New Year... No Gimmicks. Let's discuss the Netflix debut of Monday Night Raw. Did it live up to the hype? What does the numbers say about wrestling's fanbase globally? Let's break this down. But first, we gotta address the elephant in the room...
If you want a wrestling podcast that keeps it 100% real on all the topics you love, you’ve com to the right place. No Gimmicks is dedicated to bringing you commentary from the worlds of pro wrestling, entertainment and when the moment calls for it, social events. Be warned, don’t come with a closed mind. This isn’t a gimmick show.
Woman:
We are the DFPN. Always question the answers.
Blak Makk:
What is up, everybody? Welcome back to the no gimmicks podcast here on the DFPN. New year. Welcome to 2025. New show.
Blak Makk:
Welcome to the new show. Before we get into that, if you read the description, if you paid attention to what we're posting, we have to address another thing in the room. So, normally, when we do a show, it's myself and my cohost, the fabulous one, Frank Dee. Frank decided to take a hiatus from podcasting. So going forward, the show will be just me.
Blak Makk:
You'll begin just me, but have no fear. I have decided to reformat the show. It probably would help if I had my mic close-up on me. But, yeah, we my my cohost, the fabulous one, Frankie d, he is he is going to be taking a hiatus. What's number love, man?
Blak Makk:
It's it's number love. I hope you come back to the show. But if not, man, it's been real. Again, number love. Take your time.
Blak Makk:
Do what you gotta do. And the door is always open, my brother. You know what I mean? So with that being said, we we did format the show a little differently now, since it is gonna be a one man show for the time being. We will be having some guests on, you know, hopefully, some reoccurring guests.
Blak Makk:
We'll have those guys on and talking some stuff. One of my big things that we're gonna be doing for the year is diving back into the indies because it was something it was kind of a passion project for me, that I kinda got away from is interviewing the indie talent and starting up the ground floor, working my way up. If you guys really do follow me on all social media platforms, I don't wanna plug myself. I'm so terrible about I'm terrible about that. But if you follow me, I did an interview with Hardee's over at BCP Plus.
Blak Makk:
Shout out to BCP Plus for being so gracious and, handing me that opportunity. But I ended up interviewing them, and that kind of reinvigorated my love for, you know, just interviewing and going back to the ground floor, looking at some of these guys that we've had on the show before because they've grown. I wanna I wanna reconnect to those guys and repump that, back in that bloodline, that that not bloodline, but that lifeline that we had back into the show. I thought we were on to something there, and the love is still there from the community. Shout out to Metropolex wrestling, MPX.
Blak Makk:
We did test a couple things out over the Christmas holiday, and I liked it. So we're gonna be going back to that. And on top of everything else that we've done, you'll be we'll we'll be sticking strictly into the world of wrestling for a minute because I want there's so much happening that I have to talk about it. So we'll talk about it. And that's gonna lead me into the show, man.
Blak Makk:
Welcome. We got a good one for you tonight. What I wanted to do, we had 2 big debuts. We had the debut of AEW on Max, which they haven't come out and said numbers yet. So once they do, we'll break those down too.
Blak Makk:
But we did have another debut. Netflix, WWE Monday night Raw is now it's it's home is officially on Netflix. Big debut. Lot of action. Lot of people talking about it.
Blak Makk:
Let's break this down. Let's break down the numbers. Let's get into the show. Welcome to the, you know, gimmicks. Again, we don't keep it a 100% real, baby, a 100% of the time.
Blak Makk:
So with that being said, let's dive in. Alright. So we get we get the Netflix debut. They came out and they dropped the numbers on Thursday, January 9th. 4,900,000 people globally.
Blak Makk:
2.6 average within the US. Let's break down what these numbers mean. Now 4,900,000 people globally is a great number, especially if you're with WWE. We're not used to seeing these numbers anymore. Right?
Blak Makk:
Globally, we're we're not used to seeing any numbers, but 4,900,000, we're going back to the attitude error with these numbers. Right? Or or so you would think. But if you look at this in the grand scheme of things, what really threw me off is they threw the US numbers. If they would have stuck with 4,900,000 globally, I probably wouldn't be looking at this any other way than the success.
Blak Makk:
But this speaks to where we are as wrestling fans. It really does. 4,900,000 globally out of 287, sorry, 287,000,000 people, that is a discrepancy. That's 1% of the total subscriber rate for Netflix. But, again, it's just starting.
