As I mentioned in the previous blog, I'm planning on revisiting some other subjects than Marvel and DC films in the months ahead on this blog (don't worry, the film reviews will kick back in soon enough as well). I've covered wrestling before in this blog and thought with series 1 of World of Sport having just finished on ITV, it'd be a good opportunity to have a look back at what worked, what didn't and where the show goes from here.
When WOS made it's comeback at the end of 2016, I have to admit to enjoying the pilot special and thought it had a lot of potential. Unfortunately, the series seemed to suffer quite a lot of setbacks in between that first episode and the first series proper starting with the show seeming to be forever delayed and bogged down with red tape. WWE launched their WWE UK division, seemingly worried about losing a potential market although after an impressive initial tournament, that too seems to have been lying in the doldrums for a while with only a handful of stars (Tyler Bate, Pete Dunne) being utilised. However, with a UK WWE show apparently now in the pipeline and a lot of stars moving between the two formats in the 18 month gap, it did mean that the roster starting series 1 had gone through quite a few changes with the likes of Dave Mastiff, El Ligero and Zack Gibson not returning for the series. However, with some canny new additions including Will Ospreay, Kay Lee Ray, Joe Hendry, Martin Kirby and Rampage Brown plus a solid foundation for the roster including Davey Boy Smith Jr, Grado, Viper and Sha Samuels and the introduction of Stu Bennett (aka Wade Barrett) and So Cal Val to replace the departed Jim Ross on commentary, the potential was definitely there.
I'm gonna say it straight off - to me the series was a bit of a disappointment. The wrestling itself was generally on the right side of watchable but it did seem a lot of the time like they were simply trying to see how many gimmick matches they could tick off in ten episodes. Ladder match? Tick. Loser leaves town? Tick. Submission? Tick. Handicap match? Tick. Mixed tag? Tick. By the time of the near-inexplicable Buzzer Battle Match in Week 9 which was almost Vince Russo-like in how convoluted it was (to wit: it starts off as a sort of Battle Bowl meets War Games minus the cage meets Survivor Series match with each team getting a random new member every few minutes and then turns into a battle royale once we're down to eight wrestlers who haven't been eliminated, it turns into a battle royale), you just found yourself thinking "Look, just cut the gimmicks and have some straight-up matches guys!" To make things worse, the big final Championship match in the last episode was just ridiculously overbooked with a totally unnecessary amount of run-ins, ref bumps etc that it just didn't feel like a decent pay-off for the previous ten weeks of emotional investment.
In fact, the Loser Leaves Town storyline between Adam Maxted and Nathan Cruz was pretty much a textbook example of the bookers rushing storylines needlessly. The pair were a tag team for the first 4-5 episodes until Cruz turned on Maxted after they lost in the final of the tag team championship tournament. The next week (!) the pair faced off in a Loser Leaves Town match with Cruz leaving and being "out of the company" only to return two weeks later in the Buzzer Battle clusterfumble to cost Maxted the match. If the bookers knew this storyline would have to be rushed through so quickly then they just shouldn't have gone with it and tried to string it out a bit more. As it was, it felt like something WCW would have done in their dying days and that really isn't what you want to be aiming for...
It's a shame because the continual reliance on gimmick matches to me came at the expense of decent character development which also hurt a lot of the top-of-the-card guys. With the exceptions of Smith and Bennett from WWE and Grado and, for those who remember the British Boot Camp series, Kay Lee and Rampage from TNA (plus the odd guest appearance from the likes of Doug Williams and Moose, who appeared as a babyface helping Sysum the week that TNA chose to give him his long overdue heel turn - talk about bad timing!), a lot of the names would probably have been unknown to those who don't keep a close eye on the UK wrestling scene and therefore needed their characters to be drawn out to make the audience care for them which WOS by and large just didn't do which is pretty much tantamount to shooting yourself in the foot when it comes to your promotion being successful.
A case in point is the company's top babyface Justin Sysum. Given how hard they pushed the guy (and make no mistake he's a decent wrestler), you'd have thought they'd have devoted some time to a couple of promo videos or interviews to build up his story, explain his motivation and give us a reason to cheer from him. Instead, he was essentially portrayed as "that bloke who wears a centurion's robe to the ring and keeps getting messed about by Rampage".
Speaking of Rampage, I thought he was booked pretty poorly as well. Since when did not giving your champion any mic time seem like a sensible booking policy? Yes, I know WWE did this with Brock Lesnar last year. He had Paul Heyman as his mouthpiece. Although Sha Samuels did a reasonably good job as being Rampage's mouthpiece, the dynamic of him being Rampage's goon (who lost more matches than he won) rather than an out and out manager in the Heyman/Cornette/Heenan style which meant that his bragging just didn't have the same effect it would've done. The thing is that, as anyone who saw him on TNA's British Boot Camp will know, Rampage is actually competent enough on the mic to be able to cut his own promos so why they took this approach with him is baffling as it felt as if it completely stunted his character.
To be brutally honest, I don't think the three-person commentary team worked very well either. Alex Shane was generally a decent play-by-play guy in the Mike Tenay/'80s Vince McMahon mould but it often felt like his two colour commentators So Cal Val and Stu Bennett just kept getting in each others' way. Both are decent commentators in their own right but a two-person booth would have just worked a bit better here and made things feel a bit less cluttered in my opinion.
