10 Decisions That Helped Kill WWE Raw's Ratings
1. Bad Booking
It would be easy to say that shoving Roman Reigns down fans' throats is still driving off fans - after all he did just retire The Undertaker at WrestleMania. However, given that Raw's ratings this spring are down 20% from the same period last year - when Reigns was WWE Champion - it's about more than that.
Reigns's rise to the top of the company was a sign of the bad booking that has long plagued the creative team, and it led to more of it when all the other talent felt like afterthoughts. However, in the past year, Raw has become almost unwatchable, and the show's so-called stars have no cachet whatsoever, even with hardcore fans.
Whether it's The Club dressing up as testicle-obsessed doctors or Alexa Bliss giving Bayley her very own "This Is Your Life" show, ridiculous segments have made watching Raw a chore only to be undertaken by masochists. Yes, there were ridiculous segments during the Attitude Era, but they at least felt like they weren't done just to kill time.
Back then, all the nonsense was balanced out by important-feeling angles and matches featuring stars. Today, there are no stars, save for the part-timers who come around for WrestleMania and leave immediately afterwards, making the full-time roster look less important and killing its members' drawing power.
Many fans feel that the only solution is the retirement of Vince McMahon, who's repeatedly proven himself to be out of touch. Will that turn Raw's ratings around? Perhaps we won't get a chance to find out.