WWE Is Finally Treating 205 Live Like Must-See TV

Tuesday night, fans of both SmackDown Live and 205 Live were shocked to see WWE Champion Daniel Bryan take on none other than the Heart and Soul of 205 Live, Mustafa Ali, in the SmackDown opener. This match-up continues WWE’s latest mission statement to try and bring the purple brand back to prominence.

The summer of 2016 was highlighted by a plethora of major events. The Summer Olympics in Rio, Drake’s Summer Sixteen Tour, and most relevant to this article, the WWE Network exclusive Cruiserweight Classic Tournament.

via WWE.com

On a weekly basis, this tournament gave us a Match of the Year candidate from some of the world’s best competitors that weighed 205lbs or under. Competitors that included standouts like Kota Ibushi, Zack Sabre Jr., and TJ Perkins, the latter of whom went on to win the tournament and become the first man to win WWE’s rebooted Cruiserweight Championship.

Needless to say, the tournament was critically acclaimed enough to warrant its own weekly spinoff series. On November 29th that same year, just weeks after TJP lost his title to The Brian Kendrick, 205 Live would debut on the WWE Network. The inaugural episode would see Kendrick lose the title to Rich Swann.

While the show had a strong opener, it quickly started to falter in the ratings department. Within a few months, 205 Live struggled to crack WWE’s top ten most watched weekly shows on the Network. WWE tried to breath new life into the show by centering it around one Enzo Amore. Not only did making Amore Cruiserweight Champion fail to boost ratings, but it wound up doing a lot more harm than good.

Due to 205 Live not being as well received as WWE originally hoped, it seemed as though they stopped putting work into promoting the show. A Cruiserweight division that was at one time acknowledged as being apart of the Raw roster was suddenly absent from Raw shows.

By Fall 2017, things weren’t looking good for the purple brand. A year after the show made its WWE Network debut, a survey was sent to a select few people asking why they weren’t watching 205 Live. Ratings were bad, the show was being ignored by the viewing public, and ignored by WWE. A brand with so much promise had suddenly become irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. It looked like the beginning of the end for 205 Live.

via wwe.com

In a weird way, there was a silver lining that came from the failure of the Enzo Amore Experiment. Once Amore was released and his title vacated, WWE decided to take the show into a new direction. Rather than continue to focus on wacky storylines or eccentric characters – like the ill-fated Zo Train – WWE decided to focus on the one thing that put the Cruiseweights on the map during the CWC: pro wrestling.

Ever since the dawning of a new Tournament to crown a new Cruiserweight Champion last January, weekly episodes of 205 Live became dedicated solely to allowing the athletes to put on tremendous matches. WWE introduced new wrestlers and characters to the show – including Mark Andrews, Buddy Murphy, Roderick Strong (albeit briefly), Mike and Maria Kanellis – and 205 General Manager Drake Maverick – to emphasize 205’s new direction and enhance in-ring talent.

Nearly a whole year later, 205 Live has found a whole new audience, and numbers grew. Even better, following a move to Wednesday nights right before NXT, ratings for 205 started to improve. Yet, WWE still continued to ignore the purple brand on its bigger stages. Apart from a couple pre-show matches, 205 Live was virtually never represented on PPV shows, and even less on the main roster.

In the span of just a few months, many started to recognize 205 Live as WWE’s best show when it comes to strictly great professional wrestling. Apparently, that wasn’t good enough. Unfortunately, it seemed like WWE still did not consider 205 Live big enough to acknowledge on its big leagues. That is, until these last couple months.

Credit: WWE.com

Last October, for the first time since TLC 2017 over a year before, the Cruiserweight division was represented on the main card of a WWE PPV. The setting was WWE Super Show Down, where Buddy Murphy received more than a home country’s welcome when he won the Cruiserweight Championship from Cedric Alexander in the heart of Australia.

Most of us perceived this opportunity as merely a special occasion for the Cruiserweights just because WWE thought a home country title win would make for a great moment on their event. We were surprised to see the Cruiserweight division receive more opportunities as time progressed. Just a month later, the Cruiserweights reached the main PPV card again.

This time at Survivor Series – one of WWE’s big four PPVs – where Buddy Murphy retained his title in a match against Mustafa Ali.

via WWE.com

Both matches were considered standout show stealing matches on stacked cards that included legends like The Undertaker, Triple H, and John Cena. Miracuously enough, on cards that included such spectacular special attractions, it was the Cruiserweight division that stood out above all else.

WWE must have taken notice to the consistent raucous crowd reaction to the matches as well as how well received they were by critics. They notice that there’s something special about this division, and want to capitalize on it.

The latest step in their latest effort to put a spotlight on 205 Live was to put one of its premiere stars – Mustafa Ali – on primetime television against the WWE Champion. Hopefully, this trend continues. Hopefully, we continue to see some of the best stars of 205 Live – such as Cruiserweight Champion Buddy Murphy, or former champion Cedric Alexander – receive the same spotlight on SmackDown, or maybe even Raw.

via WWE.com

Now, WWE is finally starting to once again acknowledge 205 Live as official WWE canon. It’s no longer just a show that has consistent great matches, but is never highlighted as essential viewing. Now, it actually matters and can be placed proudly beside WWE’s top brands.

For the better part of 2018, 205 Live has felt like must see television. Now, WWE is finally giving us a reason why we need to tune in every week. Because you never know when the next time one of the show’s stars will make a run-in on Raw or SmackDown.