And yet...and yet, I do get the impression that given a bit of time to iron out the kinks that WOS does have potential. They've got a very good roster with the likes of Smith, Ospreay, Rampage, Sysum, Samuels, Robbie X, Joe Hendry, Martin Kirby, Kip Sabian, Nathan Cruz, BT Gunn, Kay Lee Ray, Viper, Liam Slater and Gabriel Kidd on board and when the wrestlers were allowed to kick loose without the gimmicks getting in the way (Smith and Ospreay had a great match in the first episode, the feud between Kirby and Hendry was never less than entertaining, Grado was always fun to watch and the cruiserweights like Slater, Kidd and X put on some entertaining aerial battles (though rather like WWE and TNA, they could do with getting away from the whole mindset of treating these guys as an acrobat sideshow and simply having them fight the same people week after week or, even worse, just having them all get crushed by the giant Crater).
So what does the future hold for WOS? Well, the fact that in the last few weeks of its run it went from a 5:30 prime time Saturday teatime slot to being buried in the 3:30 mid-afternoon slot doesn't bode well but with a tour being announced for next spring, I hope that it's a sign that ITV are prepared to give it another chance. The first series may have been far from perfect but the series deserves a chance to develop a bit and find its own niche. Not least because if the UK televised wrestling scene is left solely with WWE's Brit promotion it's gonna make things just a bit boring (although the news that Progress have been given their own cable show is definitely an interesting development). We shall see...
Showing posts with label Wrestling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wrestling. Show all posts
Monday, 8 October 2018
Saturday, 11 March 2017
A look back through Wrestlemania - from the worst to the best...
So the season of Wrestlemania is almost upon us. The big event of the wrestling calendar is approaching its 33rd instalment so I thought it'd be a good time to use the blog to take a look back at the other 32 and rank them in order from worst to best. Some of this may be controversial but hey, each to their own opinion. Anyway, let's get this thing going shall we?...
NB - I actually started this article a year ago in the run up to Wrestlemania 32 but didn't finish it in time so I've kind of kept it in storage until now. Luckily the intervening year hasn't changed my opinion too much...
THE BOTTOM TIER
Vince, What Were You Thinking?
32. WRESTLEMANIA 9 (1993)
Do I really have to go into details here? Basically, this was the year that was supposed to see the post-Hogan generation of wrestlers finally break out and come into their own...only for Hulk to return a month prior and squash everyone back down the card. But it's not just the fact that the main event here (Bret Hart loses the title to a very green Yokozuna who then gets squashed by Hogan in 20 seconds flat) left a very bad taste, it's the fact that 75% of the matches on this card flat-out sucked. If I have to pick a highlight, I'd go for the Steiner Brothers vs the Headshrinkers. Maybe at a stretch Shawn Michaels vs Tatanka (although at 18 minutes it's way too long for its own good) or Lex Luger vs Mr Perfect (despite a screwy ending) but one half-decent and two just about watchable matches is pretty damn poor for the big event of the year.
31. WRESTLEMANIA 32 (2016)
Just an absolute mess from start to finish, WM32 really did sum up everything that was wrong with WWE's booking in 2015-16. The main event of Roman Reigns vs Triple H was a real endurance test with the crowd simply not caring who won, Dean Ambrose and Brock Lesnar proved that PG street fights really don't work and even the better matches such as AJ Styles vs Chris Jericho and the Divas triple threat were spoiled by the wrong wrestler going over (if you believe the rumours, to ensure Reigns would get a pop when he won the title at the end. Which, erm, very much didn't happen). And at a mind-melting six hours, it makes Japanese water torture seem like a fun option by comparison.
30. WRESTLEMANIA 11 (1995)
WWF were in the doldrums financially and creatively at this point and boy did WM11 bear that out. The title match between Shawn Michaels and Diesel is probably the pick of the bunch here but it wasn't even the main event! That "honour" went to a match between Bam Bam Bigelow and NFL star Lawrence Taylor which well and truly sucked the meat missile. Beyond that, the IC title match between Razor Ramon and Jeff Jarrett is at least watchable (although the screwy DQ ending takes quite a bit away from it) and it's nice to see Owen Hart win his first gold in the WWF but the rest of the card was by and large terrible.
29. WRESTLEMANIA 15 (1999)
Ironic that during what's largely considered to be the Attitude Era's hot streak, WWF put out one of their worst Wrestlemanias. Vince Russo, who then had the book, had experimented with the fast lane style of booking at the previous year's Survivor Series and done it pretty well but WM15 proved it's difficult to capture lightning in a bottle twice. Inexplicable storyline arcs, rapid fire heel and face turns, matches with no backstory...by the end of it you were staring at the screen like a burnt out zombie. The saving grace was an entertaining brawl between the Rock and Steve Austin in the main event - without that, this would have had a very good chance of unseating WM9 as the worst ever.
