10 Compelling Pieces Of Evidence That Prove Wrestling Is Worse Than It's Ever Been

To many longtime wrestling fans, it's obvious that WWE and, therefore, the wrestling business is at one of the lowest points in history. Attendance is down all over the country for all events, TV ratings have gone down to their lowest point in nearly 20 years, and mainstream acceptance of wrestling and wrestlers is non-existent.

Since WWE is a monopoly, they reflect the wrestling industry in North America. Fans of TNA and ROH can pretend that their promotions matter but they are essentially independent companies with television exposure. For better or worse, WWE is the reflection of the wrestling business and their business is in the toilet.

Wrestling fans, almost exclusively under the age of 25, defend the product to the bitter end because, quite honestly, they have never seen great wrestling. Their only exposure to the product is the WWE monopoly and all the problems that come with that.

The bottom line is that the wrestling business is down...really, really far down.

But has it reached its nadir?  Is this the worst state of the business in history?

Let's find out...

On May 10, 1999, Monday Night Raw received the highest rating in WWE's history. It was the pinnacle of the Attitude Era with "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, The Rock, and Vince McMahon participating in the main event. The episode earned an 8.1 rating, the equivalent of approximately 9 million people watching the episode. That show was followed the next week by the highest rated segment in company history (The Rock's "This is Your Life" comedy bit with Mick Foley) which earned an 8.4.

A little over 15 years later, WWE has been setting records again but this time they are in the opposite direction. The September 28, 2015 episode of Raw drew an average of 3.3 million viewers, the lowest non-holiday rating for the show since 1997. In the past 15 years, WWE has succeeded in chasing away 6 million viewers from their show.

That means more people used to watch wrestling than actually watch it today.

WWE and its defenders are quick to point to Monday Night Football as a reason for their low ratings but hasn't WWE dealt with football every single year since 1993? 

As for our other promotions, TNA and ROH barely count considering their shows drew 275,000 viewers and 127,000 viewers, respectively.