ASK TITO: WWE vs. AEW Competition is Over?, New WWE Theme Music?, Jesse Ventura, Bret Hart, & More

The EXCELLENCE IN COLUMN WRITING is upon you and is going to provide snappy answers to your current events questions derived from emails, comments below columns, or from social media. Being honest here, I’ve been very busy personally and professionally that I haven’t had as much time to write lately, but being even more honest here, I haven’t had much to write on either. What am I going to write on? How much I enjoy the WWE product and hardly see any flaws on it, or another column on how much I loathe the AEW product?

But I will say this about the WWE… Enjoy the Smackdown on USA Network honeymoon while it lasts. The second 2025 begins and RAW begins on Netflix, Smackdown won’t matter. It will return to the Smackdown prior to 2019 where it was the stepchild of the WWE especially with it foolishly remaining on Friday. Now, if Smackdown was on Thursday, totally different story… But Smackdown on Friday on a USA Network channel available to only 70 million homes where it used to be on a network channel of 100+ million households won’t be WWE’s priority.

Think about how crazy things are going to get for the WWE during early 2025… They are on Netflix for RAW and beginning the Royal Rumble to Wrestlemania season. What perfect timing… Netflix numbers will go through the roof because the hype for the Rumble matters and then the build-up to Wrestlemania matters more. Netflix executives are going to be using dollar bills to light up their cigars for the $500 million per year deal they have given the WWE, and then the post-Wrestlemania season happens. Oh hey, SummerSlam, and then it’s back to their naps before the next Rumble to Wrestlemania season begins.

For me, that’s what wrestling has become… It’s seasonal… I’m very focused during January through April and then I’m just waiting for SummerSlam to get here. After that, I’m like “hey, the NFL is back!”.

Back during the Monday Night Wars, this didn’t happen… Go watch the summers of 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000… Holy cow, those May, June, and July Pay Per Views mattered and everything mattered during the Fall months.

And that’s what competition breeds… Pushing out quality events all year round instead of what we just had with the WWE and that was complacency following Wrestlemania 40 and I’d argue before SummerSlam. Even now, we’re not seeing Roman Reigns every week as he’s still taking weeks off. Come early 2025 through April 2025, we’ll see Roman often again.

Why has WWE taken their foot off the gas? Because AEW no longer matters.

AEW is no longer competition to the WWE, and we could argue they seriously were through 2022 with a touch of it happening during 2023.

It’s over… AEW is getting less than HALF of bodies sitting in arenas with 5,000 capacity and tarping off large sections of bigger arenas that they foolishly lease. Tony Khan is now uncorking bottles of champagne whenever AEW Dynamite gets above 700,000 now… Estimates for AEW’s All In Pay Per View buyrates are down from last year’s show, but really, anything below 200,000 purchases for PPV is quite low.

The amount of money that AEW is throwing around could bankrupt the Khans, but they are billionaires. Something on their Income Statement has to incur losses so that they’ll effectively write something off on their taxes. Wrestlers like MJF, Okada, Mercedes, Adam Copeland, Will Ospreay, Swerve, and others whom Tony Khan has given above-market value contracts to need to wear shirts that say “I (heart) IRS” because each of you are expenses that helps the Khan’s creative accountants find out ways for them to pay LESS in taxes for 2024 and beyond.

Best thing about AEW is that they’ll get a TV deal done because their 700,000 viewership shows are cheaper for Warner Bros. Discovery to put on a 2 hour of block of prime time television than the royalties they’d have to pay out to air television shows or movies. For now, they can take advantage of the limping Cable/Satellite industry but there will come a time when that $40 billion+ of debt will need to be paid by WBD.

Notice what the WWE has done? They’ve signed deals with PROFITABLE companies like Netflix, who used to lose money but now is printing it, and Comcast/NBC/Universal who is relieved that they didn’t foolishly purchase 20th Century Fox like Disney did. WWE is in bed with 2 companies that are cash heavy who won’t sweat when the WWE cools things down after Wrestlemania. However with Warner Bros. Discovery, if they somehow overpay AEW on their new deal, they’ll be expecting results BECAUSE THEY NEED THEM. Trust me when I say this, WBD is sweating that NHL deal that they just signed for 7 years. They foolishly thought that by having the NHL on TNT, viewership would grow like their NBA coverage. Nope, the NBA drew because of the “Inside the NBA” show carrying the water up the hill for a declining NBA product.