28. WRESTLEMANIA 2 (1986)
Put this one down to a case of growing pains. After the success of the initial Wrestlemania, Vince McMahon decided that they should go all out for WM2 and book it across three cities. Unfortunately the quality of the matches was pretty poor. On the plus side, there's an entertaining tag title match between the Dream Team and the British Bulldogs, a fun brawl with the Funk Brothers taking on Junkyard Dog and Tito Santana, Ricky Steamboat carrying Hercules to a decent match and even the main event between Hulk Hogan and King Kong Bundy isn't that bad. On the flip side, the rest of the card contains a dull as hell boxing match between Roddy Piper and Mr T, five sub-three minute squash matches (including a contender for the worst WM match ever in Adrian Adonis vs Uncle Elmer), a dull double count out between Paul Orndorff and Don Muraco and proof that even Randy Savage can only work so many miracles when he's up against a slug like George Steele. Luckily Vince would learn from his mistakes the following year...
27. WRESTLEMANIA 29 (2013)
Wrestlemania 27 is usually the one that gets referred to first when it comes to recent disappointments but I would argue that 29 is actually worse. There was nothing truly awful but none of the big matches (Cena vs Rock, Triple H vs Brock Lesnar, Undertaker vs CM Punk) delivered the way they could have while the rest of the card was just forgettable. And somehow having a really dull Wrestlemania is arguably even worse than one that's a total train wreck - as least those can be perversely entertaining sometimes...
26. WRESTLEMANIA 13 (1997)
Probably the first WM on our list to contain one of the all time classic Mania matches in Bret Hart vs Steve Austin which was a fantastic brutal hate-filled brawl with an unexpected double turn at the end just to cap it off. Unfortunately, that's literally all it's got going for it. Of the other six matches on the card there's really only one that's even average which is the Chicago Street Fight between the Legion of Doom and the Nation of Domination and the main event between Psycho Sid and the Undertaker must be up there in the worst Mania headline matches of all time. You have to feel sorry for the Hit Man and Stone Cold really...
25. WRESTLEMANIA 4 (1988)
"Can we just concentrate on the match here Gorilla? It's too late and I'm getting too tired to argue with you now." That quote from Jesse Ventura late on in the event tells you everything you need to know about WM4. It was a brave idea (a 14 man title tournament to determine a new champion after the whole Hulk/Andre shenanigans) that didn't quite work just because of how long the whole thing was. If you're willing to persevere with it though there's a few decent matches in here - Randy Savage vs Ted DiBiase in the main event is well worth a watch while Ricky Steamboat vs Greg Valentine deserved better than to be buried as a semi-forgotten first round match. There's an entertaining tag title bout between Strike Force and Demolition as well and the battle royale that kicks the whole thing off is fun enough also. But at four hours...let's just say you're gonna need a whole vat of black coffee and plenty of matchsticks to prop your eyelids open to get through this in one go.
LOWER MID-CARD
Generally a couple of good matches here and there but approach with caution
24. WRESTLEMANIA 27 (2011)
Much maligned at the time due to the fact that a 15 minute borefest between Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler (which didn't even end that tiresome feud!) bumped Daniel Bryan vs Sheamus off the card, a poor main event between John Cena and the Miz and the presence of the Rock yukking it up between matches which quickly became tiresome. Yet get past those (admittedly major) disappointments and there were actually a few decent matches on here such as Edge vs Alberto del Rio, Cody Rhodes vs Rey Mysterio (probably Rey's last great WM moment), Randy Orton vs CM Punk and Triple H vs the Undertaker. The trouble is that, rather like WM25 a couple of years earlier, it's the bad stuff that everyone remembers and in this case it was really bad. Proof that two or three poor booking decisions can turn what would otherwise have been a half decent 'Mania into a bit of a train wreck unfortunately.
23. WRESTLEMANIA 12 (1996)
Similar to the previous year, this took place when WWF were struggling both financially and creatively and unfortunately it showed a bit. Putting Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels in the main event was a great idea. Making it a 60 minute Iron Man match with no falls until the final minute really wasn't - some people like it but I just find it dull unfortunately. That aside though, there's nothing particularly wrong with WM 12 (apart from the comically bad Backlot Brawl between Goldust and Roddy Piper) and all the matches are passable enough (Undertaker vs Diesel being my pick of the bunch with Steve Austin vs Savio Vega and the six man opening tag match also being worth a look), it's just that this really did need 30 minutes clipping off the main event and a couple more matches putting in.
22. WRESTLEMANIA 25 (2009)
If there was an award for worst organised Wrestlemania then this one would be right up there. It starts off great with a MITB match which officially marked the emergence of CM Punk as a major player. Then we get...um, a half hour Kid Rock concert. Followed by a Divas battle royale which was won by Santino Marella in drag and a legends match featuring a way past it Jimmy Snuka and Roddy Piper. There's a brief resurgence in the middle with a great match between the Undertaker and Shawn Michaels and a vicious brawl between the Hardy brothers, even the three-way between John Cena, Big Show and Edge is surprisingly watchable but the main event between Triple H and Randy Orton was another let down and drags this one below the average line.
21. WRESTLEMANIA 21 (2005)
I think this one suffered just because the previous four Wrestlemanias had been so good. It comes out of the traps blazing with a great MITB match and Rey Mysterio vs Eddie Guerrero but the pace drops off massively thereafter, only really coming alive again for a great technical match between Shawn Michaels and Kurt Angle with both main events (Cena vs Bradshaw and Batista vs Triple H) being big disappointments just because of how green Cena and Batista both were at the time. And don't even get me started on that Big Show sumo match...
