Wrestling's Past - A hierarchy of superstar athletes who
gave their all from the time they crossed the threshold into the arena to the moment
that they went to sleep that night, never disappointing a fan and always obliged
to the ones that got them to where they were.
Wrestling's Present - More of a trick and pony show of
recycled storylines, conspiracy, and politics. That compared to the old days
just doesn't cut the mustard.
Don't get me wrong, I am a wrestling junkie, it is my only infatuation
when it comes to athletics, I'm even a wrestler myself (hoping to get back into
it). Wrestling's past of real heart and soul wrestlers putting it all into what
they did; now that part is far from over; you still have guys that live and breathe
this industry just as I have done since the time I was only a few years old. I
love this business and I don't want to see anything happen to it. Wrestling's
Past was Historic, from the Monday Night Wars of WCW Monday Night Nitro and WWF
Monday Night Raw to even before I was born when Hulk Hogan slammed Andre the Giant
and the historic Montreal Screw job just 12 years ago. From Lou Thesz, to Dusty
Rhodes, to Ric Flair, to Dwayne "The Rock” Johnson, to “Stone Cold” Steve
Austin, to Eddie Guerrero, to Triple H, to The Undertaker, to John Cena, Edge
and Randy Orton; whatever generation of wrestling you watched; you loved it as
an entertainment staple and as a sport.
But lately, the spark has left from wrestling; the arenas
have quieted down and the crowds are getting scarcer, you just don’t hear that “pop”
like you used to. I will be a wrestling fan till the day I die but as far as
the presence of wrestling as it is today, it just plain – for lack of a better
word – sucks.
There are two main wrestling organizations in the United
States today and they are WWE – World Wrestling Entertainment (formerly World
Wrestling Federation) – and TNA – Total Nonstop Action Wrestling. These two
staples in the wrestling industry are very different, just by their names you
can tell that this is true. World Wrestling Entertainment with an emphasis on ‘Entertainment’,
this is the biggest wrestling organization on the planet; I mean it’s a global
freakin phenomenon, but yet I find myself getting bored with it because Vincent
Kennedy McMahon seems to care more about the revenue that the wrestling
industry brings in rather than the athleticism of his workers and exploiting
the talent instead of wrenching at the hearts of fans like a soap opera. Once
again, don’t get me wrong; the WWE has wonderful wrestlers, some of the most
extraordinary athletes in the industry. Including but not limited to the
longest signed wrestling superstar in the WWE, The Undertaker, Rey Mysterio Jr.,
Batista, John Cena, Randy Orton, Triple H, Shawn Michaels, and many more. Even
the stars of the future such as The WWE Champion Shaemus, Evan Bourne, Kofi
Kingston, Cody Rhodes, Ted Dibiase Jr. Primo and Carlito.
TNA on the other hand is all about the action, of course
they entertain the fans just as WWE does but they entertain more with their
athletes than their will to make money. Of course they want to make revenue
from their product but not as badly as the WWE does. Their wrestling is pure
and unaltered; of course you still have the gimmicks, storylines (that highly mimic
those form early WWE), and pre-determined outcomes, but somehow they find a way
to be a little more tasteful with what they do.
As a disclaimer, this is just the opinion of one person; if
you feel the same this is good; if you don’t feel the same please feel free to
express your opinions but don’t try to change mine. As I said before: I am a
wrestling junkie and wrestler myself, I know a lot about the business; I know
less than some of the big guys of the industry but I also know what fans want
and the actions that they crave for because I am also a fan so I know what I
want to see and then I speak with other fans. WWE IS and will always be my
favorite federation till the day I die and even carrying on down into the
generations of my family, I’m not a big fan of TNA; I will explain why in a
minute. It came a time when WWE was faced with adversity and yet they overcame;
take for instance the Monday Night Wars between WCW’s Monday Night Nitro and –
then WWF – Monday Night Raw, due to WWE’s taping schedule the Vice President of
WCW – Eric Bischoff (and most of the internet for that matter) – would give
away the results of the taped shows. This led to the ratings war that gave both
WCW and WWF victories but due in part by the nWo storyline; this was a immense impetus
boost for WCW, which in turn led them to go on a ratings conquest streak for 84
consecutive weeks. “The Wars”, which had originally began in mid-1996 had
started to make a turn for WCW when on April 13, 1998, due in part to a match
between Vince McMahon and “Stone Cold” Steve Austin, WCW had lost a ratings war
for the first time in the 84 week span. By this time, Raw was taking new advances
in programming; Nitro, however, began producing monotonous programming with recurring
storylines that weren’t maintaining fans in the seats.
