The news of Smackdown going LIVE and the 2016 WWE brand extension shocked the wrestling world when it was announced several weeks ago. Some fans are very excited about the possibilities for new storylines and pushing more talent. Some fans don’t think the roster is deep enough to execute it well-enough. All we know is that it has gotten people talking and excited about the WWE product. Stephanie McMahon was recently a guest on the Wrestling Compadres Slamcast where she spoke about the upcoming brand split. Here were the highlights of the interview.
Stephanie on why the brand extension was decided on by Vince and the WWE:
“One of the reasons behind it is because with the proliferation of talent that we have now, especially with all of the up-and-coming stars on NXT, there’s an opportunity there to really grow our business and differentiate between RAW and SmackDown, which also gives us the opportunity from a business perspective to expand different lines of business and from a storyline perspective to really slow down our stories a little bit more and really focus and concentrate. When you’re going from RAW to SmackDown every week with your storylines, they burn out a little bit faster than they do when it’s weekly” (Source: Wrestling Compadres Slamcast, H/T Wrestling Inc).
Stephanie also says the idea for the brand extension has been in the works for quite some time now:
“It’s something that Vince [McMahon] had planned on for quite some time, but we hadn’t fully developed it until it got closer to SmackDown going live. It [has] been in the works for a little while now. But the Shane [McMahon] storyline certainly gives us a great storyline platform to promote it” (Source: Wrestling Compadres Slamcast, H/T Wrestling Inc).
You can listen to the full interview here.
[irp posts=”13858″ name=”WWE Draft Rules Revealed”]
Personally looking forward to it!!!! Exciting time to be a wrestling fan!
I dont understand the slowing of the storylines. We’re still having PPV’s every month. Storylines still dont slow down. Sometimes its gonna be 4 weeks and sometimes its gonna be 3 weeks inbetween PPV’s.
I think there going to announce each brand has its own PPV’s like 4 a piece and then they have joint shows at the big 4 and then maybe some other individual network specials with special names like Saturday night main event or clash of the champions back in the day so the big PPV caliber specials may end up being every 6 to 8 weeks per brand
When’s the last time they actually advanced major storylines on Smackdown? Most of the major main eventers haven’t been showing up there since the brand split ended. Midcard feuds usually just have stuff from Raw repeated with the opposite winner(sometimes).