There are many things that determine if a wrestling show is good: quality matches, entertaining promos, hot crowds, and engaging storylines. But what if there was a more important factor? What if what truly determined a show’s quality was not any of the things I just listed, but Anna Kendrick blankly staring at a Jackson Pollock painting while a solemn Sean Rowe song plays in the background?
I’m doing a short and very stupid statistical look at the correlation between show quality, as determined by user ratings on Cagematch, and if the lead-in movie to Dynamite is The Accountant.
Now, you might point at things like “small sample sizes” and “correlation does not imply causation” as arguments as to why this doesn’t matter. I would reply that none of you are Christian Wolff, so why should I care about your opinions on the validity of this article?
So blindly open this YouTube link in another tab, boot up the 12 water-cooled cores on your Bx-32, and think about dogs playing poker. We have (very low level) math to do.
First of all, I put together the following table of show ratings on a 10 point scale and the movie that preceded Dynamite. I did my best to accurately record the movies that played before each episode.
| Date | Cagematch | Pre-Dynamite Movie |
| 9/22 | 8.88 | The Accountant |
| 9/15 | 7.80 | Godzilla: King of the Monsters |
| 9/8 | 6.66 | Creed II |
| 9/1 | 7.02 | Wanted |
| 8/25 | 4.61 | The Meg |
| 8/18 | 8.08 | Pacific Rim |
| 8/11 | 6.67 | Tag |
| 8/4 | 6.02 | The Equalizer |
| 7/28 | 7.75 | Law Abiding Citizen |
| 7/21 | 7.17 | The Accountant |
| 7/14 | 8.36 | Ready Player One |
| 7/7 | 7.79 | Creed |
| 6/30 | 7.92 | Kong: Skull Island |
| 6/26 | 7.49 | The Replacements |
| 6/18 | 5.53 | Aquaman |
| 6/11 | 6.84 | Captain America: Civil War |
| 6/4 | 4.91 | Ready Player One |
| 5/28 | 5.46 | Bones episodes |
| 5/19 | 7.18 | The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor |
| 5/12 | 7.56 | Kong: Skull Island |
| 5/5 | 7.22 | Jack Reacher: Never Go Back |
| 4/28 | 7.10 | Pacific Rim |
| 4/21 | 7.52 | Kong: Skull Island |
| 4/14 | 8.24 | Central Intelligence |
| 4/7 | 5.78 | Hellboy II: The Golden Army |
| 3/31 | 8.43 | Shooter |
| 3/24 | 7.81 | Hellboy II: The Golden Army |
| 3/17 | 8.07 | The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor |
| 3/10 | 7.96 | Ready Player One |
| 3/3 | 7.68 | The Equalizer |
| 2/24 | 7.27 | The Accountant |
| 2/17 | 7.66 | Central Intelligence |
| 2/10 | 7.94 | Back to the Future |
| 2/3 | 7.57 | The Meg |
| 1/27 | 7.69 | Geostorm |
| 1/20 | 5.54 | Tag |
| 1/13 | 7.06 | Ready Player One |
| 1/6 | 8.29 | The Meg |
The three shows which had The Accountant as the lead-in were the February 24 Dynamite main evented by a Lance Archer vs. Rey Fenix ladder match, night two of Fyter Fest with Lance Archer’s IWGP United States title win over Jon Moxley, and, of course, this week’s Grand Slam show. The average Cagematch rating of these three shows is 7.77, while the median is 7.27.
For the other 35 episodes of Dynamite in 2021 that had inferior lead-in movies, the average Cagematch rating is 7.18 and the median is 7.56.
On average, episodes that start shortly after Ben Affleck drives an Airstream are notably better than those that are RV-less.
You may, however, express concern at the advantage of the median rating in the comparison between the two groups. This is due to your misinterpretation of the data – it’s clear that the first two showings of The Accountant taught Tony Khan that the next time a Dynamite would follow the movie, he had better come prepared. And that’s why we got Danielson-Omega on free TV.
Therefore, the only conclusion to be drawn from this data is that The Accountant does improve the quality of an episode of AEW Dynamite.
