2011 Pro Wrestling Thread

Overall thoughts on the PPV:

- Outside of the belt going from Orton to Henry, I think the whole show was a sort of overreaction to the latest bad ratings news. Otherwise, it's hard to fathom the belt back on Cena (completely clean, by the way) and Triple H beating Punk in a clusterfuck main event.

- Cena vs. Del Rio was good, until the ending. As schiez pointed out, Del Rio is now Swagger; he got beat convincingly, dropping the belt, despite interference twice from his manager. He'll lose a rematch at some point, and then go back down to the midcard with The Miz, R-Truth and others.

Even worse for the WWE, a large portion of the crowd was bitterly anti-Cena. I'm guessing it was at least a quarter of the crowd, maybe up to half, and while it's still in New York I wouldn't exactly consider Buffalo to be Philly or NYC when it comes to smart fans. At points, Cena was getting booed out of the building, even though: 1) Del Rio is not loved by the IWC 2) The WWE has done everything in its power to portray Del Rio as a straight heel, with no hints of being a tweener 3) Del Rio did a promo against the crowd right before the match started for cheap heat. He's not there yet, but Cena is approaching "Babyface Hogan in WCW" territory, except with little kids.

- Orton vs. Henry was the only truly surprising result of the night. Not only did Orton get beat, he got beat completely clean. The whole tone of the match was weird. The WWE kept bringing up that Henry had never won the belt in 15 years, but it was kind of hard to feel good about it, since he's playing a stark heel. Is Orton injured or something? If he isn't, it seems odd to book it this way.

Despite his recent wins, Henry still strikes me as more like Kane, a career high midcard guy, then a world champion. If the WWE didn't care much for Del Rio's reign, or Christian's, it seems bizarre to have another not-so-over guy with a belt.

- The crap at the top of the card overshadows the decent undercard, especially the diva's match, which had the hottest crowd reaction I've heard in the past... Well, whenever. (Speaking of hot, Natalya, oh la la.) Once the WWE heard the crowd reaction for Beth, I don't know how they didn't change the finish, unless they plan to turn her face at some point. (My suggestion: Don't bother having Kelly turn heel, because she can't play it, just build it up as a clone of the Punk-Cena feud. Beth talks about how much she loves to wrestle, blah blah blah, etc. Maybe you get a face-tweener or face-face match that people actually give a shit about.)

The pop Beth got was one of the biggest of the night, which is unheard of for a diva's match. Also, I definitely think the result poisoned the well for some of the other matches.

 

The pop for Beth should have been expected by WWE, and I think they did expect it, but just didn't care. They tend to like to have wrestlers lose in their hometowns, for some ridiculous reason (except for house shows). They could have just had Beth win the belt at the PPV SUnday, and then lose it either tonight, or the next Raw or at HITC, which is only two weeks away.

 

My guess is that this sets up a HHH-Laurinitis feud for control of WWE, to be hammered out at Survivor Series. Miz, Truth and Nash vs. Cena, Rock and HHH.

 

Nothing that happened last night really matters. All three matches will get rerun for Hell in a Cell in two weeks. I suspect Del Rio will get the title back in time to make the Mexico tour as champion. Had he beat Cena last night and again at HiaC, that'd be four straight PPV losses for Cena, so they gave him one last night. Of course, switching the title like this just devalues it more, but that ship is already off the horizon.

Glad they gave Henry the world belt. Even if he loses it right back on Tuesday or at HiaC, it's a nice lifetime achievement award for someone who's been a loyal employee for 15 years.

 

OK. That was confusing. Why the hell did Trips just fire Miz and Truth?

 

I'm so confused. Surely, someone has a master plan that will wrap up all the loose ends? Right? RIGHT?

 

Beats the hell out of me. Is Vince Russo back on their payroll?

First, these "firings" are bullshit, because everyone knows they're not actually getting fired. What they should do, if a wrestler is actually going to leave on their own accord, fire him/her then, so it looks more legit, and can give the fan pause in whether or not future firings are real ones.

Second: Do Miz and Truth have to pay their $250K fines now? What is the purpose of fining someone if you're just going to fire them at the end of the show? If anything, Trips should have done, "If you beat Cena/Punk tonight, you're just fined $250K. You lose, you're fired. Pick your poison."

Third: Again, another hometown loss, this time it was Miz. And Lawler is well-known in Cleveland, and predictably, got his ass kicked. I'm tired of seeing JR get beat up, then King intervenes and then gets his ass kicked as well. It's been done to death already.

Fourth: I wasn't too enthused about Hugh Jackman, because I figured it would just be a movie plug. But he actually did a pretty good job in his role, and it was cool to see Ryder get the rub.

Fifth: I can't help but think Punk is totally mocking the babyface role. Loved his facial expression when Trips told him he wasn't fired, and he seemed to be really hamming it up on the apron during the tag match.

Sixth: The Divas match, as usual, had no purpose. Beth/Natalya should be dominating everyone, not losing to roll-ups.

Seventh: I wonder if the technician who sets up the anonymous GM stand ever thinks to himself, "Why the fuck am I doing this?"

Eighth: Back to Henry, I'll give him credit. He generated some good heat. I think he'll drop the belt back to Orton at HITC, but maybe if they give him the chance, he would make a good champion.

Ninth: When did Justin Gabriel become a babyface, and watching that match, why should I care?

Tenth: Not the best Raw they've ever had, by far. Didn't like too much of it.

 

I agree with most of these, with two counters. 1 isn't going to ever happen now, not after Brian Pillman got legit fired and then actually went to the WWF from WCW. 2, I think Triple H was "investigating" during the night, and then decided to fire Truth and Miz based on his findings.

 

Good point on No. 1, although the WWE could get around it by having the wrestler sign a statement saying that the firing is for storyline purposes and that the wrestler is leaving as of his own accord.

No. 2, I'll guess we'll have to see next week.

 

An idea for getting rid of the tired "firing" storylines: institute an actual list of contender rankings for each show—so we know not just who the fabled No. 1 contender is, but all the way down the line to No. 25 or whatever. and if wrestlers piss off whoever's in charge, instead of them being "fired," the consequence is that they are dropped to the bottom of the rankings. which is a real consequence—they are that much further from getting a title shot—and also provides a storyline of having to wrestle their way back to the top.

but enough with the instantly meaningless firings already.

 

TNA tried the rankings concept a while back but quickly dropped it. Then they revived it in a different form with the recent Bound For Glory series, which actually sort of worked.

In case you weren't following, they took 10 or 12 top wrestlers and made them eligible for a "season" of matches that have lasted several months. They got points for each victory, with different totals coming for submission wins, pins, count-outs etc. That led to some cool matches where, for example, guys were trying to win via submission to pick up more points -- and even ended up losing because of it.
The standings also included house show matches, which is a novel idea.
Eventually, the top four in points met in semifinal matches at the last PPV. The winners then faced off, with the winner of that match getting a title shot at the Bound For Glory PPV.

TNA whiffs on a lot of ideas, and there were apparently some flaws in the execution of this one. But the concept is pretty damn cool.

 

In the dying days of the AWA, they tried a team challenge with three teams, captained by Sgt. Slaughter, Baron Von Raschke and Larry Zbyszko. They even mixed up babyfaces and heels in the teams, which made things really confusing. Didn't last too long, and neither did the AWA after that, although jobber Jake (the Milkman) Milliman won a battle royal, which was the highlight of the whole thing.