Blak Makk:
4,900,000 people is a strong number. Even Netflix said that this is a strong number for them. Do they expect this to increase or decrease? 1, we'll we'll know next week. Right?
Blak Makk:
Because one thing's for sure, two things for certain. It's gonna come on next week. Those numbers have to get reported again. What I would have liked before we dive into where we are as a fan base, what I would have liked personally is them not reporting it. If you look at what AEW's done and you you can make up your own speculation if it was gonna be good, if it was gonna be bad, if it was gonna be indifferent.
Blak Makk:
They haven't reported those numbers. Right? They reported the television numbers. The Nielsen rating came out, and it was a little bit higher than where they normally would function. Right?
Blak Makk:
So there's an increase on the television side, but the numbers on Max have not really been rewarded yet. And so if you look at this number and compare it to what I'm about to say about WWE and what people like Eric Bischoff have come out and said, Nielsen rating should not be applying to the Netflix rating. So you kinda have to get rid of this archaic ancient kind of format. Because if you put into the fact that Nielsen accounted for 2,500,000, sorry, 2.5 per people for household, then those numbers grow exponentially if you try to multiply them with what you're seeing on Netflix. So 2.5 people per household, is that going to account for a a subscription?
Blak Makk:
No. It doesn't. Because rule number 1, right, and this is just how I look at it. Rule number 1 is you can't count 2.5 people per account when you can obviously make multiple accounts on a Netflix account. Right?
Blak Makk:
So you can within that one account, you can have about 6 subaccounts because mom has 1, dad has 1. If you have 3 kids, they each have 1. That's at least 5 accounts. So if anybody's watching raw on those accounts, should that number really count, or are we going to the overall? These are some of the questions that I have.
Blak Makk:
And Nielsen's not tracking this stuff because they're not tracking the streaming numbers. Who's reporting that? The company. And if you're gonna take the company at their word, then you have to take into account that they they looked at all these accounts. Who's watching Monday Night Raw on these accounts?
Blak Makk:
And is it trust? Is it the trust system? Right? They're they're impressed with it, so they reported it. If that's the trust system, alright, these numbers are the numbers.
Blak Makk:
We don't have to refute them. You can bump them up. Again, you can you can boost them. You cannot. Right?
Blak Makk:
But you gotta take the company at its word. They reported 4,900,000 globally. They have 287,000,000 subscribers. And in that, you have a possibility for let's multiply that number times 5. Right?
Blak Makk:
So 287,000,000 times 5 is a shitload of accounts possible. Right? There's no way that all 287,000,000 accounts are just one person. That's that's that's ludicrous because I, myself, have me, my wife, and my kids. So you have the account for that some way.
Blak Makk:
So if my kid who doesn't even live here is watching Monday Night Raw, which he did at his house, right, then does my account track his number? That's that's the big question. Sorry. This may sound confusing if you're look if if you're listening. This may sound really confusing.
Blak Makk:
But that just goes to say, what are we actually tracking? And 4,900,000 people globally, this is where my concern may lie. Right? So the wrestling fan base is very divided in America, and we'll take that US number, 2,600,000, which people have tried to boost it already and say that's at least 6,000,000. No.
Blak Makk:
It's 2,600,000. The company reported it. You have to go with that. You can't boost it. You can't say anything else other than 2,600,000.
Blak Makk:
Right? And then that 2,600,000, that's only that's only maybe double what they did normally for 2024. So they average about 1.2 in 2024. So on this Netflix debut, it only doubled your audience. When in the United States, you know there's a lot of people with Netflix accounts.
Blak Makk:
Are people just not tuning in? Did they forget that it was gonna be on Netflix, which is highly it's it's likely, but it's also highly not likely because it's impossible to even log on Netflix and not see it. If you have a Netflix account, they've put this thing on the front row. They did a lot of hype for it. I'm probably gonna get a lot of shit for this one, but it it's fine.
Blak Makk:
But that that's what I'm saying. It's like, you did a lot of hype. 2,600,000 in America, it doubled your audience. Yes. That's great.
Blak Makk:
But you also doubled that for when The Rock came back. You know what I mean? Like, you had you had a 2 point mil you had 2,000,000 viewers when The Rock came back. He was doing this whole thing, building himself up to WrestleMania. And 2,600,000 is kind of it's kind of a low number in the grand scheme of things, but that lets you know where we are as a fan base.