Thus, I’m officially here to say that the WWE vs. AEW war is OVER. What you’ll see is AEW occasionally overpay for a WWE free agent and it won’t matter because WWE will replace said wrestler with someone younger and cheaper. Effectively, AEW has become TNA which is what I tried to explain to y’all on December 7th, 2023 and I was attacked for this opinion. AEW will have a weak cable deal and a high wrestler expense, much like TNA did with having Spike TV and spending the Panda Energy money which they, too, used as tax write-offs. WWE never saw TNA as a threat, just as they now have officially thought less of AEW as a threat.

It’s over, folks… AEW had 5 years to put out a competent product and opted to side with the Young Bucks clique rather than quality wrestlers.

Onto your questions.

ASK TITO: Your Questions, My Answers

What are your thoughts on Def Rebel’s contract possibly expiring with WWE?

If this is true, and there’s speculation right now that it’s just a rumor, I’ll be dancing in the streets. This is the last true weakness of the WWE presentation, as theme music has SUCKED for the last 15 years since the WWE pushed away from Jim Johnston (former music producer). To this day, I cringe when I hear Orton or Miz’s theme music, while everything under the last 5 years with Def Rebel has mostly sucked.

Here’s a good example… Listen to Sycho Sid’s music from 1995-1997. It is FLAWLESS… Completely captures the character that WWE wanted to feature and it was a large man who could get unhinged at any point. It’s so simple, as it sounds like the theme song from the movie Psycho and then just plays amped up music afterward. You hear that opening part of the song, you knew Sid was coming out just like the glass shattering for Stone Cold Steve Austin.

Theme Music MATTERS and it’s been an Achilles heel for both WWE and AEW for the past 5 years especially. AEW’s theme music is actually much worse than WWE’s and WWE’s is terrible.

I remember that I used to cherish having the WWE theme music on a CD during the 1990s and proudly drove with those themes blasting out of my car. Now, the only themes I have on my phone are those same 1990s theme songs.

WWE needs to find a music producer, like Jim Johnston, who can craft music who fits the vibe of the wrestler and can get those wrestlers over before they even walk out of the curtain.

And let me state this about theme music… Just because a large crowd sings along with a theme song, doesn’t make it good. If you’re paying $100 or more to see a WWE show, you’ll chant whatever to maximize that ticket purchase. The theme music isn’t for the loyal fans in attendance, but others to be impressed by WWE’s presentation. Trust me, nobody outside of WWE fans are lining up to purchase Cody Rhodes’s awful theme song.

The appeal to newer fans is whom the WWE should be seeking with a new music producer higher. Def Rebel’s theme music sucked and it’s time to move on to something better that fits what WWE wrestlers need.

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Was Bryan Danielson being placed in a plastic bag taking things too far for AEW?

YOU need to ask yourself this from what you want out of a wrestling product… Do you want it to be kid friendly or do you want it to be a big more violent and catering towards adults? You cannot have both things…

It’s a means to get heat and Bryan survived the angle…

Oh, we have fears that younger children might do this on their younger siblings or friends? OK, then what are your fears about kids trying to take high risk jumps off of things? Hitting people with chairs or using tables?

Now, if the plastic bag is used often, that’s bad but only for repetitive reasons. Hence why putting someone through a table is no longer impressive because it has been done so much. The reason we’re talking about this plastic bag incident is that nobody has done it for years and thus it made a bigger impact.

Gee, imagine that… Doing something that hasn’t been done for years and it caused a big reaction… You’re onto something here, AEW. Now stop doing these table spots multiple times per show and thus greaten the impact of higher risk moves when tried.

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Thoughts on Jesse Ventura returning to WWE announcing on NBC prime time shows?

I think it’s great anytime a big legend of the wrestling business comes back and contributes… In this case, it’s just an announcer and as far as I can tell, Jesse still knows how to speak well. Now, the content of what he speaks during interviews is conspiracy laced and gets off topic, but he’ll be a professional in that booth. I suspect he’ll be part of a 3-man team because Jesse is older (73!) and hasn’t been a diehard wrestling viewer in a while. However, he still knows the business and how it works…

With NBC bringing back Saturday Night’s Main Event as their prime time specials, and Jesse did many of them back in his day, it’s a good relationship to have. And yes, he’s deep into conspiracies, but states them with professionalism and keeps his calm when presenting his opinion. That’s much different than say the Ultimate Warrior speaking who attacked groups of people. Jesse’s comments have been directly on the government rather than excluding races or sexualities of groups of people. Big, big difference.

