Former WWE star on AEW's rebuild: "There's no patience, there's no foresight, there's no vision" (Exclusive)
A former WWE star believes that AEW does not have any patience which is why the company apparently suffers from a lack of viewership. The star is none other than EC3.
AEW started hot in 2019 and had a great momentum till 2021. However, the company has seemingly lost many viewers ever since the Brawl Out incident. AEW has also suffered from some questionable creative decisions which has led to major criticism by the fans.
Speaking on Sportskeeda's The Wrestling Outlaws podcast with Dr. Chris, The NWA Worlds Champion claimed that there's no leadership and vision in All Elite Wrestling which will hold the company back from gaining more viewers.
"You do have to rebuild. You gotta tear the house down and I think even if they try to go that route, there's no patience, there's no foresight, there's no vision and there's no leadership that can allow 'Can we handle if we heard the number went to 600k but we're going to come back in three months and get back to eight and then in six months, we're back to a million.' There's no patience for that so that'll never happen." [5:33 - 6:01]
Vince Russo further explained why AEW will not reach the same level as before
Former WWE Head Writer Vince Russo also spoke about the decline in the viewership of AEW. Russo is an experienced veteran of professional wrestling and has worked closely in building WCW. He also provided his services as the Head Writer in WWE during the Attitude Era.
Speaking on the same podcast, Vince Russo recalled signing with WCW and helping to spike the ratings of their television shows. Russo noted that he had a game plan for his actions. However, he also spoke about the rating decline of WCW and how they never recovered from that.
"No, no way... Me and Ed went to WCW at a time when their ratings were in the toilet. We had a game plan, bro, within a three to six-month period, we were gonna tear down the building and start building a new one and that's exactly what we were doing. In three months in, the numbers started increasing."
The WCW veteran continued:
"Bro, three months later, they called me back and the number went right back to where they were before Ed and I joined the company... We had them, we lost them, again... Bro, it is so much easier to gain a new viewer then to get a viewer back... I don't see them ever getting that audience back." [3:50 - 5:07]
All Elite Wrestling's current average viewership is between 600 to 800 thousand. It will be interesting to see if the company reaches a million viewers in the upcoming months.
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