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That number is up almost 17% from the 216,000 buys that Extreme Rules 2011 (John Cena vs. John Morrison vs. Miz) garnered, but with the higher talent price tag that came with Brock Lesnar, the buyrate could be seen as disappointing especially if you compare them to Lesnar's ability to draw money on PPV in recent years.
While fighting for UFC, his PPV buys were through the roof and never lower than the 600,000 range for fights - and often much more, sometimes topping one million. Obviously, one lesson to be learned here is that the UFC audience is not going to follow Lesnar back to WWE. But, WWE's take on the PPV was up.
So, was this a success or a failure?
In speaking to one WWE office source today, he noted that the buyrate blame shouldn't go on Lesnar, but on the company itself for making fans believe that the secondary PPVs aren't important anymore.
The source pointed out the poor buyrate for the Rock's first wrestling match in years at Survivor Series 2011 and then compared that to Wrestlemania buyrates involving Rock the last few years.
"No one should spin this as Brock failing. Brock didn't fail the company. The company failed itself in that we've conditioned the majority of the audience that only Wrestlemania is important now," said the source. "This show came right after Mania, so you are going to lose fans that invested money in that show. No one will remember that. But, we also rushed out a marquee match and it didn't really succeed for us, either. I think the lesson to be learned is that no matter who is on what show these days, the branding won't be strong enough, no matter how good or bad the creative side may be. We've conditioned everyone to see it as Wrestlemania and then everything else, because we spent a year building Mania. There was going to be a drop-off after that climax."
However, the source noted that Lesnar as a PPV draw for the company isn't a lost cause.
"We had to reintroduce him to our new audience. Seven year olds didn't know who Brock was. Now they do. The numbers were up so on paper, it looks good. This is part of another year-long build. The upside is that when we hit Wrestlemania, then Lesnar will draw and the company gets our investment back that way - because now it's Wrestlemania plus the talent that draws, not the talent drawing for Wrestlemania. That's the lesson we need to learn here, in my opinion."
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