Ever since the Wednesday Night Wars started, both AEW Dynamite and NXT have been putting on quite a show and they have even gotten the whole world talking and buzzing that their TV ratings have been the best they ever had.
All Elite Wrestling Executive Vice President “The American Nightmare” Cody was recently interviewed by Talk Sport on how much the people inside AEW pay attention to the ratings and his thoughts on the ratings war.
This is what Cody said:
“Obviously the rating, they almost matter more to the respective brands individually.” “Warner Media and TNT, they’re looking at the ratings and the demographic, that P1 demo and how you’re doing there, and then I’m assuming USA are doing the same for NXT. It’s more of the fans that put them in contrast to each other. ‘Well they did this and they did this’.”
Cody then talked about the amount of crossover between AEW Dynamite and NXT and the trends you can see in each show’s fanbase.
This is what Cody said:
“If you look at the data, there’s not nearly as much crossover as you would think. Not so much like the ’90s where you were turning the channel, they both have dedicated fanbases.
“You’ve got to look at minute-by-minutes, which are a scary thing to look at. It’s like baseball, but it’s the way to go.” “If you look at those minute-by-minutes, you can see trends. And even after eight weeks or so, you can see some trends like ‘Ok, this person, they really seem to like’ or ‘they really seem to like the action here’ or ‘they like it when this person has the mic.’ So you want to play to your strengths, and you also want to adjust your long-form plan but not adjust it drastically where you become something other than yourself.”
Cody then talked about the importance of both show’s audiences and the massive amount of people watching each week being vital for wrestling’s popularity.
This is what Cody said:
“The biggest takeaway from all of it is for those folks outside, that’s kind of critical. I don’t know if hater is the right word, but those folks who will say like ‘Oh, wrestling is not that popular.’ I’m telling you when you look at two shows that are existing on Wednesday nights, that audience combined is massive for current core-cutting generation television.” “Pro wrestling is definitely the most popular that it has been in years, and I’m incredibly happy about that. But we just got to look at our minute-by-minutes and by honest with each other as performers on our execution.”
Cody was then asked if he himself and anyone else in AEW are paying attention to what is going on in NXT.
This is what Cody said:
“We’re aware [of what NXT do] more because we have friends in both locker rooms.” “We diligently make sure that we don’t have it on the monitor in go-position because, again, we’ve got to be more aware of the audience that’s watching on TNT. There’s a difference between playing to the audience strategically that’s flipping channels from, perhaps, TNT to USA.”
Cody then talked about having friends and a deep connection in NXT due to what his dad did for the brand. Cody also talked about having respect for what NXT are doing, but he just thinks that they are doing a drastically different show.
This is what Cody said:
“We’re aware of it. We’ve got so many friends in the locker room, and I have a deep-rooted connection to NXT because my dad helped change it from the developmental to more of a fully-fledged out brand with his contributions there.” “So I have nothing but respect for what they’re doing, I just think we’re doing a drastically different show.”
Cody then talked about him being more focused on what is going on in AEW before looking at what is going on in NXT.
This is what Cody said:
“It’s more something you look at it [NXT] after the fact, and it’s like ‘what did they do this week’ and whatnot. I’d think they’d be the same, but you’d be surprised how we’re very much just focused on our show.” “If we got all like ‘let’s find out what they’re doing,’ that would be really easy to do, but it wouldn’t be very true to what we’ve been trying to do all along. We have Jon Moxley, Chris Jericho, Kenny Omega, PAC, myself, Darby Allin, Kris Statlander and just the talent that I’m naming now, my responsibility is to them and to make sure they beam across the television sets appropriately.”
