Friday, January 31, 2014

What I learned from Meltzer's PPVs Ratings (Part Four)

The train keeps on rolling.  If you're just joining us, be sure to check out part one, two and three.

So far, we've been dissecting what we can learn from the the star ratings awarded to 280+ WWF PPVs. But it's time to spice things up and let our data dataset grow! So, now we've added 110 WCW/JCP PPVs along with 35 Clash of the Champions television specials as well as 22 SNME/The Main Event (WWF) television specials.  In total, this now covers about 450 professional wrestling events from 1985-2013.

The first question that one wonders is how do the two companies stack up year-by-year:

The red (WWF) and blue (WCW) columns at the bottom represent the number of matches included.  

As you see, WCW (really JCP) was quite light in 1986/1987, so I would take those two WCW datapoints with a serious grain of salt.

Here's that same data sliced a little differently.  Here the fiscal year has been adjusted so it ends with WWF's Wrestlemania event.

Raw Data (unweighted)


Looking at the WWF versus WCW dynamic, there's a comparable number of matches between 1988-2000 or WM5 to WM17. Interestingly, this splits the war into two pieces.

Part One: 1988-1994 where WCW was higher (exception being in 1991).





Part Two: 1995 to 2000 when WWF was higher (exception being in 1997).  





Oddly enough, that also roughly aligns when the Hulkster jumping ship!

That leads me to an interesting query -- does employing Hulk Hogan to wrestle actually tank the quality of the show?

It's hardly definitive proof but shows without Hulk Hogan averaged 1.85 stars while shows with Hulk Hogan averaged 1.63 stars.  Was this because shuffling the deck to add Hogan's allies and put him on top disrupted the ability for the talented wrestlers to succeed?

When we dig deeper and look at PPVs with and without Hogan in WCW while he was employed by Turner, we'll see a mixed bag.  1994 & 1995 non-Hogan PPVs were certainly stronger (2.0 star avg versus 1.6 star avg for Hogan shows) but 1996 & 1997 are essentially tied (1.99 versus 1.97).  1998 was on the anti-Hogan side (1.77 versus 1.39) but the trend was flipped in 1999 (1.16 versus 1.71).  Lastly, in 2000, the non-Hogan shows prevailed (1.42 versus a dismal 0.95 star average for shows with Hogan).  However, the end result was only 1.67 without Hogan and 1.62 with Hogan - hardly a slam dunk.

More to come in installment Five!

Thursday, January 30, 2014

WWE TV Rights Negotiations Continue!

Late last night news broke that WWE had signed a new 5-year television deal to continue their relationship with the "UK pay TV giant" BSkyB.

Recent WWE TV Rights Coverage:

Some of the important nuggets of information to consider:
  1. As Dave Meltzer noted in his report, "timing is everything".  Right now Live Sports are receiving record renewal rates, especially with combined with long term exclusivity.  Additionally, a new competitor in the marketplace (BT Sports) likely drove up the bidding before WWE renewed with their longtime partner.
  2. This represents a significant increase for WWE. In fact, the Hollywood Report story suggested that, "value is believed to be about three times that of the previous five-year agreement".  That's a really key figure because that's in the range of what Vince McMahon has been promising shareholders during the monthly conference calls.
  3. Unlike the previous deal (signed in late 2009 just months before it started in January 2010), this renewal moved all 12 PPVs to Sky Box Office (essentially to a pay-per-view channel akin to the setup in the US).  Previously, some PPVs aired as "special events" for free on Sky.  It's believed that this move would pave the way for the subscription over-the-top WWE Network to be available in the UK with the monthly PPV programming being broadcast there.
This brings up the question of what will WWE be doing with the current domestic negotiations with NBCUniversal.  (I recommend re-reading some the previous coverage on this blog with last month's "Can we predict WWE TV Rights Fees for 2015?")

