Why Are WWE and AEW Creative Teams Both Struggling?

It isn't uncommon for pro wrestling as a whole to experience a lull period in the final few months of the year.

With American football back in prime time several nights of the week, the excitement of the summer over and sights set on the upcoming holidays, WWE and All Elite Wrestling primarily have a tendency to take their foot off the gas and coast creatively until the new year gets underway.

None of those are valid reasons for why the shows are struggling, however. Mediocre television shouldn't be accepted as the norm from either company, regardless of when it is.

That isn't to say WWE and AEW are devoid of interesting angles at the moment. Seth Rollins having to vacate the World Heavyweight Championship has given Raw a boost, while the AEW World Championship picture has started to pick up thanks to Samoa Joe betraying current champ "Hangman" Adam Page at WrestleDream.

Both women's divisions are also excelling, but otherwise, there isn't a whole lot else worth getting excited over in either promotion.

Full Gear and Survivor Series are shaping up to be solid events this November, but the average fan's frustration with the weekly shows should be enough to motivate the powers that be to raise their game and deliver better programming.

Only after addressing the problems that are plaguing each product can WWE and AEW take the necessary steps toward fixing them.

Before Seth Rollins went down with an injury earlier in October, both of the men's top titles in WWE were held by Superstars who have been established at the main event level for years.

Cody Rhodes is the face of the franchise and Rollins has been Raw's MVP in 2025, but their respective lengthy title reigns have forced everyone else to take a backseat and haven't made for the most must-see storylines.

Meanwhile, Adam Page is the perfect person to be leading the charge as AEW world champion, but he isn't new to the top of the card, either. Jon Moxley, who had a stranglehold on the prestigious prize prior to Hangman dethroning him in July, is a four-time champ in his own right and has been overexposed in the title scene.

A few fresh faces have challenged for WWE and AEW's world titles as of late between LA Knight and Kyle Fletcher, but more is needed to shake things up.

Both companies have deep rosters of talent to choose from but instead opt to overlook them and wait until it's too late to give them an opportunity to shine.

The future should be now, not down the road when today's headliners are out of the picture and past their prime. Not enough effort is being put into making new stars.

Seth Rollins vs. CM Punk appeared to be planned for Saturday Night's Main Event on November 1 prior to The Visionary's injury.

And even if The Best in the World winning the World Heavyweight Championship there was the intended endgame, there wouldn't have been anything out of the ordinary about it.

Rollins getting hurt at Crown Jewel and having to relinquish the title should have resulted in a drastic shift in the landscape of Raw, and for a split second, that looked to be the case when Bron Breakker, Bronson Reed and Paul Heyman betrayed The Visionary in shocking fashion.

Unfortunately, the follow-up fell flat. Breakker and Reed were left out of Monday's Battle Royal to determine Punk's opponent for the championship and Jey Uso, who last held the gold four months ago, went on to win it instead.

The storyline is still playing out, but WWE should have struck when the iron was hot with Breakker. It will be a monumental moment regardless of when he takes the title, but it would have sent quite the message for him to win it immediately after putting Rollins on the shelf.

This is an issue WWE has faced more often than not during Triple H's creative regime. Failing to capitalize on organic characters and angles has become its biggest weakness—and something AEW has been better at in 2025 despite its own faults.

Not being nearly as established as WWE, AEW has had to find what works for it by trying out new characters, concepts and championships.

Regardless of what succeeds and what fails, it's admirable that the promotion has been more willing to take creative risks when necessary.

The big business WWE has done in recent years has resulted in it resting more and more on its laurels and going back to the same few ideas, most notably the overreliance on The Bloodline.

SmackDown has The MFTs—a bootleg Bloodline—and Raw has the O.G. Bloodline back in Roman Reigns and The Usos.

For nearly a year, The Death Riders were what all of AEW revolved around, and fans weren't shy to let the company know it wasn't worthy of being the focal point of the promotion.

Darby Allin was likely going to be the one to unseat Jon Moxley as AEW world champion when he was ready to return to television, but the promotion instead went with Adam Page in that spot.