WWF was also making a statement as by saying that “WWF was a
place where not only the older stars could ascend but the younger talent could
too” unlike what was happening in WCW where Kevin Nash and Hulk Hogan were the
only two superstars being ‘pushed’ while younger stars weren’t given the
chances – excluding Goldberg and DDP. Any real wrestling fan is going to
remember when DX raged “War” on WCW at the Norfolk Scope in 1998 -- this was
actually my favorite segment of the Monday Night Wars. On this night, DX
interviewed fans on camera that were attending the WCW Nitro show that night
and it was revealed that some of the fans there that night had actually gotten
their tickets for the event for free, this was thought to be a way to pack the
arena to capacity due to low ticket sales and attendance records, WWF was on a
roll now and with the steady decline of Monday Night Nitro it was
inevitable. This sharp decline in
revenue by WCW led to WWF being able to ‘buy out’ its rival in early 2001.
TNA, what can I say about TNA other than the fact that they
are new and they really just became popular about 5 years ago after signing a
contract for regular television instead of going straight to PPV and charging
$10.00 for anybody that wanted to watch it on TV, not really sure what the
tickets cost at that time -- but from what I hear that are pretty sensible
compared to WWE’s prices. Coincidentally, TNA’s emergence came shortly thereafter
the fall and selling of WCW, which led many people to articulate that TNA is
the new WCW. This federation has the shortest existence but yet they are
already gaining steam on their way to the top of the food chain as far as big
companies are concerned. TNA was founded by former WCW wrestler Jeff Jarrett,
who also competed in TNA up until last year. With the recent acquisition of
Hulk Hogan also came the acquisition of some of the most popular yet
disrespected former WWE stars that were released from their WWE contracts.
Names such as Jeff Hardy, RVD, Shannon Moore, Sean Waltman, Scott Hall, and the
Nasty Boys. Acquiring these stars as free agents isn’t what I don’t like about
TNA (although WWE is pretty much screwed now unless they can pull something
major), I guess it’s in part due to TNA’s immaturity of being a wrestling
federation; they are chalk full of recycled WCW superstars and this makes up
most of their roster; so in my eyes they were simply handed popularity -- only a few WWE superstars were WCW superstars.
Another reason that I am not a big fan of TNA is because of
how some of their superstars are ultimately treated. In both WWE and TNA there
is a low number of Hispanic or Hispanically rooted superstars and the ones that
they do have are ultimately jobbers excluding Rey Mysterio of WWE and Hernandez
of TNA; this was true for my favorite Puerto Rican superstar who was in both
WWE and TNA but only under contract with TNA (along with his contract in Mexico
as their Champion.) In WWE he was known as Ricky Banderas and in TNA as Judas
Mesias, the Judas Mesias character was a great character – although the
storyline that he was ultimately put in resembled the storyline of Kane and The
Undertaker in WWE.