The latest rumor I've heard is that WWE is looking for about "$280M" in their negotiations (2/3/14 Wrestling Observer).  What isn't clear is the length of the deal or how they'd want to structure that money.  However, I would submit the following graph:


Today, Domestic TV Rights are clipping around at about 10% growth year-over-year.  (2013 is estimated based on 3 quarters of information and 2014 is completely projected.)  Keep in mind that Total Divas! on E!  has been a lucrative program and it's questionable whether that project would continue indefinitely. 

Assuming a similar deal to BSkyB at 5 years (which is plausible), if WWE wanted to hit $280M by the end of the contract (which begins in the end of 2014), that would represent about a 19% growth year-over-year (twice as high).  If they wanted to average $280M over the five years, that would average about 31% growth year-over-year.  While those are hefty numbers, considering the high values being thrown for other sports packages, it's possible they'd go for it.  It would lock up WWE before the exclusive negotiation period and it would continue the relationship that WWE has with the company.  And it's in the range of the change (at least in terms of year-over-year growth) that would be in line with what happened in the BSkyB negotiation -- triple where they are today.

-Chris Harrington (@mookieghana)

Addendum: 1/31/2014

We do know from WWE's annual reports:

WWE revenue details
Jan-Dec 2012: $34,001,000 (UK); total Europe/Middle East/Africa: $70,720,000; int'l TV rights = $50.6M; int'l Live Events = $31.6M
Jan-Dec 2011: $33,178,000 (UK); total Europe/Middle East/Africa: $76,165,000; int'l TV rights = $51.2M; int'l Live Events = $39.8M
Jan-Dec 2010: $33,932,000 (UK); total Europe/Middle East/Africa: $80,263,000; int'l TV rights = $45.4M; int'l Live Events = $39.9M
Jan-Dec 2009: $36,516,000 (UK); total Europe/Middle East/Africa: $82,508,000; int'l TV rights = $39.1M; int'l Live Events = $41.0M
Jan-Dec 2008: $47,301,000 (UK); int'l TV rights = $37.2M; int'l Live Events = $41.7M
Jan-Dec 2007: $45,068,000 (UK); int'l TV rights = $32.8M; int'l Live Events = $37.4M
(8 month transition period) May-Dec 2006: $21,812,000 (UK); int'l TV rights = $20.7M; int'l Live Events = $15.7M
May 05-Apr 06: $34,788,000 (UK); int'l TV rights = $28.5M; int'l Live Events = $28.3M

For the purposes of these numbers, int'l is basically "not US or Canada or PR" since they count that with "North America" but they do break out Mexico as int'l (as part of Latin America). They've begun splitting out UK revenues since it's their "largest international market".

I tried to see if I could figure out what UK TV Rights fees were, but without spending more time drilling into counting tours and whatnot, I wasn't confident in what I could extract from the numbers above.
My take on BSkyB was that putting all the PPVs on Sky Box Office meant that WWE Network could show them because that sounds like a similar arrangement to what WWE does in the US, but perhaps I'm misunderstanding that. If nothing else, it seems like surprising that Sky would triple their rates (Hollywood reporter) without getting PPV exclusivity, but at this phase I think WWE is playing from a position of strength. 

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Retrospective Stats for CM Punk in WWE

Analysis by Chris Harrington (@mookieghana)

The wrestling world is buzzing about the abrupt departure of CM Punk from World Wrestling Entertainment. After seven years of being a fixture on WWE television, it appears that following an excellent showing in the 2014 Royal Rumble, Punk has called it quits and headed home for rest, relaxation and whatever else he'd like to do.  While the internet collectively loses it's mind over whether Daniel Bryan is being oppressed and the Kane fans lament that we won't get to see the Director of Operations Mr. Haggar Pants versus Punk, we're going to spend a little time reviewing some of the statistics about the CM Punk's career in WWE.

Officially, CM Punk's debut in WWE was on the rebooted ECW program in July 2006 (with his actual televised wrestling debut in August 2006).  However, those weren't actually his first televised WWE matches. Rather, a year earlier in 2005, Punk had a pair of matches taped for Sunday Night Heat:

Since he started, he's been a real fixture on WWE TV.