20. WRESTLEMANIA 1 (1985)
This gets a semi-free pass because it was the first time WWF had ever done something like this. In terms of the quality of matches it's not great but the nostalgia factor carries it through. The main event tag match is good fun and Andre slamming Studd is a good moment while the other three title matches (Wendi Richter vs Leilani Kai, US Express vs Sheik & Volkoff and JYD vs Valentine) are at least watchable. Don't get me wrong, compared to modern day stuff it looks ridiculously dated but if it doesn't at least give you the warm fuzzy glow of nostalgia then there's something wrong with you.
19. WRESTLEMANIA 28 (2012)
This one got off to a very bad start with an 18 second match between Sheamus and Daniel Bryan which nearly broke the Internet the next day because fans were so angry about it followed by three more forgettable matches. However, it picks up in the middle with a great match between Undertaker and Triple H and stays in fourth gear from there until the end with the CM Punk vs Chris Jericho and Rock vs Cena matches rounding things off in style. One that you have to persevere with but there's a few decent bits. Start watching it halfway through for best results though.
18. WRESTLEMANIA 6 (1990)
The second of the three "express line" Wrestlemanias from the turn of the decade. Despite a packed crowd in Toronto, it's unfortunately the weakest of the three. The main event between Hulk Hogan and the Ultimate Warrior is a deserved classic and the tag team title match is worth watching just to see Andre's final Wrestlemania match but beyond that this one's pretty poor to be honest with matches that either didn't deliver the way they should've done (Jake Roberts vs Ted DiBiase), were cursed with terrible gimmicks (Randy Savage and Dusty Rhodes being chucked into a poor mixed tag match when a singles match between the two would've served far better) or just plain forgettable (the rest of it). It just about gets a pass for the main event and the hyped crowd who keep the atmosphere going but this was a real missed opportunity when all's said and done.
17. WRESTLEMANIA 16 (2000)
Pretty much a two match card but the TLC match and the triple threat between Angle, Jericho and Benoit pretty much saved this from going the same way as WM15 the year before. The main event's decent enough but having a heel (Triple H in this case) go over on the final match of the night at Mania with Vince's help just feels wrong, especially given how bored to tears everyone was by the McMahon family feud at this point while the rest of the card was definitely a bit substandard. Ah well, them's the breaks.
UPPER MID CARD
Not quite classics but still a good way to spend 3-4 hours
16. WRESTLEMANIA 24 (2008)
Rather like WM23 the year before, this was a mix of good and bad. On the plus side, Michaels vs Flair was a great match and a fitting send-off for Naitch, Taker vs Edge more than delivered in the main event slot and the MITB match at the start is an awesome opener. On the downside, Kane squashing Chavo Guerrero in ten seconds was just a waste of a match, ditto Floyd Mayweather vs Big Show (the noughties' answer to Lawrence Taylor vs Bam Bam Bigelow?) and Batista vs Umaga wasn't much better. Pretty much the midway marker for Wrestlemanias so far.
15. WRESTLEMANIA 23 (2007)
This seemed better at the time to be honest. On the plus side, Shawn Michaels finally carried John Cena to a good Wrestlemania match in the main event, Chris Benoit vs MVP and Money In The Bank were both good efforts and even Undertaker vs Batista exceeded expectations. On the downside, Khali vs Kane and Lashley vs Umaga were both poor matches and drag this one back down to just above average. Could've been worse though.
14. WRESTLEMANIA 7 (1991)
The last of the trio of express line Wrestlemanias from the turn of the decade. This one felt like it had more on the line than 6 and in Warrior vs Savage it has an all-time classic. Hogan vs Slaughter in the main event wasn't bad either while the tag title matches between the Hart Foundation and the Nasty Boys and the IC match between the Big Boss Man and Mr Perfect at least kept interest up while the undercard had a hidden gem between the Rockers and the Faces of Fear as an opener plus the start of Taker's streak. True, there's still quite a bit of filler on there but at least this is well on the right side of watchable.
13. WRESTLEMANIA 5 (1989)
Confession time - I'm biased here as this was the first Wrestlemania I saw. It seems to get a lot of bad press mainly due to being one of the express line Manias but the main event of Hogan vs Savage is maybe the best main event Mania match that the Hulkster was ever in. Further down the card, there's entertaining matches like the Brain Busters vs Strike Force, Blue Blazer vs Mr Perfect and the Rockers vs the Twin Towers. Okay, there's some misfires on there as well but overall I think this one just shades it as the best of the three "cram everyone on the card" Manias.
12. WRESTLEMANIA 26 (2010)
After three average Manias, this one at least delivered with a good five quality matches capped off by a superb Taker vs Shawn main event. Add to that good bouts between Jericho and Edge, the triple threat match between Legacy, Rey vs CM Punk and Money In The Bank and that's a pretty solid card. Sure, Cena vs Batista was a bit underwhelming, the Divas and tag title matches weren't great and the Bret vs Vince match probably shouldn't have happened but this one at least has way more good than bad on it.
11. WRESTLEMANIA 31 (2015)
Take care of the basics and the rest'll take care of themselves. Okay so it's not exactly "What the World is Watching" but in terms of a tagline for Wrestlemania 31 it works perfectly. This was a good solid show with the only clunker really being the head-scratching Triple H vs Sting match. Even if there was no real "holy shit" moment, there's plenty to get your teeth into here including the IC ladder match, Cena vs Rusev, Taker vs Bray and Orton vs Rollins all being worth a watch. When even the Rock's talking segment works well, you know that the stars have aligned nicely.
