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| A draw or no? Not sure that can be answered Photo Credit: Scott Finkelstein |
One of the comments to my Cageside Seats piece about Pro Wrestling Guerrilla said that Sami Callihan was a more valid name to fly out to Reseda than Jessicka Havok was (despite the equality in travel costs and savings on actually booking a woman versus booking a man) was that Callihan was more of a "draw." If true, that would be the ultimate rebuttal, and I'm not sure that I'm in a position to clearly state that either one would have more of a financial impact on an equal promotion.
That being said, it raises an interesting question. How does one actually go about determining what a draw actually is in the indies? Let's look at Callihan, at least through the eye-test in PWG. Watch a show from before Callihan showed up there. The crowd was SUPER NO VACANCY, right? It appeared that way. Look at a show after he showed up there. No real change in crowd, right? So, how could it be assumed that Callihan was or was not worth the flight in? DVD sales are one metric, and again, I don't have those numbers in front of me. However, it would take a lot more than raw DVD sales to convince any one member of the PWG roster is a draw over the others.
If we're talking on a macroscopic level, I'd be willing to assume that there are no individual draws left in independent wrestling, but promotions themselves are the magnetized names here. Chikara, PWG, Dragon Gate USA, Combat Zone Wrestling, even to a much more diminishing effect Ring of Honor are the names people see. On a more local level? Sure, a promotion that hasn't made it yet nationally could use a bump from someone who is nationally known. In that case, sure, Sami Callihan right now, could walk into a gym in Indiana with weeks or months of promotion and provide a double-digit percent increase in ticket sales.
But PWG is not a podunk promotion. It's not even a super-local promotion like Absolute Intense Wrestling (a local entity with some national exposure). It has the name cache and establishment of a company that actually tours outside of a small area. People come to it because they can pay them because they make so much money from their product. In that, they have the money to be able to experiment and bring in wrestlers who may not be established names but might fit their style.
And honestly, calling Jessicka Havok a non-established name is dishonest at the least. We could kvetch whether she's bigger than Callihan or not (and judging on buzz I hear from the numerous "in-the-know" fans I interact with, if Callihan is a bigger star, Havok is not all that far behind), but bringing her out wouldn't be akin to flying in someone really unknown like Gregory James, Fred Yehi, or Juan Francisco de Coronado.
I think any argument over whom PWG books or doesn't book can really leave drawing power out of the equation, because the name on the marquee is what sells the show. That name brings in a reasonable expectation of quality with a core group of wrestlers going up against a rotating list of wrestlers who make appearances. As long as that framework is in place, it doesn't matter if they fly in Callihan or Havok or both or neither.
That being said, it raises an interesting question. How does one actually go about determining what a draw actually is in the indies? Let's look at Callihan, at least through the eye-test in PWG. Watch a show from before Callihan showed up there. The crowd was SUPER NO VACANCY, right? It appeared that way. Look at a show after he showed up there. No real change in crowd, right? So, how could it be assumed that Callihan was or was not worth the flight in? DVD sales are one metric, and again, I don't have those numbers in front of me. However, it would take a lot more than raw DVD sales to convince any one member of the PWG roster is a draw over the others.
If we're talking on a macroscopic level, I'd be willing to assume that there are no individual draws left in independent wrestling, but promotions themselves are the magnetized names here. Chikara, PWG, Dragon Gate USA, Combat Zone Wrestling, even to a much more diminishing effect Ring of Honor are the names people see. On a more local level? Sure, a promotion that hasn't made it yet nationally could use a bump from someone who is nationally known. In that case, sure, Sami Callihan right now, could walk into a gym in Indiana with weeks or months of promotion and provide a double-digit percent increase in ticket sales.
But PWG is not a podunk promotion. It's not even a super-local promotion like Absolute Intense Wrestling (a local entity with some national exposure). It has the name cache and establishment of a company that actually tours outside of a small area. People come to it because they can pay them because they make so much money from their product. In that, they have the money to be able to experiment and bring in wrestlers who may not be established names but might fit their style.
And honestly, calling Jessicka Havok a non-established name is dishonest at the least. We could kvetch whether she's bigger than Callihan or not (and judging on buzz I hear from the numerous "in-the-know" fans I interact with, if Callihan is a bigger star, Havok is not all that far behind), but bringing her out wouldn't be akin to flying in someone really unknown like Gregory James, Fred Yehi, or Juan Francisco de Coronado.
I think any argument over whom PWG books or doesn't book can really leave drawing power out of the equation, because the name on the marquee is what sells the show. That name brings in a reasonable expectation of quality with a core group of wrestlers going up against a rotating list of wrestlers who make appearances. As long as that framework is in place, it doesn't matter if they fly in Callihan or Havok or both or neither.