Match Stats

With some assistance from the excellent Cagematch.net website, take a look at these monthly match stats:
Really, in over seven years, there's only two months where Punk didn't have any matches recorded: November 2010 and May 2013.  (You can see a few other periods of reduced activity - largely clustered such as November & December 2010, April & May & June 2013 as well as July 2010 and December 2012.)


On an average year, Punk wrestled at about 148 shows and had about 166 matches.  
He did double-duty at about 9% the shows, namely wrestling on TV then again in the dark match after the cameras turned off.  This was particularly true in in 2008, 2011 and 2012.

He really was in the upper-echelon for most matches - particularly 2007-2009.

Approximate Most Matches in WWE (2007-2013)

2007: Batista (159), MVP (142), Jeff Hardy (140), Randy Orton (139), Finlay (132), CM Punk (130), Kane (129), Carlito (126)

2008: CM Punk (169), Kane (157), John Morrison (143), Cody Rhodes (142), Kofi Kingston (139), MVP (139), Shelton Benjamin (139), HHH (137)

2009: CM Punk (197), John Cena (181), Kofi Kingston (178), Randy Orton (178), Big Show (170), Chris Jericho (167), Jack Swagger (165), Christian (160)

2010: Kofi Kingston (183), Sheamus (181), The Miz (178), Jack Swagger (178), John Cena (176), The Big Show (174), Randy Orton (174)... CM Punk (108) ...

2011: Randy Orton (208), John Cena (200), Alberto Del Rio (197), The Miz (191), Kofi Kingston (187), CM Punk (183), Dolph Ziggler (183), Daniel Bryan (176), Sheamus (175)

2012: Sheamus (218), The Big Show (214), Daniel Bryan (214), Kane (199), Kofi Kingston (197), Dolph Ziggler (193), John Cena (184), Santino Marella (182), CM Punk (177), Cody Rhodes (171)

2013: Daniel Bryan (227), Dean Ambrose (215), Seth Rollins (211), Randy Orton (209), Antonio Cesaro (206), Roman Reigns (201), Ryback (195)... CM Punk (111)

(combination of stats from cagematch, wrestling observer, the history of WWE and personal records)