10. WRESTLEMANIA 18 (2002)
Much like WM31, simply a good solid Wrestlemania card where pretty much all of the matches delivered to some degree and the big arena atmosphere definitely helped it feel like a "proper" Mania. Rock vs Hogan really is a "once in a generation" type match just for the atmosphere while the ultra-intense Taker vs Flair match is well worth a watch too. The main event of Triple H vs Jericho isn't bad either, it's just overshadowed a tiny bit by what's gone before.
9. WRESTLEMANIA 8 (1992)
If only the second half of this thing was as good as the first, this would be in the Top 5 easily. As it is, pretty much all of the first five matches (with the exception of the throwaway eight-man brawl which serves its purpose as filler) are all worth a watch with Savage vs Flair for the title being the highlight closely followed by Hart vs Piper for the IC belt. The main event with Hogan vs Sid was lacklustre but for the first half alone, this definitely deserves to be in the upper echelons of Wrestlemanias.
THE CLASSICS
If you're gonna start anywhere, start with one of these...
8. WRESTLEMANIA 19 (2003)
Ironically, WWE was suffering a bit of an identity crisis at this time following the end of the Attitude Era but not that you'd know it from watching this show. Apart from a below-par handicap match with Taker (and the questionable booking around the otherwise decent HHH vs Booker match), pretty much everything on here works to some degree right from the fast-paced cruiserweight opening match between Matt Hardy and Rey Mysterio. The three-way for the tag titles featured some of the best technicians in the company at the time, Hogan vs McMahon was an excellent hate-filled streetfight, Jericho vs Michaels was everything you hoped it would be, Austin vs Rock was a real "end of an era" moment and Angle and Lesnar put on a worthy main event to close the show out. Good stuff.
7. WRESTLEMANIA 30 (2014)
A solid show elevated up the list by the main event which saw WWE finally acknowledge the reaction Daniel Bryan had been getting from the fans and put him over to win the title in a real feelgood moment (similar to Guerrero and Benoit ten years earlier). Aside from that, Cena and Bray Wyatt had a much better match than they really had any right to, Lesnar vs Taker was a real "holy shit" moment due to the end of the Streak (the rights and wrongs of which have been debated endlessly elsewhere) and even if the Divas match and battle royale felt a bit like filler, this was a Mania that left you with a good feeling overall.
6. WRESTLEMANIA 22 (2006)
Another Mania which delivered despite coming at a time when WWE had gone a bit stale creatively. Rey winning the title in a great match against Orton and Triple H plus a vicious streetfight between Shawn Michaels and Vince McMahon were the highlights but add in a great MITB match, a hate-filled brawl between Mick Foley and Edge, the Divas title match between Mickie James and Trish Stratus and a better than expected match between Triple H and John Cena and that's six good reasons to watch the show right there. Even the two below-par matches (Candice Michelle vs Torrie Wilson and the Boogeyman vs Booker T) are at least kept nice and short so as not to spoil things too much.
5. WRESTLEMANIA 14 (1998)
True, there have been better technical Wrestlemanias but WM14 pretty much symbolised everything that made the Attitude Era so watchable. The main event with Austin pinning Shawn for his first title run is a real "passing of the torch" moment while Taker vs Kane and the New Age Outlaws vs Cactus Jack and Terry Funk are both entertaining wild brawls. Essentially, this one is a riot from start to finish and that's what makes it so enjoyable. As with WM3, it's very much of its time but for the sheer atmosphere and excitement, this one is hard to beat.
4. WRESTLEMANIA 20 (2004)
Like WM30 a decade later, this is remembered for the feelgood moment at the end when Chris Benoit and Eddie Guerrero, written off as "vanilla midgets" in their WCW days, both won their World and WWE Title matches and celebrated in the ring at the end. Subsequent events make it more of a sad thing to watch nowadays but it was a great moment at the time. There was plenty more to recommend about this Mania too including Evolution taking on the Rock 'n' Sock Connection in a high-octane brawl, Taker and Kane lifting the roof off the place (even though the match was solid rather than spectacular) and even the Goldberg-Lesnar non-match being enlivened by Stone Cold sending them off with a couple of Stunners much to the crowd's appreciation. Good stuff.
3. WRESTLEMANIA 10 (1994)
It's funny how sometimes the best Wrestlemanias come at a time when WWF/E as a whole isn't in good shape. In early '94, the company was basically a ship without a rudder with several big names having departed and the PPV's the previous year being somewhat underwhelming to put it kindly. Yet somehow they pulled a real rabbit out of the hat with WM10 capped off with Bret Hart winning back the title he should never have lost the year before and Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon both cementing their legacies as main event players with an awesome ladder match. Further down the card, Bret and Owen Hart had a technical masterclass in the opener and Randy Savage (in his last WWF PPV match) and Crush's wild "Falls Count Anywhere" brawl is good fun too.
2. WRESTLEMANIA 3 (1987)
Pretty much the gold standard by which all Wrestlemanias are judged, WM3 was the first real classic Mania and still holds up well today. The crowd was off the hook for the main event of Hogan vs Andre, matched only by a technical classic between Randy Savage and Ricky Steamboat. But every match on the card had a big main event feel about it with a solid build-up and good storytelling and that's what makes this the best of the early Wrestlemanias by a long chalk.
