I gotta say, this should make every wrestling fan think “big picture.” WWE may not always do so re: booking, but it’s hard to argue about their business sense. Since the brand extension, WWE’s been on the right track (and in fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if UPN doesn’t renew the contract, if SD ends up online-only late next year)…

From 1Wrestling:

JOEY STYLES’ OPINION ON THE VINCE MCMAHON, JIM ROSS PROCTOLOGY SKIT ON RAW LAST NIGHT
By: Joey Styles
10/25/2005 12:43:34 PM

Based on the feedback so far, I am going to anger about half of internet wrestling fans with this commentary but I guess half is better than all.

Because WWE waited until they knew Jim Ross DID NOT have cancer and had a successful surgery before shooting that skit, I have no problem with it at all. I can understand if it was not your type of humor but I enjoy The Three Stooges, Blue Collar TV, Leslie Nielsen movies, Ben Stiller movies, etc.

In fact the only criticism I can make is that it was probably twice as long as it should have been for maximum laughs.

Hearing JR’s voice while the sundry collection of objects was being extracted from what was obviously a plastic ass was side splitting…and more importantly for business, it made Jim Ross an even more sympathic character. Jim Ross is now the biggest babyface in WWE right now and WWE will capitalize on that when he recovers from surgery.

Think about this, assuming internet reports are true (and they are only correct 50% of the time from what I have seen), WWE wants to bring Jim Ross back when Austin wins at Taboo Tuesday to call RAW live on WWE.com.

Right now, approximately 3.2 million homes watch RAW on TV and 350,000 homes watch RAW on WWE.com.

With JR anchoring the online show as the biggest babyface in the company, the weekly online audience can grow to up to 1 million homes weekly which would make mainstream media news headlines.

Furthermore, WWE does not sell or retain revenues from any commercials that air on TV…but they sell and retain all revenues for commercials on WWE.com. A Jim Ross hosted RAW could easily be worth millions annually in ad revenue to WWE. They can even put JR’s announce table on the other side of the RAW entrance so he is seen on TV and TV fans are directed to WWE.com where WWE keeps the ad revenue!

I’ll even take this one step further. As the entire world moves to broadband over the next five years and streaming online video is full screen and TV quality, what if WWE did not need to air their programming anywhere but WWE.com. What if pay-per-views were only available online where WWE keeps 100% of the revenues vs. TV pay-per-view which allows WWE, TNA, UFC, etc to keep only 40% of the revenues.

The only people in the wrestling business who cannot grasp what the internet means are snail-mail newsletter writers who did not see that websites like 1wrestling.com would gut their readerships like fish.

Speaking of fish, didn’t Vince (Dr. Heiney) pull a fish out of JR’s ass last night? Nurse Slobberknockers…LOL!

Please everybody, lighten up. Pro wrestling became sports entertainment years ago and it is never going back which is why WWE launched WWE 24/7 TV and online to cater to old school wrestling fans.