WWE Reportedly Considering Ending The Brand Split

WWE has already made a slew of significant changes to its programming in recent months, but another major one could be on the way.

On the heels of Paul Heyman being ousted as Raw Executive Director, being replaced by Bruce Prichard and WWE consolidating the previously separate Raw and SmackDown creative teams into one entity, WWE is now considering doing the same with its main roster. According to the Wrestling Observer’s Dave Meltzer (h/t Cageside Seats), WWE could combine the rosters for the red and blue brands in the near future: “Meltzer said on Wrestling Observer Radio that combining the Raw and SmackDown rosters into ‘one troupe’ is something that’s ‘been talked about’.” Meltzer also stated in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter (h/t WhatCulture) that the “brand split could be abandoned because of frequent low ratings.”

One of the many changes WWE has made over the past several weeks has been the “brand-to-brand invitation,” which is very similar to the “Wild Card Rule” that WWE enacted in 2019 as a direct response to the company’s plummeting TV viewership. At least thus far, WWE hasn’t relied too heavily on 2020’s version of the Wild Card, using it sparingly to allow some midcard talents, like Baron Corbin, to crossover from one brand to another.

That, however, is a slippery slope, and WWE could be ready to take a ride.

After Vince McMahon blamed Raw’s decreasing ratings on the lack of star power and its focus on newer stars earlier this year, the writing was on the wall. McMahon’s first major move was the brand-to-brand invitation, his second was the removal of Heyman, and his third was appointing Prichard—who loves focusing on established stars—as the new head of WWE’s entire creative team. Each and every single one of those moves inched WWE closer and closer to a full-fledged end of the brand split, which has been in place since 2016 when the decision was made for Raw and SmackDown to operate as completely separate brands.

While there have unsurprisingly been some times when WWE has utilized Raw stars on SmackDown and vice versa, the rosters have remained largely separate for the past five years, except in route to Survivor Series and during times in which viewership dipped to worryingly low levels. That is exactly what’s happening right now as both Raw and SmackDown viewership have consistently flirted with historically low viewership in recent months. There are countless factors contributing to WWE’s ratings downfall, ranging from its audience-less shows to poor storytelling to a lack of star power. Despite WWE’s myriad of problems, the absence of stars like Becky Lynch, Roman Reigns, Brock Lesnar and others is undoubtedly contributing to its dissipating audience.

However, the true long-term solution to that is creating new stars in their absence, which is what Heyman was trying to do before he got the boot. Heyman was booking Raw with the idea that it would take 18 months to establish new top talents, but he was ousted before he hit the one-year mark during a time when WWE’s audience-less shows make it virtually impossible for the company to determine which stars really were, or were not, getting over. That means that WWE could very well be tempted to revert to Plan B, which is ending—or at least blurring the lines of—the brand split in an ill-advised move that is nothing more than a temporary Band-Aid that will lead to more long-term problems.

A consolidated roster may look good on paper, but it leads to a lack of TV time for anyone who isn’t a top star, too much TV time for those who don’t need it and burnout from fans who quickly grow tired of seeing both Raw and SmackDown dominated by the same stars week in and week out. At a time when WWE’s audience is already almost microscopic in comparison to what it’s been in the past, the last thing the company should do is make another move that doesn’t take its fans, its stars or its long-term future into consideration.

Because as great as it sounds for WWE to have every single star at its disposal for both Raw and SmackDown, history suggests that’s actually a disaster waiting to happen.

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