1. WRESTLEMANIA 17 (2001)
Take the fast-paced action of WM14, add in a good dose of quality technical wrestling (the only thing WM14 fell down on slightly), a packed out enormodome atmosphere and you've got the best Wrestlemania to date. The main event between Austin and Rock (despite a slightly screwy ending) is an all-out classic but the TLC match between the Hardys, Dudleys and Edge & Christian runs it close as do the matches between Triple H and the Undertaker and Angle and Benoit. In fact, the whole card is solid and every match keeps your interest. Let's just say that it'll take something very special from WWE to move this from the top of the tree in the future.
NB - I actually started this article a year ago in the run up to Wrestlemania 32 but didn't finish it in time so I've kind of kept it in storage until now. Luckily the intervening year hasn't changed my opinion too much...
THE BOTTOM TIER
Vince, What Were You Thinking?
32. WRESTLEMANIA 9 (1993)
Do I really have to go into details here? Basically, this was the year that was supposed to see the post-Hogan generation of wrestlers finally break out and come into their own...only for Hulk to return a month prior and squash everyone back down the card. But it's not just the fact that the main event here (Bret Hart loses the title to a very green Yokozuna who then gets squashed by Hogan in 20 seconds flat) left a very bad taste, it's the fact that 75% of the matches on this card flat-out sucked. If I have to pick a highlight, I'd go for the Steiner Brothers vs the Headshrinkers. Maybe at a stretch Shawn Michaels vs Tatanka (although at 18 minutes it's way too long for its own good) or Lex Luger vs Mr Perfect (despite a screwy ending) but one half-decent and two just about watchable matches is pretty damn poor for the big event of the year.
31. WRESTLEMANIA 32 (2016)
Just an absolute mess from start to finish, WM32 really did sum up everything that was wrong with WWE's booking in 2015-16. The main event of Roman Reigns vs Triple H was a real endurance test with the crowd simply not caring who won, Dean Ambrose and Brock Lesnar proved that PG street fights really don't work and even the better matches such as AJ Styles vs Chris Jericho and the Divas triple threat were spoiled by the wrong wrestler going over (if you believe the rumours, to ensure Reigns would get a pop when he won the title at the end. Which, erm, very much didn't happen). And at a mind-melting six hours, it makes Japanese water torture seem like a fun option by comparison.
30. WRESTLEMANIA 11 (1995)
WWF were in the doldrums financially and creatively at this point and boy did WM11 bear that out. The title match between Shawn Michaels and Diesel is probably the pick of the bunch here but it wasn't even the main event! That "honour" went to a match between Bam Bam Bigelow and NFL star Lawrence Taylor which well and truly sucked the meat missile. Beyond that, the IC title match between Razor Ramon and Jeff Jarrett is at least watchable (although the screwy DQ ending takes quite a bit away from it) and it's nice to see Owen Hart win his first gold in the WWF but the rest of the card was by and large terrible.
29. WRESTLEMANIA 15 (1999)
Ironic that during what's largely considered to be the Attitude Era's hot streak, WWF put out one of their worst Wrestlemanias. Vince Russo, who then had the book, had experimented with the fast lane style of booking at the previous year's Survivor Series and done it pretty well but WM15 proved it's difficult to capture lightning in a bottle twice. Inexplicable storyline arcs, rapid fire heel and face turns, matches with no backstory...by the end of it you were staring at the screen like a burnt out zombie. The saving grace was an entertaining brawl between the Rock and Steve Austin in the main event - without that, this would have had a very good chance of unseating WM9 as the worst ever.
28. WRESTLEMANIA 2 (1986)
Put this one down to a case of growing pains. After the success of the initial Wrestlemania, Vince McMahon decided that they should go all out for WM2 and book it across three cities. Unfortunately the quality of the matches was pretty poor. On the plus side, there's an entertaining tag title match between the Dream Team and the British Bulldogs, a fun brawl with the Funk Brothers taking on Junkyard Dog and Tito Santana, Ricky Steamboat carrying Hercules to a decent match and even the main event between Hulk Hogan and King Kong Bundy isn't that bad. On the flip side, the rest of the card contains a dull as hell boxing match between Roddy Piper and Mr T, five sub-three minute squash matches (including a contender for the worst WM match ever in Adrian Adonis vs Uncle Elmer), a dull double count out between Paul Orndorff and Don Muraco and proof that even Randy Savage can only work so many miracles when he's up against a slug like George Steele. Luckily Vince would learn from his mistakes the following year...
27. WRESTLEMANIA 29 (2013)
Wrestlemania 27 is usually the one that gets referred to first when it comes to recent disappointments but I would argue that 29 is actually worse. There was nothing truly awful but none of the big matches (Cena vs Rock, Triple H vs Brock Lesnar, Undertaker vs CM Punk) delivered the way they could have while the rest of the card was just forgettable. And somehow having a really dull Wrestlemania is arguably even worse than one that's a total train wreck - as least those can be perversely entertaining sometimes...