WWE Opponents


CM Punk Opponents

Name singles tag rumble handicap Total
John Cena
62
41
5

108
Rey Mysterio
55
27
5

87
John Morrison
42
29
8
1
80
The Miz
37
32
8
2
79
Kane
46
21
10
1
78
Chris Jericho
50
17
3
1
71
Randy Orton
21
39
5

65
Dolph Ziggler
40
8
7

55
Alberto Del Rio
44
7
4

55
The Big Show
29
17
6
2
54
Chavo Guerrero
39
7
5

51
Daniel Bryan
35
11
3
1
50
The Undertaker
30
14
3
2
49
R-Truth
25
16
7
1
49
Ryback
25
17
2
1
45
Edge
13
21
5

39
Curtis Axel
18
3
3
11
35
Elijah Burke
20
13
2

35
Mark Henry
16
13
5
1
35
William Regal
25
5
3

33
Cody Rhodes
2
22
9

33
Matt Hardy
12
14
6

32
Shelton Benjamin
14
10
7

31
Mike Knox
28
1
1

30
Kofi Kingston
9
10
11

30
Jeff Hardy
23
1
2

26
Dean Ambrose
2
8
1
14
25
Roman Reigns
1
8
1
14
24
Seth Rollins
1
8
1
14
24
MVP
8
6
8

22
Matt Striker
12
4
2
4
22
Batista
13
4
4

21
Luke Harper
3
13
1
1
18
Big Daddy V
6
5
1
5
17
Christian
7
7
3

17
Jack Swagger
6
4
7

17
JBL
12
2
2
1
17
The Great Khali
5
3
8

16
Snitsky
11
3
2

16
Triple H
3
8
3
2
16
Erick Rowan

13
1
1
15
Kevin Thorn
11
2
1

14
Sheamus
9
1
3

13
Paul Heyman



12
12
Marcus Cor Von
5
6
1

12
Hardcore Holly
9
1
2

12
Stevie Richards
11



11
Manu
2
9


11
JTG
2
2
7

11
Carlito
5
2
4

11
Ted DiBiase

6
4

10
Umaga
8
1
1

10
Finlay
2
4
4

10
Zack Ryder
3
1
5

9
Chris Masters
1
1
6

8
Chuck Palumbo
7

1

8
Santino Marella
2

6

8
Tyson Kidd

5
2

7
Tommy Dreamer
4

3

7
Shawn Michaels

3
3

6
Tyler Reks

1
5

6
Drew McIntyre


6

6
David Otunga

2
4

6
Mr Kennedy
3
1
1
1
6
David Hart Smith

5


5
Justin Gabriel

1
4

5
Rob Van Dam
2

3

5
Evan Bourne
2

3

5
Bray Wyatt

3
1
1
5
Rene Dupree
5



5
Vladimir Kozlov


5

5
Jerry Lawler
2
3


5
Booker T
2
1
2

5

Undoubtedly, an enormous milestone in his WWE run was his electrifying program with John Cena leading into the Money in the Bank PPV held in Punk's home city of Chicago in 2011.  It seems appropriate then that Punk's most frequent opponent in WWE was also John Cena. However, that's only if you include every house show, every dark match and every time the two were both in the same royal rumble or battle royal.  If you limit yourself to televised encounters, Punk's most frequent opponent on WWE TV was "Guru of Greatness" John Morrison.

Televised CM Punk Opponents

Name Raw PPV Sm! ECW Other Total
John Morrison
6
10
11
17
3
47
The Miz
13
6
2
11
3
35
Rey Mysterio
7
9
11

1
28
Kane
14
4
7
1
1
27
John Cena
17
7
2

0
26
Chris Jericho
13
6
3

1
23
R-Truth
6
5
8
1
0
20
Daniel Bryan
13
4
3

0
20
Randy Orton
10
7
1
1
0
19
Mark Henry
9
4
1
3
2
19
The Big Show
6
8
3

1
18
Edge
5
3
9

1
18
Chavo Guerrero

2
4
11
0
17
Alberto Del Rio
10
5
1

1
17
Elijah Burke

3

13
0
16
Matt Hardy
3
1
11

1
16
Shelton Benjamin
3
3
4
5
0
15
Dean Ambrose
6
1
6

0
13
Dolph Ziggler
8
2
2

0
12
Roman Reigns
6
1
5

0
12
Seth Rollins
6
1
5

0
12
Cody Rhodes
8
1
1
1
0
11
Ryback
5
4
1

0
10
William Regal
8
1


1
10
Christian
2
3
3
1
1
10
MVP
1
3
5
1
0
10
The Undertaker

5
5

0
10
Jeff Hardy
1
5
3

0
9
Curtis Axel
5
1
2

0
8
Big Daddy V

2
1
4
1
8
Sheamus
4
2


1
7
Luke Harper
3
1
1

2
7
Jack Swagger
4
2

1
0
7
Triple H
3
2
2

0
7
JBL
4
1


1
6
Stevie Richards



6
0
6
Kofi Kingston
2
4


0
6
Batista
2
2
2

0
6
Matt Striker

1

5
0
6
Finlay
1
2
2
1
0
6
Hardcore Holly

1

5
0
6
Erick Rowan
2
1
1

2
6
Carlito
3
1


1
5
Mike Knox

1

4
0
5
Marcus Cor Von

1

4
0
5
Mr Kennedy
1
2
1
1
0
5
Ted DiBiase
3

1
1
0
5

(Other includes Tribute to the Troops, Superstars, NXT on SyFy, Sunday Night Heat, Saturday Night's Main Event and Main Event.  Note: This number excludes rumbles.)

Punk's most common partners for televised bouts were Luke Gallows (16), Kofi Kingston (14), Kane (11), John Cena (10), Daniel Bryan (9), Sheamus (7), Rey Mysterio (7), Cody Rhodes (6), R-Truth (6), Jeff Hardy (6), Dolph Ziggler (5), Matt Hardy (5), Jimmy Uso (4), Jey Uso (4), Tommy Dreamer (4), Goldust (3), Chris Jericho (3), MVP (3), Alberto Del Rio (3), Evan Bourne (3), John Morrison (3), The Miz (3), Drew McIntyre (3) and Randy Orton (3).

