2008 Running Pro Wrestling Thread

Fuck it. Don't feel guilty for other people's actions. People still buy Elvis CDs. People will still see The Dark Knight. People will still watch wrestling. We can't be expected to feel responsible for the self-destructive actions of others.

My favorite phrase in the world (besides 'shit happens'): Not my problem.

 

Freedom of choice, baby. If people were truly turned off by the product after Benoit's death, then it would have showed. Obviously, there's a hell of a lot of us that still enjoy WWE and at the end of the day, there's not a damn thing wrong with it.....

.....as long as they keep bringing Mickie James and Beth Phoenix out every Monday.

 

Are they even going to suspend Santino?

 

Probably not, since he was on last night ... and Piper even cracked on him about it. Hell, the fans even gave him a "D-U-I" chant.

 

Dear Vince,

Thanks for some of the ECW flashbacks as you celebrate 100 episodes. It really reminded me of a sort of promising start that has now swirled down the bowl, through the pipes and straight into the septic tank. Congrats on 100! I'm surprised you got it this far.

 

I'm actually pretty surprised ECW made it to 100 too. Thing is, it's not a bad show. It just shouldn't be called ECW.

 

WWECW would be a better show if they'd just let everyone who never gets a chance on Raw or Smackdown get their mat time and air time in on this show. Kind of like a WWE Triple-A. That way, when one or two guys are getting over on this show, they can be called up to the main two shows and it means something as long as they're allowed to do something.

I'm glad they only have an ECW title and not tag champs or another singles title. They should rename the ECW title as a TV title as it's pretty well stated without actually be said that it's a hollow world title belt.

 

WWECW should indeed be treated like a Triple A of sorts. Instead of pushing overrated mid-carders such as Kane, Chavo Guerrero, Big Daddy V, Stevie Richards, and Tommy Dreamer, we should be seeing young, talented, and exciting wrestlers in 10-minute+ matches. Guys currently on the roster like CM Punk, Kofi Kingston, Elijah Burke, Shelton Benjamin, John Morrison, The Miz (plus a few guys currently training in Florida) should be allowed to let loose and become superstars. Give us a reason to care about these guys, like they do on the other two shows so effectively. Then once they reach a certain level, have them cross over to Raw and SmackDown. The WWE has done a nice job building Punk up, but that's about it.

And I think the ECW TV Title is a superb idea. Let's face it, the show doesn't deserve a World Title, but still, the TV Title in ECW's prime days was usually held by Rob Van Dam and considered more prestigious than the company's top championship. Have it defended once every week, with the monthly PPV match being "Extreme Rules".

 

Problem is, if you don't have a couple of fairly big names, ratings are going to drop even more. And even assuming all the good workers are there, you'd have to let them wrestle their kind of match -- CM Punk vs. Jamie Noble in six minutes on ECW isn't CM Punk vs. James Gibson in ROH, and since that's not likely to change, it'd just be a giant disappointment.

 

Agreed on the Punk/Noble(Gibson) comment. I also think having ECW on Sci-Fi lends itself to having a show that's not all about the wrestling, either. I'm sure that's why The Zombie character was there at the beginning and Kevin Thorn was stuck with a Vampire gimmick and so on. Might also explain a bit why Kane is the ECW champ and The Boogeyman was drafted to ECW and Viscera got a makeover into Big Daddy V, too.

 

I suspect what happened was that Vince/WWE wanted a third brand and figured an established name would help get it off the ground. Obviously the WCW brand was shot to hell between its pathetic endgame and the equally fail InVasion. But ECW still had cred, even as it got dragged into the muck with said InVasion. And as a bonus (intentional or not), Vince was able to establish his dominance over the ECW concept by turning it into a show with only the faintest relationship to old-school ECW even at the start, one that died pretty quickly.

 

So if this stuff about Ashley Massero working as an escort is true, does the WWE fire her or use it as a storyline?