I’m happy for this relationship returning. Good for both parties and you’ll quickly see that Jesse hasn’t lost a step at all. He is THE BEST color commentator ever and I’d argue that his teaming with Gorilla was the best announcing team ever. I still consider Jim Ross to be the best announcer ever but with Gorilla a close second and Jesse was just better than Jerry Lawler.

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Do you think that Bret Hart is OK with Triple H now per his recent WWE return?

Time heals all wounds, but Bret is also a very smart businessman. If he’s going to make any kind of money with the WWE, he has to be good with the management of the company. Well, Triple H is in charge of the product now and hence, Bret has to put past feelings aside.

It’s very likely that Bret will get on a podcast next week and badmouth Triple H’s work… BUT then in a couple of months, he’ll make more WWE appearances. That is who Bret Hart is and most promoters know he’s just an old man yelling at the clouds at this point. It’s likely that Triple H has heard Bret’s critiques of him and just doesn’t care, which is amazing considering the rabbit ears that Triple H used to have on criticism. So yeah, evolution has happened for Triple H!

Bret was mad at Triple H for lying at Survivor Series 1997 for being in on the Screwjob and specifically lying to his then-wife’s face about knowing. Bret never got over that and has attacked Triple H for years, even after forgiving Shawn Michaels who physically participated in the Screwjob instead of being trusted inside the ring itself. Ditto for Vince McMahon, who actually killed Bret’s brother Owen Hart. Bret forgave him for BOTH the Screwjob and killing Owen, yet never forgave Triple H for just knowing about the Screwjob.

It’s maddening to be a fan of Bret Hart when he does stuff like attacking Triple H for years while forgiving HBK/Vince, along with constantly bashing Ric Flair out of pure jealousy or attacking Bill Goldberg for Starrcade 1999 even though Bret wrestled like 10-11 times for 3 weeks after Bill “put him out of the business”.

Bret’s career didn’t end the way he wanted it to end, but he had a damn good career and made both Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels into big stars. I’d also argue that Bret’s matches with Undertaker and Diesel (Kevin Nash) were incredibly important to their careers, too. And GOOD LORD, Bret’s matches hold up incredibly well and are delights to watch to this day. Just watch his SummerSlam 1991 and 1992 matches, alone, and you’ll be blown away at the absolute quality. For both of those events, he wrestled a Curt Hennig with an injured back and a British Bulldog who was dealing with substance issues. Yet Bret goes out there and pulls 5-star matches with both… That is BEFORE he gets elevated to the Main Event where he put on great matches with Bob Backlund, Undertaker, Shawn Michaels, Steve Austin, Kevin Nash, and virtually anyone who wrestled him.

Just F’N chill, Bret. You were a victim of an unfortunate circumstance, which you somewhat helped create by refusing to drop the title… But you forgave Vince McMahon for orchestrating that and being negligent towards the safety of your brother Owen Hart, so why are you holding extensive grudges with others? Makes zero sense especially with what Vince did to you and your family. And only now are you badmouthing Vince McMahon because of his own legal problems.

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Thoughts on Dave Bautista suddenly slimming down?

He’s 55 and carrying massive muscle mass isn’t safe for his long-term health. I’m not here to make accusations, but as you get older, testosterone is naturally lost and muscles atrophy as well. If you literally take nothing, you’ll struggle to retain muscle mass. Most adult men either remain skinny because of a loss of muscle or they gain fat. Guys like the Rock and Batista being JACKED in their late 40s and now 50s is not natural. Not just jacked, but massive muscles with veins popping right out.

Which, again, makes me question what is WWE/TKO’s Wellness Program with their Board Member, the Rock. Dude is massive in his 50s and has a reason to shave his head. And after all, the Rock was the guy who had breast reduction surgery during late 1998 because a possible side effect to taking performance enhancers.

Batista looks fine, as we have it too much in our heads of the jacked up version of himself. I just hope that he lived cleanly to help offset some of the health negatives that maybe the enhancers brought on for the past 25 years of use or more.

