>>11860479Wrestlers have been working on performance bonuses for decades. In fact every wrestling contract on Earth was massively based around performance bonuses before 1997 and most all the way until 2015.
People are suggesting the difference now is that they aren't getting paid on the house but on Meltzer ratings.
I'm going to admit, I'm not unbiased here. I despise Dave Meltzer and blame him for the downfall of wrestling as a major attraction, and think Tony Khan is a pointless nepobaby who doesn't know what he's doing.
With that said, we're in a new era in terms of the wrestling business now. Live event money is dwarved in revenue terms by broadcasting rights deals. In addition, the model of wrestling where your top star is an attraction who draws rather than the brand itself drawing died with overexposure of talent on thrice weekly television.
Promoters have been giving bonuses for having the best match of the night (in their opinion) since at least UWF and Mid South. So there's precedent.
Moreover than this - what is Tony Khan's intended audience? Its not people like me who think Meltzer is a jumped up blogger and his opinipns are retarded; Khan's audience are Meltzers subscribers and people like them. He expects his audience to know who some Mexican lucha never seen in the US is.
So if you think about it from a business standpoint, Khan is bonusing people who get a high rating according to a trusted mind in their target audience. That's not as retarded as it first sounded when I read the headline before I thought about it. He's asking his employees to appeal to his target demographic.
