Image from Batista – WWE Universe Facebook
This week’s WWE Raw did a 3.46 rating and averaged around five million viewers. We can all thank the return of Batista for that.
Even though I thought his return was kind of underwhelming, this didn’t stop people from tuning in to see him. This week’s numbers for Raw are the highest the show has seen since March 2013. It’s an impressive showing since we are still in January and WrestleMania XXX isn’t until April.
The WWE had initially wanted Batista’s return to be a surprise as he was to appear at the Royal Rumble. As a viewer, I would say keeping him as a surprise would have been better as I did not feel that Batista’s return was all that exciting. Still, I’m sure the WWE was happy about the ratings as the decision to advertise his return turned out to be a good thing after all.
The question that still remains is whether fans will continue to keep watching the product. The first two hours of Raw were level at around five million viewers thanks to the appearances of Batista and Brock Lesnar. The third was when viewers tuned out because there was the advertised main event of Randy Orton and Kofi Kingston.
The return of Batista is a good sign for the WWE and its road to WrestleMania XXX. I do feel sad however that fans are only tuning in to see the past stars like him and/or Lesnar. Sure, they bring in huge ratings, but they cannot wrestle forever. The WWE seriously needs to build new and popular stars very soon because guys like Batista, Lesnar and the Rock are getting older as each day passes by …