Blak Makk:
The wrestling fan base has shrunk. It has. It just has. And we're further dividing ourselves by this AEW, WWE thing. I wrote an article about this a long time ago that I never published because I it was just it was too much.
Blak Makk:
But looking at these numbers, the American audience is petty, and it's not as big as people think. There is no win in just 2,600,000 viewers. When Jake Paul and Mike Tyson globally has 60,000,000, they made it a spectacle. Right? And that's where that's where it comes from.
Blak Makk:
The NFL did big numbers. The week before, they did big numbers, which kudos to them. I'll I'll jump into the production side of of WWE on Netflix. It was wonderful. No buffering issues.
Blak Makk:
Stream was crispy the whole time. They they did a whole bunch of good things with this with this production. It was not a bad show. But where the numbers don't indicate if going into the show, what I would have said about Monday Night Raw is anything less than 5,000,000 people globally, I would have counted that as a failure. I'm I'm leaning away from that now because 4.6 is like you can it's there.
Blak Makk:
The numbers are there for you to build on. Definitely. Is it a great number? Not really. But you have something that you can build on.
Blak Makk:
Now out of that 4,600,000, who's gonna go in back and tell someone to watch Monday Night Raw? That's the that's the indicator. And that's what I'm saying. Like, next week is gonna be really, really big for them. So we're we're building up to the Royal Rumble.
Blak Makk:
We're getting ready to ramp up to WrestleMania season. You threw a lot at this debut in which that's another issue. You threw so much at us. It has so many celebrities. What's gonna happen when those celebrities are not there?
Blak Makk:
Right? What's gonna happen when you don't have a rock? Cena's back, but is he gonna be back every week? Hogan, we're we're not gonna talk about Hogan. We are not gonna talk about Hogan.
Blak Makk:
Yeah. Undertaker there. The only person really you didn't have there that added so much history to Monday Night Raw was the one you could've replaced him with Hulk Hogan. Right? You could've replaced Stone Cold Steve Austin for Hogan.
Blak Makk:
You know? So it's it's apples to apples, the conversation, but, again, these types of things are gonna affect. Am I gonna tune in for the nostalgia? Did I get enough out of this debut for me to wanna tune in? And that's really up to the people that watch because you had 3 hours of television, and you have 4 matches and a lot of fluff around it.
Blak Makk:
Right? Am I going to tune in? You have PLE level matches, but is that going to be enough for me to tune in next week? You have punk versus Rollins, a rivalry match in which Centimeters Punk came out victorious. I don't know if I woulda did that on that particular show.
Blak Makk:
Why? Because it makes it seem like the feud is over. If I wanted someone to tune in next week, then I need a cliffhanger for the show. There were things there were things that I would have done differently. I would've I would've put some history in there, but, also, I need to build towards the future.
Blak Makk:
And we had tribal combat. We had Roman Reigns. They brought all of their big guns to the show. But it also reminded me of what AEW was like back in the day. They threw all of their big guns into the show.
Blak Makk:
And I remember someone saying this is a marathon. It's not a sprint. Well, we kinda sprinted out the gate Monday night. Now there's something in place that they've built on. They they can continue forward.
Blak Makk:
They can keep our interest with. That is very much probably the case. They probably ended a lot of stuff so they can build some new stuff. Right? But was this enough for people to want to come back?
Blak Makk:
That is going to be the big question. I keep saying that, but it's the absolute truth. What is going to be the outcome of this week? And that, ladies and gentlemen, is your WWE news. Now before we get out of here, I'm gonna try not to keep you guys long, especially on this on this first run.
Blak Makk:
But let's get into AEW. We got some things we need to talk about there too. One second. Alright. AW.
Blak Makk:
They also kinda sprinted out the gate with theirs. They they what they did, I liked for their Max debut. They brought stories. They left me on cliffhangers. They also announced that Kenny Omega was gonna be coming back.
Blak Makk:
We had a pay per view, was in that led us out of, that that show led us out of as the max debut. We have people returning that were gonna be a part of this show. I think for all intents and purposes, they are starting already to build towards July in Arlington, Texas. I do think that. But one thing that got announced today has me really concerned of where we are gonna be in 2025.
Blak Makk:
Looks like we're gonna start losing people in 2025 because what they announced to or what it wasn't really them that announced it. Sean Ross Sapp of Fight For announced that Malachi Black's contract may have been up. And we've seen on dynamite that, Buddy Matthews wrestled Will Osprey. Will Osprey won. And then they went to this whole promo about if you need a guy, you don't need Malachi Black leading you guys.
