to rage on as long as there are two shows on Wednesday nights. Should NXT move to Tuesday and give fans wrestling on almost every night of the week? Is WWE afraid that AEW unopposed will score higher ratings than Raw?

Overall viewership of professional wrestling has been a struggle week after week during the pandemic, but it’s always been said that the business is cyclical. If this year has been the down year because of outside situations, then maybe next year when not as much (hopefully) is occurring, the industry can get back to where it was in October 2019, when wrestling was cool again.