This is just my opinion, but I think Hollywood needs a Wellness Policy.

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Does WWE Hall of Famer Donald Trump have a chance to win the 2024 election?

Given the short attention spans of everyone these days, there’s always a chance… Plus, heading into the Tuesday debate, it was a close race and the real challenge was not just who would win the most votes, but who could win states needed for the Electoral College count of 270.

Kamala has been riding the momentum of being a fresh candidate and having a positive convention versus Trump being himself. This debate on Tuesday between Kamala and Donald was huge because it was “make or break” for Kamala, as voters wanted to know more about her and how she’d look when challenged in a debate. Well, given the way she got Trump to scream “they are eating dogs, they are eating cats” and that’s a completely made-up rumor of what is actually happening in Springfield, OH… It’s safe to say that Kamala Harris has momentum and I think she could flip a state like North Carolina because of it. Then, Trump would need more help on the electoral map to win.

In my opinion, Donald Trump should be BEGGING for a 2nd debate with Kamala to prove himself. Bad first debates happen… Ask Ronald Reagan during 1984 or Barack Obama during 2012. Both incumbents had bad nights but returned during the 2nd debates with new energy and beat their opponents to win the election. Compare that to Donald Trump during 2020, who had a bad first debates and had a decent, but not great, second debate and Biden would go on to win the 2020 election to make Trump the first single-term president since George Bush from the early 1990s. In my opinion, Trump is foolish to refuse to have another debate. Now, everyone will remember what happened in the first debate only.

Worse yet for Trump, he’s doubling down on the eating pets thing from Springfield, OH along with pushing other conspiracies.

If you were to ask me today, Kamala Harris, I think, is going to take North Carolina and make things very difficult for Donald Trump to win. There are even remote chances that she could take Georgia and even Florida, which makes total game over.

THAT SAID, so much has changed in the last 2 months… Trump was shot, Biden steps down, and Kamala becomes a rock star that nobody expected. With 50 days from the election, anything can happen… However, early voting starts soon and could be casted based on recent events such as this debate. If I were any campaign advisor with Trump, I’d beg him for another debate with Kamala to see if they could challenge her past positions on issues.

Ultimately, whomever gets in the White House will probably join with a split Congress and we’ll be back to what we’ve just had for the last 4 years. However, I could see Kamala more gridlocked by a split Congress than Trump. With Supreme Court granted immunity, I don’t see Congress mattering if Donald Trump wins while Kamala would be the typical law and structure abiding president if she wins.

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THE LAST WORD

If you’ve ever read the book Animal Farm by George Orwell, you’ll know that it’s a story of how neglected animals overthrew the farmer and operated the farm by themselves. Then, the pigs of the farm took over with one rising to the top named Napoleon. Napoleon became a hypocrite yet very effective leader who was able to spin any of his actions to the benefit of the farm. But he had a sidekick named Squealer who helped push lies and propaganda to the other animals to keep them fooled about being led by a dictatorship. Animal Farm was published during 1945 and has themes alluding to Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany and Joseph Stalin’s Communist Russia, as both were effective at spreading lies and propaganda to keep their dictators in power.

Looking at today’s politics, you have entire networks full of “Squealers” who push complete lies and propaganda for a particular movement or candidate. There’s a reason why Donald Trump praises the likes of Sean Hannity, Jesse Waters, or Laura Ingraham at FOX News even when he bashes other at that network. He knows who will kiss his arse and give him great coverage, no matter what happens.

But in the Pro Wrestling context, Dave Meltzer is “Squealer” for All Elite Wrestling (AEW) even when his own tag team partner, Bryan Alvarez, sometimes figures things out.

In each and every Wrestling Observer, Meltzer overly praises each AEW match and overrated them with his star-ratings while always making an excuse for the lower viewership. Oh, it’s the NBA/NHL playoffs causing lower viewership or the Olympics, even though both playoffs and the Olympics have opposed AEW before. In fact, viewership for the NBA in particular was higher in previous years than it has been lately.

If you look at Dave’s All In 2024 star ratings, 6 out of 8 matches had at least 4 stars on a system with up to 5 stars maximum (though Dave has been going above that for his praise of AEW or New Japan matches). That is RIDICULOUS… Compare that with SummerSlam 2024, he gave at least 4 stars to 3 out of 7 matches. Compare that to another WWE event, such as Wrestlemania 40, he gave at least 4 stars to 7 matches out of 13 matches. Wrestlemania 40 has been considered by many to be one of the best Wrestlemanias of all time, if not the BEST SHOW of all time.