Blak Makk:
You guys could be tag team champions. Blah blah blah. It looks like we're gonna be in that year where they're gonna be losing people. Now we know Malachi Black is is really a WWE guy. We know that.
Blak Makk:
But who else in dub in AEW is gonna be walking out the door? Right? And we've I talked about this on a on a earlier podcast. What do we do with the people that are in AEW and they are unhappy? You gotta let these guys go, and that's being nice.
Blak Makk:
You can't keep these guys on the roster. And if they're unhappy, if they're not being productive, like, this should be the year that contracts get get, you know not I don't wanna say terminated, but, you know, it it you get an amical in on both sides to contracts. You just have to because you're building up to all in. You you pretty much have an I or should. You should have an idea of what all in is gonna look like, who you want to be in those events, and you should start building towards that.
Blak Makk:
Just like WWE is building towards WrestleMania. WrestleMania is in April. They're building toward they've been building towards us since survivor series. You gotta start putting these blocks in in a place and taking people on the ride. You know?
Blak Makk:
It it needs to be it needs to be transparent, and I don't I don't feel like it it has been. And that piece of news just let me know, like, you know, it's 2025 is probably gonna be a year to where we lose a couple people. Malachi Black's won. We may lose Britt Baker. Who knows?
Blak Makk:
There's a there's a bunch of people that, you know, may be on they may be on their way out. Ricky Starks. If they come to an a a conclusion. We already know that Pence is gonna make his debut. He didn't make his debut, last week, due to time constraints on the show, which that is insane, but we know he's there.
Blak Makk:
We know that his tag team partner should be on his way out later this year. Right? So we should be approaching some of these these endings, particularly with the people that are unhappy and they haven't been doing anything with. And I hope that continues to be the case. I know Tony doesn't wanna be that type of guy, but if there's any year that you need to start doing that, it's this year.
Blak Makk:
You just renewed a TV rights deal. You are building towards something that you haven't done before, which is a stadium show in the United States. You need to start building goodwill with the fans in the United States. The way you do that is give them the best show as possible, and you cut out the outside noise. Doing these moves, it may sting a little bit at first, but it will in the in the end, it'll cut out a lot of the outside noise because people people are fickle.
Blak Makk:
Let's just face it. They'll they're fickle. They'll get over it. They will get over it. But, you know, it's it's gonna be interesting.
Blak Makk:
We're gonna be in interesting times because both companies are figuring out the streaming thing. Max is building up their library for AEW, which is it's gonna be a very interesting year for both companies to see where we are. And I, for 1, plan on sticking around and, you know, seeing what the fuss is about. Oh, man. But before we get out of here, I mentioned that we're gonna be working with the Indies.
Blak Makk:
I am going to be working more closely with Metroplex Wrestling. Shout out to them and all of their wrestlers, and shout out to the brand new MPX champion. Kari Jai Wright. He won it again. I'm gonna try to get him back on the show.
Blak Makk:
Let's go over some things that we may have missed along the way, because we've been busy. We've been busy. But on the network side of things, and this is gonna be your final shots and thoughts, ladies and gentlemen. On the network side of things, we are ramping back up for 2025. The smoke pit's coming back.
Blak Makk:
We're gonna be recording soon, and those episodes will be dropping again. This episode will be on the No Chemics YouTube. So please like and subscribe to at no gimmicks d f p n on youtube, youtube.com/atnotegimmicksd f p n. The podcast episodes in audio form will be on, YouTube as well. Also on the website, this will be on the website.
Blak Makk:
So tap in, tune in, guys. We got we got so much coming this year. I am ready to get back to work. I'm ready to get, back in, into shape, if you will, in podcasting shape. So tune in.
Blak Makk:
Thank you guys for listening. Thank you guys for liking. Thank you guys for subscribing. Until next time. You guys be peaceful, and enjoy what you wanna enjoy.
Blak Makk:
My guy ain't here, so I'm a have to say it for you. Go get your pet spayed and neutered. It's wintertime. We got a big winter storm. Take care of your dogs.
Blak Makk:
Take care of your cats. Take care of your animals. If you're not, please have your dog spayed or neutered and get them somewhere where they can be cared for properly. Until next time, guys. Peace.