My point is that Judas Mesias was jobbed out to – in my
opinion – superstars that weren’t even on his echelon, the exception to this
being Sting but only because he is an icon of the business. Ricky could have
been the Undertaker of TNA but he was released from his TNA contract for
reasons that I am not sure of, of course he never would have been able to carry
the federation by himself but with a push he could have ran through that
program like a hurricane but instead they have him lose to Abyss and job to
Rhino; whom in my opinion is just trying to catch some bit of lost glory from
his old ECW days. Another reason of why I’m not necessarily a fan of TNA – and I’m
not sure why I have this reason – I’m not a fan of TNA’s President, Dixie Carter.
This is no offense to her but there is something about Ms. Carter that doesn’t
sit right with me, something seems corrupt to me, but I may just be too
overzealous when it comes to wrestling companies.
It may seem that WWE and TNA are the only threats to claim
the territory of American kingpin of wrestling; but at the the beginning of
2010 Cookie Jar Entertainment. Became the sole distributor for English Language
entertainment pertaining to Mexico’s number one wrestling organization AAA –
Asistencia Asesoria y Administracion – which coincidentally has that wrestler
Ricky Banderas that I spoke of earlier on the roster along with former TNA
superstar Konnan, La Parka, Mascarita Sagrada Jr., Cibernetico, Alex Kozlov,
Marco Corleone (Mark Jindrak), and more.
Now although TNA has practically screwed the WWE with their
newest acquisitions; the war isn’t over yet; if the WWE just takes steps to
reduce the chance of fans splitting and going over to TNA. On Jan. 4, 2010 TNA
and WWE were in a head to head battle on WWE’s regularly scheduled Monday Night
Raw program and TNA moved to Monday Night for one night only to pull off a 3
hour spectacular featuring Hulk Hogan, WWE’s special guest host for Raw was
Bret “The Hitman” Hart.
As I have said throughout this article, I am one of the
biggest fans of the WWE that you will ever meet and I do have some suggestions
for them; I’m not saying that these suggestions will just totally turn the WWE
around and put them back in the driver’s seat because I just don’t make
decisions like that and there is no guarantee that Vince McMahon will even read
this let alone take my advice.
Annually WWE releases superstars that they aren’t using from
their contracts; this is a double edged sword in my eyes; these superstars aren’t
being used on the shows so they should be released if you have nothing for them
to do yet on the other hand if you do release them, at least do it in a way
that doesn’t burn any bridges between both parties to where the superstar may
not want to come back. Releasing superstars also gives them the straightaway to
stray to the competition and I am sure Vince McMahon doesn’t want to make more
enemies – although I know he really doesn’t give a damn.
The second thing, TNA’s structure is built around superstars
that have already made a name for themselves such as Booker T, Scott Steiner,
Kurt Angle, and many others have done already. WWE has this ‘new talent initiative’,
which in the last few months has seen several new faces emerge into WWE under
the ECW brand. Again this is a double edge maybe triple edge sword; a lot of
people don’t watch FCW and they have no clue who these superstars are, but
instead research their matches on YouTube and search their biographies on
Wikipedia trying desperately to find out who they really are and where they
come from. I understand more than anybody about giving younger guys the chance
of a lifetime and this is the good thing about this but if you want to capture
fans attentions then you need to hire guys that are already notorious in the
industry, and for god’s sake please bring back the guys that can still go and you
haven’t burned bridges with – Kevin Thorn is not an option unfortunately.
Better yet; look to Mexico for fresh faces, AAA is perhaps the best place for
high flying cruiserweights as well as strong heavyweights that can move around
the ring just as cruiserweights do. Most of them can speak English so that isn’t
necessarily a problem, hell you had Funaki for the longest time and he couldn’t
speak English up until a few years ago.
Another thing, you know how I said that repetitive storylines
are what basically slaughtered WCW; well WWE management either didn’t get or
didn’t bother to read that memo because they are really milking some of their
older storylines to death. Take the John
Cena/Randy Orton feud; that got boring after the 3rd encounter.
Every since the first SvR – SmackDown vs. Raw – video game; Vince McMahon
figured that this would be the most popular storyline in history; but guess what;
it wasn’t, it got boring really fast and then it became apparent that Cena and
Orton were playing tag team with the title belt all through 2009 which also
became annoying.
