FanPost

How 50-50 is 50-50 booking?

There's a general feeling that WWE employs 50-50 booking. This is where superstars will win as many matches as they lose. This has a negative impact on the talent, making it almost impossible for any member of the roster to look like a star in the presentation. With 50-50 booking, everyone is as good as everyone else which makes no one stand out.

So I decided to see if the WWE are really employing this booking style. I've compiled the results of matches from the last 6 weeks of programming (from TLC to the last Smackdown) to see how each member of the roster has been doing when it comes to winning and losing.

A couple of notes on this before we start:

- This covers wins, losses and draws/no contests, as well as a win percentage. It doesn't differentiate the type of match finish i.e. count out/DQ/pin/submission.

- Only Raw, Smackdown and PPV matches are included - so no Main Event or Superstars or NXT

- The Royal Rumble match has been omitted due to the fact it really screws up the figures.

- I've also stated whether each superstar is a face or heel. I'm considering the ones that turned during the 6 weeks to be Tweeners.

- The chart is ranked alphabetically so it's relatively easy to find everyone.

- Some figures are for stables - these include all the individual matches anyone has had in that stable as well as when the stable has teamed together.

So get your Steiner memes at the ready! There's gonna be some mathematics involved.

Best win percentages (70-100%)

Name Alignment Matches Wins Losses Draws/No Contest Win %
Titus O’Neil Face 6 6 0 0 100
AJ Styles Face 3 3 0 0 100
Sasha Banks Heel 3 3 0 0 100
Mark Henry Face 2 2 0 0 100
Roman Reigns Face 12 10 1 1 83.3333333
Charlotte Heel 10 7 2 1 70

These 6 individuals have won more of their matches than anyone else on the roster over this time period. You might find a few surprisingly names there. Despite lots of talk about having to make Roman Reigns "look strong" he only comes fifth on this list. Perhaps more people should be talking about how WWE are making Titus O'Neil look strong as he has the largest undefeated streak (6-0). Granted the majority of his wins came against Stardust and Tyler Breeze. The Boss is also bossing it with a 3-0 record. Any worries about Sasha Banks being buried aren't reflected in the figures. Babyfaces seem to do better at being undefeated with 4 faces to 2 heels being included on the list. This supports the perception that WWE is a babyface territory.

Lowest Win Percentage (0-20%)

Name Alignment Matches Wins Losses Draws/No Contest Win %
Brie Bella Tweener 10 2 7 1 20
Social Outcasts Tweener 10 2 7 1 20
Alicia Fox Tweener 5 1 4 0 20
Jack Swagger Face 5 1 4 0 20
Team BAD Heel 2 0 2 0 0
The Ascension Heel 3 0 3 0 0
The Miz Heel 3 0 3 0 0
Stardust Heel 4 0 4 0 0

Here's the bottom 8 in terms of wins. The true jobbers with no wins are all heels, once again backing up the feeling that this is a babyface territory. Stardust is the worse for wear, losing all 4 of his matches (most of them to Titus O'Neil). Despite being the new J.O.B. Squad, the Social Outcasts still managed to pick up 2 wins. When the jobbers are winning that's when you really feel like 50-50 booking is going on.

The 50-50s (40-60%)

Name Alignment Matches Wins Losses Draws/No Contest Win %
Dean Ambrose Face 15 9 3 3 60
Dolph Ziggler Face 10 6 4 0 60
Becky Lynch Face 12 7 5 0 58.33333
Alberto Del Rio Heel 14 8 6 0 57.14286
Neville Face 9 5 3 1 55.55556
Rusev Heel 12 6 6 0 50
Chris Jericho Face 2 1 1 0 50
Paige Tweener 2 1 1 0 50
The New Day Heel 16 7 9 0 43.75
The Usos Face 12 5 7 0 41.66667

Now to look at those who are actually recipients of 50-50 booking, only winning around 50% of the time. This is the longest of our lists with 10 names on it. Surprising to see established midcard jobber Dolph Ziggler all the way up there, winning 60% of the time all the time. Despite potentially being in the main event of Wrestlemania, Ambrose is precariously close to the 50% mark though he is being more protected as more of his matches end with no contest. Rusev has the definition of 50-50 booking with 6 wins and 6 losses. Although Rusev was actually on a 6 match winning streak before losing the last 6 matches. The talent on this list has a lot of names that have been tipped for stardom at some point (Ambrose, Ziggler, Del Rio, Rusev) but they never quite made it there. At least not yet anyway.

The best of the rest

Name Alignment Matches Wins Losses Draws/No Contest Win %
Wyatt Family Heel 13 9 4 0 69.23077
Kalisto Face 15 10 5 0 66.66667
Sheamus Heel 10 3 5 2 30
Tyler Breeze Heel 4 1 3 0 25
Kevin Owens Heel 13 3 7 3 23.07692
Ryback Face 9 2 6 1 22.22222

There were a few notable omissions on those lists so I thought I'd include them here. The Wyatts have been booked relatively strong, setting them up for Bray's match with Brock at Wrestlemania. Shockingly Tyler Breeze has a better win percentage than Kevin Owens who is winning less than a quarter of his matches. Meanwhile, former champion Sheamus has plummeted since losing the title, losing half of his matches.

Conclusions

I think this data shows that there are certainly areas where WWE can be accused of employing too much 50-50 booking. However, there's definitely a sense that certain talents are being pushed and protected whilst others are acting as enhancement talents. Overall, I think what matters more than the statistics is the qualitative data. How does their audience change their perception of a character based on a win or a loss? The Wyatt Family are a perfect example of this. Despite a decent win percentage, you still feel like they are glorified jobbers due to the way they lost their feud with the Undertaker and Kane. The other question is do these wins and losses really matter? Road Dogg would tell you they don't and in some cases and wonder if he's got an argument for that. For instance, Titus O'Neil's winning streak could be said to not matter as he hasn't been in a storyline with it. Conversely AJ Styles' winning streak probably matters a lot more as he is a new talent trying to establish himself on the roster.

Either way if WWE wants to make sure they're not doing 50-50 booking, there should be a lot more names in that 80-100% region and the 0-20% region. Until then, the rest can just keep trading wins and losses.

The FanPosts are solely the subjective opinions of Cageside Seats readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cageside Seats editors or staff.