AEW continues to battle uncertainty as the company wraps up another year in its young history. Dynamite recently suffered an unfortunate setback, which was predicted by a certain WWE Hall of Famer. Now, another harsh warning has been made after doing some math with the All Elite Wrestling numbers.
AEW continued its 2300 Arena residency this past Wednesday with the 309th episode of Dynamite. Just over 900 fans packed the former ECW Arena in Philadelphia to watch Mercedes Moné retain the TBS Championship over Alex Windsor in the 15-minute opener, right after an in-ring angle between Gabe Kidd and Darby Allin.
Dynamite also saw Mark Briscoe defeat Lance Archer, while Brody King and Bandido retained the World Tag Team Championship over the Death Riders’ Wheeler Yuta and Claudio Castagnoli. After additional appearances by Ricochet, Hook, Women’s World Champion Toni Storm, and Unified Champion Kazuchika Okada, among others, there was another brawl to build to FTR vs. Edge and Christian.
The Young Bucks teamed with The Don Callis Family’s Josh Alexander and TNT Champion Kyle Fletcher for a 22-minute main event victory over Kenny Omega, Mike Bailey, Kevin Knight, and World Champion ‘Hangman’ Adam Page. Despite the apparent star power, Tony Khan was unable to draw a significant increase in Dynamite’s key demographic ratings and total audience. The episode averaged 472,000 viewers on TBS. The 19.3% drop from last week marks the lowest total audience for Dynamite since October 8, 2024, which is when the Title Tuesday special went up against WWE NXT.
Dynamite #309 drew the lowest viewership in the history of AEW’s flagship show on Wednesday nights. The episode also drew a 0.11 rating in the 18-49 key demographic, which is down 15.4% from last week. This also marks the lowest Dynamite key demo rating since October 8 of last year, and the second-lowest key demo rating in the history of the show. Dynamite ranked 7th for the night on cable in the key demo.
The total audience was down 28.5% from the same week a year ago, while the 18-49 key demographic rating is down 42.1% from the same week in 2024. As for the 10-week average, this week’s total audience was down 23.8%, while the key demo rating was down 31.3%.
Eric Bischoff has called AEW and Tony Khan out on several issues in recent years, despite working for the company early on. The industry veteran previously predicted the decline we’ve seen in recent months. On the latest episode of his 83 Weeks podcast, Bischoff and co-host Conrad Thompson celebrated the 30th anniversary of WCW Monday Nitro, and Thompson gave a nod to the 70-year-old for his 500,000 viewership prediction for AEW Dynamite, and mentioned how he saw Bischoff taking a victory lap on social media.
After being asked if he had anything to say, the former WCW authority figure wished Tony Khan and his company well, but proceeded to issue a harsh rebuke of the All Elite Wrestling fanbase, and Dave Meltzer of The Wrestling Observer:
Look, I wish AEW and Tony [Khan] well, I got no issues. I could care less. They’re — I can’t even describe to you how irrelevant anything that has to do with AEW really is to me, but I do like screwing with their ridiculous, ridiculously stupid, willfully ignorant fanbase, who just absolutely collapse and overreact to anything that is said about AEW. They’re the lowest of the low, they’re the low-hanging fruit that’s so low hanging to the ground, the fruit is starting to rot on the vine. That’s the typical online AEW fanbase, and collectively the dumbest group of people I think I’ve ever been exposed to, right?
So, it’s fun to tweak them because they’re so easily tweaked, and at the head of that group of rotten low-hanging fruit is Dave Meltzer, who is proven himself, on a daily basis, to be the single most out of touch person to talk about, write about, or watch professional wrestling. I have never met anybody so out of touch with the mainstream as Dave Meltzer, but now it’s becoming evident to everybody.”
Eric Bischoff Touts AEW Dynamite Prediction
Eric Bischoff often makes headlines for his scathing takes on Tony Khan and AEW’s product. In continuing his observation on the future of Dynamite viewership during the latest episode of 83 Weeks, the WWE Hall of Famer explained how he got to the 500,000 viewership prediction less than a year ago:
About a year, or eight months ago, I was sitting down and there was this debate about ratings and network deals, and what AEW could be doing in the future, and I just sat down with a glass of wine and I just looked at the previous two years of ratings for AEW, and it’s simple math. If I can do it, it’s pretty simple math. I had a little $8 calculator and a glass of cheap red wine, and I went…
I punched in a couple of numbers, and went, ‘Wow, they were losing an average of about 22%-23% of their audience every year. Here’s where they’re–And, Dave[Meltzer]–For a guy who studies so fu**ing much, you should just figure this part out, it’s a simple math equation. I took their existing audience, averaged it out over whatever it was, 3-4 months, and said, ‘OK, that’s my baseline of what AEW is currently doing,'” Eric Bischoff said.
Easy E continued and reiterated a harsh warning for AEW: Dynamite was headed to the area of 300,000 viewers per episode.
I went back and looked and [saw they had been] losing about an average of 22%-23% or whatever it was at the time. So, I just did the simple math, Dave. You don’t have to study, you just have to actually do s**t, and I did the math and I went, ‘Oh, well… this is where they are now.’ This is where they’ll be a year from now, this is where they’ll be three years from now, unless they reverse the 20% average attrition per year.’
And I came up, and I said by the end of their existing contract, they’re going to be hovering around 300,000 viewers. I projected in November… on November 14, 2024, I said a year from now they’re going to be, they meaning AEW, will be hovering around 500,000 viewers, and I was absolutely right, once again,” Eric Bischoff declared.
AEW will wrap its 2300 Arena residency with Wednesday’s Dynamite and Thursday’s Collision tapings. The September To Remember block of AEW programming will take place on September 17 from Canada Life Place in London, Ontario, serving as the go-home push to All Out on September 20 in Toronto.