This past Thursday WrestleZone Radio’s daily pro wrestling news show WrestleZone Daily welcomed former WWE Head Writer Ed Ferrara.
You can listen to Ed’s appearance at the 25:25 minute mark in the embedded audio player above. Some of his transcribed comments can be found below.
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On his initial reaction to the news that Smackdown is going live for two hours every Tuesday night on USA:
EF: My initial reaction was that of… and, granted, it comes from a place of just being wary of the product… they seem to have started to get to get their mojo back a little bit on the creative end. A little bit. My reaction was, kind of, audience fatigue. I don’t watch Smackdown now. There’s already three hours on Monday nights. The fear is that they are going to glut the market with their product. Even tho they are the market they are going to put too much product out there and split their audience. Especially if they are going to go hardline split between the two brands which remains to be seen.
On the decision to split the brands and have both shows operate with their own storylines:
EF: That’s what I think the problem is. That’s the sword that cuts both ways. Having the separate brands between the two shows it gives Smackdown a chance to discover and build it’s own audience. At the same time it might take some of the RAW audience away. Especially if Smackdown gives the audience something that RAW doesn’t. For example, if Smackdown starts becoming more “serious” and a little more “wrestling friendly” or “mature” in their storylines I’ll probably wind up drifting over to that and not watching RAW. Even tho in the back of my mind I know RAW is and always will be the main priority. That’s the risk that they take. If they don’t then they are really risking audience glut and audience burn out by having five hours. If it’s a matter of starting something on Monday and paying it off on Tuesday at the end of the show. When it’s 11:20 and the show goes off the air on Monday night. Are people really going to be psyched to watch Smackdown the next night? No, it’s going to become a chore. Just like the three hour episodes themselves have become.
Related: Vince Russo Explains Why He Thinks WWE Is Struggling To Create New Superstars
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