Get rid of WWECW, it’s not worth the torture of even
watching that monstrosity of what used to be real hardcore wrestling. You don’t
even have Extreme Rules matches anymore, what exactly happened to that? Once
you scratch ECW move those superstars to RAW because the next step is going to
be crucial. BECOME YOUR OWN COMPETITION! That’s right I said it, become your
own competition; meaning, you own WCW so use it against the new age WCW – TNA
-- and also yourselves. Do this any way you want but here is what I would do
and please don’t take any of these statements the wrong way. You can keep
SmackDown and move WCW Thunder to the slot where ECW used to be -- I know it
seems pointless but you will see where I am going with this in a minute. Here
is the crucial moment where you got to listen; DON”T RUN WCW, instead make WCW
into like a weekly Taboo Tuesday sort of event where the fans can express their
opinions and someone other than Vince McMahon (say Dusty Rhodes) could decide
which ideas make it to the show and which ones don’t. Better yet why not call
Konnan up from AAA and see if he would want to take over and possibly bring
Legion Extranjera with him. WCW can operate totally different from WWE or they
can work the same as ECW has been doing but don’t and I mean DON’T wash it down
to a pile of practically a shell of what it used to be – it’s going to be that
anyway seeing as it was bought out by the competition. Second option would be
to scratch SmackDown (or turn SD into WCW, either way you want to put it) and
have WCW on Fridays; you can still have the roster split as you normally do
anyway just some of the superstars would be known as WCW stars and I know a lot
of superstars wouldn’t want that.
No more conspiracy, no more politics; it’s okay to focus on
the revenue, turn John Cena back heel already a lot of people are waiting for
this to happen. Break up Legacy and push Cody and Ted; move Randy Orton on from
this psycho-maniac that has only 3 bloody moves to something bigger. Shaemus
should have never gotten the push for the title that early and I don’t know whose
idea it was to give him the shot that early and I really don’t care, but I do
think that a lot of the younger guys that have been there longer deserved the
shot more than Shaemus did. Just my opinions you can take it or leave it as
they are.
Do something about these bloody 13 PPV’s a year thing, why
not 6 PPV’s a year to give you more time to build on storylines instead of a
PPV every 3 bloody freakin weeks.
Will you PLEASE stop catering to these little kids that
watch your programs, I understand that you want to go all PG-13 on us because
little kids are watching but what is going to happen when those little boys
grow up and want to see what the divas are wearing under their costumes. Or
when the little girls grow up and start daydreaming in class about a wrestler
that they saw on Raw the night before. I’m not saying that you should go back
to the Rated-R sleazy and sexually overdriven things that used to be shown on
Raw and SmackDown but just make it a little more exciting for us to watch. I
tell you what you do; if you really want to cater to the smaller/younger crowds
of the WWE then here’s what you do; scratch WWE Superstars on Thursday Nights
but not fully, turned that into a fully featured kids show presented by WWE
Kids Magazine or something like that and leave the other shows for your more
mature fans.
And this is a personal message to Mr. McMahon if he were to
ever read this.
This is far from a bash against your organization or the way that you run it; I love
the WWE and would be honored to work for you one day as a wrestler, valet, or
even a creative writer. These are just suggestions that I would do if I owned a
federation with as much power and authority as the WWE has. I just want to help
WWE regain confidence in its product and for the fan-base to regain their
interests in the “sport” and not just the “entertainment” value that it brings
to the table. May I also suggest a slight change to your name, scratch the ‘Entertainment’
part from your name and perhaps go with something a little more fitting like “World
Wrestling Allegiance”, “World Wrestling Generation”, or “World Wrestling
Domination”. I would suggest “World Wrestling Foundation”, but given the
controversy between World Wrestling Federation and the World Wildlife Fund I
know the moniker of WWF can’t be used.
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