Broadening the scope to all events, Punk's most common partners overall were Luke Gallows (27), The Miz (25), Kofi Kingston (23), Chris Jericho (22), John Cena (18), Daniel Bryan (17), Dolph Ziggler (14), Alberto Del Rio (13), Kane (13), Tommy Dreamer (13), Sheamus (12), Rey Mysterio (11), Batista (9), Jeff Hardy (8), Cody Rhodes (8), R-Truth (8), Shawn Michaels (7), The Big Show (6), John Morrison (6), Matt Hardy (5) and Randy Orton (5).

Frequent Punk Opponents by Year:

2006: Mike Knox, Hardcore Holly, Stevie Richards, Rene Dupree, Shannon Moore, Test
2007: Elijah Burke, John Morrison, Matt Striker, Big Daddy V, Marcus Cor Von, The Miz, Snitsky, Kevin Thorn
2008: Chavo Guerrero Jr, John Morrison, Chris Jericho, Cody Rhodes, Shelton Benjamin, JBL, The Miz
2009: The Undertaker, Jeff Hardy, William Regal, Kane, Rey Mysterio, Chris Jericho, Matt Hardy
2010: Rey Mysterio, The Big Show, Kane, Edge, The Undertaker, R-Truth, John Morrison
2011: John Cena, Alberto Del Rio, Randy Orton, The Miz, R-Truth, Rey Mysterio, Mark Henry
2012: Daniel Bryan, Dolph Ziggler, Chris Jericho, Ryback, Kane, The Big Show, The Miz, John Cena
2013: Curtis Axel, Ryback, Luke Harper & Erick Rowan, The Shield, John Cena
2014: The Shield

It's especially noteworthy that Punk & Cena faced off 73 times in 2011 alone.  Next highest in a single year was the Punk versus Alberto Del Rio in 2011 (47 times) and Punk versus Daniel Bryan in 2012 (46 times) followed by Punk versus Rey Mysterio in 2010 (43 times), Punk versus Chavo Guerrero Jr in 2008 (41 times), Punk versus Dolph Ziggler in 2012 (39 times), Punk versus Randy Orton in 2011 (36 times) and Punk versus The Undertaker in 2009 (34 times).

Not counting rumbles, Punk wrestled in PPV matches against at least 57 wrestlers.  Among his frequent opponents, the only ones that he didn't battle on a pay-per-view were Gene Snitsky, Kevin Thorn, Stevie Richards, Manu, The Great Khali, Chuck Palumbo, Ted DiBiase Jr, DH Smith, Tyson Kidd, Jerry Lawler (though they did wrestle thrice on Raw), and Rene Dupree.

Win-Loss Record


Punk's WWE Win/Loss Record
2006: 64-2-2 (97.0% win)
2007: 103-28-0 (78.6% win)
2008: 109-54-3 (66.9% win)
2009: 95-89-1 (51.6% win)
2010: 29-82-3 (26.1% win)
2011: 72-104-10 (40.9% win)
2012: 120-48-9 (71.4% win)
2013: 82-26-3 (75.9% win)
2014: 9-4-0 (69.2% win)

Total: 683-437-31 (61.0% win)

If you decide to split out "clean losses" from "loss via DQ" or "loss via count out", the only year of significant difference is 2012.  Punk's record that year was 118 clean wins, 2 wins by DQ, 2 losses by count out, 31 losses by DQ, 1 loss by reverse decision (w/ Jericho & Bryan vs David Otunga, Dolph Ziggler & Mark Henry on 1/16/12 Raw) and only 14 clean losses in 2012.  Only three of those clean losses were singles matches: 5/28/12 Daniel Bryan beat CM Punk, 6/4/12 Kane beat CM Punk and 11/12/12 Cena beat CM Punk (with Foley as the special enforcer).  As noted, most of Punk's losses in 2012 were as a result of a disqualification.


