WWE: Shortening WWE Pay-Per-View Time Slots Could Be a Good Thing

What I am about to suggest will be controversial and likely unpopular. But I am going to say it anyway.

WWE needs to look at its pay-per-view schedule and, where necessary, shorten the allotted time period of the pay-per-view based on the overall popularity of the event. Set a maximum of two hours for the less popular, and go from there.

Three hours is a long time to keep anyone’s attention. Just ask the Raw producers.

After that show went to three hours with its 1,000th episode last summer, it seems like the quality of the programming has diminished. It is almost like WWE is forcing the extra hour.

In the past, USA Network has been more than generous with its time for Raw, even allowing the program to run 10, 15, even 20 minutes past its slotted 11 p.m. ET end. But when you have a cash cow in your barn like USA has with Raw, you don’t mind if it moos a little longer and louder than the other cows.

Raw now runs about the same amount of time as a WWE pay-per-view. And if WWE is having trouble filling the Raw time, it must be fairly frantic about filling PPV time.

The WWE Universe has never been one to be silent if they do not like something or someone. If they don’t like a match on Raw or SmackDown, they will start chanting, “Boring!” Or worse yet, they will sit on their hands during a match.

Chants of “Boring!” and periods of relative silence have greeted many PPV matches recently. Even popular midcarders like Santino Marella, for all their talent, cannot avoid those down times.

I’m not saying shorten all of the events. WWE knows which PPVs are hot and which ones are lukewarm.

WrestleMania is four hours long, and that is fine because WrestleMania is to WWE what the Super Bowl is to the NFL. But what about some of the other PPVs like Extreme Rules, No Way Out and TLC? Do you consider them in the same vein as SummerSlam, Survivor Series and the Royal Rumble?

As I mentioned in a previous blog, I am not sensing a whole lot of energy around this weekend’s Hell in a Cell. With the exception of a few matches, the rest of the card is basically filler.

So why not shorten future HIAC events to two hours? The same goes for Extreme Rules, No Way Out and TLC. Put a fewer number of matches on them, but increase the value of the matches.

For my $50 purchase, I would rather see four or five good matches of 20-30 minutes each than three good matches, two or three squash jobs and the obligatory five-minute Diva match. Shortening the time periods also could eliminate the need to put non-match talent in hit-or-miss sketches just to get them some face time.

SummerSlam, Survivor Series and the Royal Rumble could be left at three hours because of their sheer popularity among the WWE Universe. Couple them with WrestleMania, and you can see WWE has quite a grand slam on their hands.

Now, no one is that naïve to think WWE ever would consider such a proposition. After all, a shorter PPV would have to carry a smaller purchase price. We all know that ain’t gonna happen. That’s too crazy an idea.

But so was WrestleMania at one time, too.

I’m just sayin’.

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