Vince McMahon Was Apparently Not Happy With A Segment On "Talking Smack"
A WWE source is strongly denying Sports Illustrated's report that Talking Smack was canceled because Vince McMahon was not pleased with the show and it did not serve the company's best interests, according to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
The report explains if that were true, Vince would have canceled Talking Smack outright instead of continuing to air it after pay-per-views. Moving forward, the series will continue, but with the lower watched Tuesday episodes being canceled.
Vince McMahon doesn't hate Talking Smack, according to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, but he does not watch it either. He gets a weekly report about the series every Wednesday. One segment Vince was reportedly unhappy with was when The New Day appeared on the series right after Kofi Kingston got cleared on the May 23, 2017 episode. This ended up being their Tuesday night debut and Vince felt their first appearance on Tuesday should have been on SmackDown.
Talking Smack was the ninth most-watched show on the WWE Network last week, with the top ten most-watched shows as follows:
1. Great Balls of Fire
2. WWE 24 Kurt Angle
3. NXT on 7/12
4. Battleground 2016
5. WWE 24 Finn Balor
6. WrestleMania 33
7. Ride Along with Angle, Show, Sheamus and Cesaro
8. 205 Live from 7/11
9. Talking Smack from 7/11
10. NXT from 7/5
Last week was the final weekly airing of Talking Smack as it was reported a few days later the series would no longer follow SmackDown Live. WWE sent us the following statement about it:
We continuously review WWE Network's programming line-up based on a variety of factors, including viewership and subscriber research. Talking Smack and Raw Talk will air following pay-per-view events, and Tuesday will continue to feature 205 LIVE.
Source: Wrestling Observer Newsletter
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