26. WRESTLEMANIA 13 (1997)
Probably the first WM on our list to contain one of the all time classic Mania matches in Bret Hart vs Steve Austin which was a fantastic brutal hate-filled brawl with an unexpected double turn at the end just to cap it off. Unfortunately, that's literally all it's got going for it. Of the other six matches on the card there's really only one that's even average which is the Chicago Street Fight between the Legion of Doom and the Nation of Domination and the main event between Psycho Sid and the Undertaker must be up there in the worst Mania headline matches of all time. You have to feel sorry for the Hit Man and Stone Cold really...
25. WRESTLEMANIA 4 (1988)
"Can we just concentrate on the match here Gorilla? It's too late and I'm getting too tired to argue with you now." That quote from Jesse Ventura late on in the event tells you everything you need to know about WM4. It was a brave idea (a 14 man title tournament to determine a new champion after the whole Hulk/Andre shenanigans) that didn't quite work just because of how long the whole thing was. If you're willing to persevere with it though there's a few decent matches in here - Randy Savage vs Ted DiBiase in the main event is well worth a watch while Ricky Steamboat vs Greg Valentine deserved better than to be buried as a semi-forgotten first round match. There's an entertaining tag title bout between Strike Force and Demolition as well and the battle royale that kicks the whole thing off is fun enough also. But at four hours...let's just say you're gonna need a whole vat of black coffee and plenty of matchsticks to prop your eyelids open to get through this in one go.
LOWER MID-CARD
Generally a couple of good matches here and there but approach with caution
24. WRESTLEMANIA 27 (2011)
Much maligned at the time due to the fact that a 15 minute borefest between Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler (which didn't even end that tiresome feud!) bumped Daniel Bryan vs Sheamus off the card, a poor main event between John Cena and the Miz and the presence of the Rock yukking it up between matches which quickly became tiresome. Yet get past those (admittedly major) disappointments and there were actually a few decent matches on here such as Edge vs Alberto del Rio, Cody Rhodes vs Rey Mysterio (probably Rey's last great WM moment), Randy Orton vs CM Punk and Triple H vs the Undertaker. The trouble is that, rather like WM25 a couple of years earlier, it's the bad stuff that everyone remembers and in this case it was really bad. Proof that two or three poor booking decisions can turn what would otherwise have been a half decent 'Mania into a bit of a train wreck unfortunately.
23. WRESTLEMANIA 12 (1996)
Similar to the previous year, this took place when WWF were struggling both financially and creatively and unfortunately it showed a bit. Putting Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels in the main event was a great idea. Making it a 60 minute Iron Man match with no falls until the final minute really wasn't - some people like it but I just find it dull unfortunately. That aside though, there's nothing particularly wrong with WM 12 (apart from the comically bad Backlot Brawl between Goldust and Roddy Piper) and all the matches are passable enough (Undertaker vs Diesel being my pick of the bunch with Steve Austin vs Savio Vega and the six man opening tag match also being worth a look), it's just that this really did need 30 minutes clipping off the main event and a couple more matches putting in.
22. WRESTLEMANIA 25 (2009)
If there was an award for worst organised Wrestlemania then this one would be right up there. It starts off great with a MITB match which officially marked the emergence of CM Punk as a major player. Then we get...um, a half hour Kid Rock concert. Followed by a Divas battle royale which was won by Santino Marella in drag and a legends match featuring a way past it Jimmy Snuka and Roddy Piper. There's a brief resurgence in the middle with a great match between the Undertaker and Shawn Michaels and a vicious brawl between the Hardy brothers, even the three-way between John Cena, Big Show and Edge is surprisingly watchable but the main event between Triple H and Randy Orton was another let down and drags this one below the average line.
21. WRESTLEMANIA 21 (2005)
I think this one suffered just because the previous four Wrestlemanias had been so good. It comes out of the traps blazing with a great MITB match and Rey Mysterio vs Eddie Guerrero but the pace drops off massively thereafter, only really coming alive again for a great technical match between Shawn Michaels and Kurt Angle with both main events (Cena vs Bradshaw and Batista vs Triple H) being big disappointments just because of how green Cena and Batista both were at the time. And don't even get me started on that Big Show sumo match...
20. WRESTLEMANIA 1 (1985)
This gets a semi-free pass because it was the first time WWF had ever done something like this. In terms of the quality of matches it's not great but the nostalgia factor carries it through. The main event tag match is good fun and Andre slamming Studd is a good moment while the other three title matches (Wendi Richter vs Leilani Kai, US Express vs Sheik & Volkoff and JYD vs Valentine) are at least watchable. Don't get me wrong, compared to modern day stuff it looks ridiculously dated but if it doesn't at least give you the warm fuzzy glow of nostalgia then there's something wrong with you.
19. WRESTLEMANIA 28 (2012)
This one got off to a very bad start with an 18 second match between Sheamus and Daniel Bryan which nearly broke the Internet the next day because fans were so angry about it followed by three more forgettable matches. However, it picks up in the middle with a great match between Undertaker and Triple H and stays in fourth gear from there until the end with the CM Punk vs Chris Jericho and Rock vs Cena matches rounding things off in style. One that you have to persevere with but there's a few decent bits. Start watching it halfway through for best results though.
