Top 10 wrestling moments of 2019

#4 The Wednesday Night Wars

The Wednesday Night Wars

When AEW started up, one of the trademarks the company filed for was Tuesday Night Dynamite.

This implied that when AEW secured a weekly television slot, they would be looking to fill the void left by SmackDown, which was soon heading to Friday nights.

When it was announced in July that AEW Dynamite would be airing on TNT on Wednesdays, it was clear that The Elite were targeting the wrestling-heavy fanbase of NXT.

A few short weeks later, WWE would announce that NXT was making the move to USA Network, as well as expanding from one hour to two.

Whether you see the move as a counterprogramming tactic or not is entirely your opinion, but it was a move that had been speculated for well over a year and meant that we had a serious ratings battle on our hands, one dubbed by fans as The Wednesday Night Wars.

The debut of Dynamite surpassed all expectations, gaining an incredible 1.4m viewers, smashing the NXT total of 891k. AEW would go on to win seven weeks in a row before NXT registered two straight wins in the ratings war.

In the digital age that we live in, it can be questioned just how much ratings really matter. However, I think what we can all agree that the competition is keeping the creative forces on both shows on their toes, and we've seen some fantasy wrestling TV over the last two months as a result.

Long may it continue!