The payoff to Page vs. Moxley at All In was the single greatest moment AEW has produced all year.

The beauty of pivoting in pro wrestling is that it tells the audience it has the power to steer the ship back in the right direction if certain storylines or stars aren't clicking. That was what made the Road to WrestleMania 40 so unpredictable and exciting in early 2024.

Breaking up The Vision way ahead of schedule and crowning Ilja Dragunov the new United States champion on his first night back are encouraging signs that WWE is willing to make the appropriate changes to its product amid dwindling audience interest.

WWE may be doing record revenue all over the world with every show it runs, but the bubble is bound to burst eventually if it can't maintain its momentum.

The quality of these events fans are attending and paying top dollar for has a lot to do with that.

Once WWE can no longer justify the high ticket price, its white-hot business will begin to dip.

One way to prevent audience fatigue is by toning down the number of events every year. The quarterly Saturday Night's Main Event specials, for example, should feel significantly more important than they do, but because the company hasn't cut back on its monthly pay-per-views, everything essentially blends together and nothing stands out.

AEW's PPVs are usually better received by and large, but the excessive runtimes cause certain matches and developments to get lost in the shuffle.

There is such a thing as a happy medium between delivering too many matches on a show and delivering too few, ensuring the viewer is ultimately satisfied but not exhausted or overwhelmed.

There is no shortage of content in WWE and AEW these days, but honing in on the angles and matches that matter most will be what gets fans buzzing again. Otherwise, they're left with substandard shows that are fine in a vacuum, but forgotten about fairly quickly.

Triple H's infatuation with long-term storytelling has been apparent since his days as lead booker of NXT, so it's hardly surprising he's adopted the same approach as WWE head of creative.

That said, not every angle needs to take six months to a year to unfold. Bron Breakker doesn't need to wait until WrestleMania to win the World Heavyweight Championship, as him winning it at any point in the near future would have an equally enormous impact.

The notion that "good things come to those who wait" is an excuse to put people who are ready for the spotlight on the back-burner because it isn't convenient for the company and them organically getting over with the audience wasn't in its immediate plans.

Meanwhile, there is no sense that AEW knows where it's going and is instead booking on the fly. That has its advantages and can make the shows less formulaic, but short-term gains can only be so effective.

Six months out from WrestleMania 42, no matches are currently clear in WWE. In AEW, Adam Page has no credible challengers waiting in the wings because no one has been built up during his reign as world champion.

Repetitive rivalries such as AJ Styles vs. The Judgment Day, Seth Rollins vs. CM Punk, The Hurt Syndicate vs. The Demand, and Darby Allin vs. The Death Riders have also added to the feeling of stagnation in both companies.

If viewers aren't given something substantial to invest in, they have no incentive to tune in weekly.

At the end of the day, pro wrestling is as much about the stories as it is the in-ring action.

WWE has always prided itself on storytelling and prioritizing that over the actual wrestling, to the point where AEW has stepped up as a welcome alternative that focuses far more on being where "the best wrestle."

Unfortunately, neither company is telling compelling stories at the moment, or at least not enough of them.

Injuries are obviously a factor, but the promotions aren't making the most of who they have available. Rather, they're going through the motions with basic booking designed to kill time and not progress anything in a meaningful manner.

The matches are consistently excellent, and AEW in particular has put on countless shows where the wrestling has been second to none. At the same time, there needs to be overarching angles that give the matches purpose and develop characters.

Some storylines on Raw, SmackDown and Dynamite have promise but aren't progressing at a rate that is keeping viewers intrigued.

An abundance of engaging stories can go a long way in generating conversation, sparking interest and changing the perception of any promotion's product almost overnight.

The Vision's betrayal of Seth Rollins was simply a small taste of how WWE and AEW can benefit from disrupting the status quo when it makes sense to do so.

During a period in wrestling when, traditionally, nothing notable happens, now more than ever should these companies be experimenting with innovative ideas in an attempt to heat back up again.

Graham Mirmina, aka Graham "GSM" Matthews, has specialized in sports and entertainment writing since 2010. Visit his website, WrestleRant, and subscribe to his YouTube channel for more wrestling-related content.