(Green bars represent # of matches each month, blue line is monthly win percentage; red line is the 3 month weighted win percentage. Keep in mind that heels lose a lot, especially at live events.)

OCELOT


Recently, as part of the Dave Meltzer WWF PPV Star Analysis Project, I refreshed my Overly Complicated ELO Theorem (OCELOT) ratings using Cagematch results 1963-2013 with a simplified k-value system.


Astute Observers may be able to correlate specific gains and drops with CM Punk's heel/face status along with which titles he was competing for.

Great WWE PPV Matches with CM Punk

(Match listing courtesy of Cagematch.net)

4/1/07: WWE WrestleMania 23 - "All Grown Up"
Eight Man Money In The Bank Ladder: Mr. Kennedy defeats CM Punk and Edge and Finlay and Jeff Hardy and King Booker and Matt Hardy and Randy Orton (19:11)

4/5/09: WWE WrestleMania 25
Money In The Bank Ladder: CM Punk defeats Christian and Finlay (w/Hornswoggle) and Kane and Kofi Kingston and Mark Henry (w/Tony Atlas) and Montel Vontavious Porter and Shelton Benjamin (14:24)

8/23/09: WWE SummerSlam 2009
World Heavyweight Title Tables, Ladders & Chairs: CM Punk defeats Jeff Hardy (c) (21:35)

5/23/10: WWE Over The Limit 2010
S.E.S. Pledge vs. Hair: Rey Mysterio defeats CM Punk (13:49)

2/20/11: WWE Elimination Chamber 2011
WWE Heavyweight Title #1 Contendership Elimination Chamber: John Cena defeats CM Punk and John Morrison and King Sheamus and R-Truth and Randy Orton (33:15)

6/19/11: WWE Capitol Punishment 2011
CM Punk defeats Rey Mysterio (14:58)

7/17/11: WWE Money In The Bank 2011
WWE Heavyweight Title: CM Punk defeats John Cena (c) (33:45)

9/18/11: WWE Night Of Champions 2011
No Disqualification: Triple H defeats CM Punk (24:01)

10/2/11: WWE Hell In A Cell 2011
WWE Heavyweight Title Triple Threat Hell In A Cell: Alberto Del Rio defeats CM Punk and John Cena (c) (24:08)

12/18/11: WWE TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs 2011
WWE Heavyweight Title Triple Threat Tables, Ladders & Chairs: CM Punk (c) defeats Alberto Del Rio (w/Ricardo Rodriguez) and The Miz (18:50)

4/1/12: WWE WrestleMania XXVIII
WWE Heavyweight Title: CM Punk (c) defeats Chris Jericho (22:23)

5/20/12: WWE Over The Limit 2012
WWE Heavyweight Title: CM Punk (c) defeats Daniel Bryan (23:58)

7/15/12: WWE Money In The Bank 2012
WWE Heavyweight Title No Disqualification Match (Special Referee: AJ): CM Punk (c) defeats Daniel Bryan (27:47)

9/16/12: WWE Night Of Champions 2012
WWE Heavyweight Title: CM Punk (c) vs. John Cena - Double Pin (26:54)

1/27/13: WWE Royal Rumble 2013
WWE Heavyweight Title: The Rock defeats CM Punk (w/Paul Heyman) (c) (23:17)

4/7/13: WWE WrestleMania XXIX
The Undertaker defeats CM Punk (w/Paul Heyman) (22:07)

6/16/13: WWE Payback 2013
CM Punk (w/Paul Heyman) defeats Chris Jericho (21:20)

7/14/13: WWE Money In The Bank 2013
WWE Heavyweight Title Contract Money In The Bank Ladder: Randy Orton defeats Christian and CM Punk and Daniel Bryan and Rob Van Dam and Sheamus (26:38)

8/18/13: WWE SummerSlam 2013
No Disqualification: Brock Lesnar (w/Paul Heyman) defeats CM Punk (25:19)