All In 2024 had 75% of its matches with at least 4 star ratings while Wrestlemania 40 was at 54%.

But that’s not even the most ridiculous part of Dave’s AEW bias. As someone who is the most plugged into AEW by knowing most of the wrestlers personally and has direct contact information with Tony Khan, he actually reports the LEAST amount of breaking news on AEW. In fact, it’s guys like Sean Ross Sapp who breaks news on AEW and makes the well-connected Dave Meltzer look like a complete idiot by comparison.

Yet, there’s a reason for this and that’s because Dave Meltzer has been purposely reporting leaked insider news on WWE to HARM them as a promotion. That is why he does this in his Observer news letter. If you go back to the 1990s, you’ll see him joining talkshows to talk about alleged steroid use and other backstage happenings while reporting, non-stop, any insider news fed to him by disgruntled wrestlers. Meltzer hated WCW, too, and in particular had issues getting along with Eric Bischoff. So what happened in the news letters? Non-stop bashing of WCW even when it was getting hot with the NWO and Dave really leaned into destroying the promotion during its later years with non-stop backstage reporting.

Why? Because Dave loves himself some New Japan Pro Wrestling and is close to the Indy scene in California. THAT is the particular brand of pro wrestling that he likes and he uses his Observer newsletter to spread propaganda on how BAD WWE is and how good California indy wrestling is or how awesome New Japan’s events are. AEW is a hybrid of workers from the wrestling promotions that Dave has been propping up as “great” in his newsletters for years and AEW even employs one of Dave’s former business writers, Chris Harrington, as SVP of Business Strategy. Harrington founded Wrestlenomics and is currently operated by Brandon Thurston who acts as his own “Squealer” for numbers analysis… No matter how bad AEW’s viewership gets, that 18-49 demo always seems to matter. Well, that’s the propaganda pushed by these Squealers.

Now, am I comparing Dave to the many Squealers and enablers that the dictators of the 1940s had? Of course not, because Dave is reporting on scripted wrestling and Adolf/Joseph’s Squealers were hiding very bad things that were happening such as murder and other war atrocities. BUT, the point remains is that no matter how bad AEW gets on viewership, attendance, or just a weakening in brand recognition, there’s ALWAYS an excuse from Dave Meltzer about why AEW’s numbers are lower.

You can keep bringing up sports and politics as excuses, but I’m pretty sure RAW and Nitro were bringing in 5-6 million viewers EACH while Michael Jordan was in the NBA playoffs, MLB had higher viewership, Monday Night Football had way higher viewership on ABC, and the Clinton impeachment stuff had people watching news networks back then. There have been higher rated Olympics than 2024 by a margin. Olympic viewership has been down since it peaked during 2008 and that’s a fact!

Furthermore, wrestling fans aren’t also NFL/NBA/NHL/MLB fans, nor are they fanatical about politics. Meltzer makes the assumption that wrestling fans are too easily distracted and that is totally wrong. Wrestling fans are the most loyal fans to a brand ever and spend more money, per person, than most sports do on merchandise in particular. With wrestling being mostly episodic, you can’t just miss a show or series of shows whereas with sports, you can watch an individual game without needing to know what happened last week.

But hey, it’s not my subscription count that is dropping and that’s not my problem. There’s a reason why they’ve pushed more things behind the paywall and that’s not because it’s selling, but because fewer were willing to pay for things if part of the show was given away for free. A great product will sell itself.

Your AEW bias and your prolonged love for New Japan/California indies is the problem and many wrestling fans see right through your BS and propaganda. And you’re no longer smart about pro wrestling because of this massive bias that has deepened with the AEW love and the desire to tear WWE down. When I hear you, Dave, I just hear frothing stupidity on a level that made me wonder what happened to the once knowledgeable Dave Meltzer. Well, as it turns out, you’ve always been pushing anti-WWE propaganda and it just wasn’t as obvious as it is now. You’re making more and more gaffes than you did before which is a sign of quality control no longer being in that messy office of yours.

But you had a good run as the top news insider… I’ll give you that.

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