18. WRESTLEMANIA 6 (1990)
The second of the three "express line" Wrestlemanias from the turn of the decade. Despite a packed crowd in Toronto, it's unfortunately the weakest of the three. The main event between Hulk Hogan and the Ultimate Warrior is a deserved classic and the tag team title match is worth watching just to see Andre's final Wrestlemania match but beyond that this one's pretty poor to be honest with matches that either didn't deliver the way they should've done (Jake Roberts vs Ted DiBiase), were cursed with terrible gimmicks (Randy Savage and Dusty Rhodes being chucked into a poor mixed tag match when a singles match between the two would've served far better) or just plain forgettable (the rest of it). It just about gets a pass for the main event and the hyped crowd who keep the atmosphere going but this was a real missed opportunity when all's said and done.
17. WRESTLEMANIA 16 (2000)
Pretty much a two match card but the TLC match and the triple threat between Angle, Jericho and Benoit pretty much saved this from going the same way as WM15 the year before. The main event's decent enough but having a heel (Triple H in this case) go over on the final match of the night at Mania with Vince's help just feels wrong, especially given how bored to tears everyone was by the McMahon family feud at this point while the rest of the card was definitely a bit substandard. Ah well, them's the breaks.
UPPER MID CARD
Not quite classics but still a good way to spend 3-4 hours
16. WRESTLEMANIA 24 (2008)
Rather like WM23 the year before, this was a mix of good and bad. On the plus side, Michaels vs Flair was a great match and a fitting send-off for Naitch, Taker vs Edge more than delivered in the main event slot and the MITB match at the start is an awesome opener. On the downside, Kane squashing Chavo Guerrero in ten seconds was just a waste of a match, ditto Floyd Mayweather vs Big Show (the noughties' answer to Lawrence Taylor vs Bam Bam Bigelow?) and Batista vs Umaga wasn't much better. Pretty much the midway marker for Wrestlemanias so far.
15. WRESTLEMANIA 23 (2007)
This seemed better at the time to be honest. On the plus side, Shawn Michaels finally carried John Cena to a good Wrestlemania match in the main event, Chris Benoit vs MVP and Money In The Bank were both good efforts and even Undertaker vs Batista exceeded expectations. On the downside, Khali vs Kane and Lashley vs Umaga were both poor matches and drag this one back down to just above average. Could've been worse though.
14. WRESTLEMANIA 7 (1991)
The last of the trio of express line Wrestlemanias from the turn of the decade. This one felt like it had more on the line than 6 and in Warrior vs Savage it has an all-time classic. Hogan vs Slaughter in the main event wasn't bad either while the tag title matches between the Hart Foundation and the Nasty Boys and the IC match between the Big Boss Man and Mr Perfect at least kept interest up while the undercard had a hidden gem between the Rockers and the Faces of Fear as an opener plus the start of Taker's streak. True, there's still quite a bit of filler on there but at least this is well on the right side of watchable.
13. WRESTLEMANIA 5 (1989)
Confession time - I'm biased here as this was the first Wrestlemania I saw. It seems to get a lot of bad press mainly due to being one of the express line Manias but the main event of Hogan vs Savage is maybe the best main event Mania match that the Hulkster was ever in. Further down the card, there's entertaining matches like the Brain Busters vs Strike Force, Blue Blazer vs Mr Perfect and the Rockers vs the Twin Towers. Okay, there's some misfires on there as well but overall I think this one just shades it as the best of the three "cram everyone on the card" Manias.
12. WRESTLEMANIA 26 (2010)
After three average Manias, this one at least delivered with a good five quality matches capped off by a superb Taker vs Shawn main event. Add to that good bouts between Jericho and Edge, the triple threat match between Legacy, Rey vs CM Punk and Money In The Bank and that's a pretty solid card. Sure, Cena vs Batista was a bit underwhelming, the Divas and tag title matches weren't great and the Bret vs Vince match probably shouldn't have happened but this one at least has way more good than bad on it.
11. WRESTLEMANIA 31 (2015)
Take care of the basics and the rest'll take care of themselves. Okay so it's not exactly "What the World is Watching" but in terms of a tagline for Wrestlemania 31 it works perfectly. This was a good solid show with the only clunker really being the head-scratching Triple H vs Sting match. Even if there was no real "holy shit" moment, there's plenty to get your teeth into here including the IC ladder match, Cena vs Rusev, Taker vs Bray and Orton vs Rollins all being worth a watch. When even the Rock's talking segment works well, you know that the stars have aligned nicely.
10. WRESTLEMANIA 18 (2002)
Much like WM31, simply a good solid Wrestlemania card where pretty much all of the matches delivered to some degree and the big arena atmosphere definitely helped it feel like a "proper" Mania. Rock vs Hogan really is a "once in a generation" type match just for the atmosphere while the ultra-intense Taker vs Flair match is well worth a watch too. The main event of Triple H vs Jericho isn't bad either, it's just overshadowed a tiny bit by what's gone before.
9. WRESTLEMANIA 8 (1992)
If only the second half of this thing was as good as the first, this would be in the Top 5 easily. As it is, pretty much all of the first five matches (with the exception of the throwaway eight-man brawl which serves its purpose as filler) are all worth a watch with Savage vs Flair for the title being the highlight closely followed by Hart vs Piper for the IC belt. The main event with Hogan vs Sid was lacklustre but for the first half alone, this definitely deserves to be in the upper echelons of Wrestlemanias.
THE CLASSICS
If you're gonna start anywhere, start with one of these...
8. WRESTLEMANIA 19 (2003)
Ironically, WWE was suffering a bit of an identity crisis at this time following the end of the Attitude Era but not that you'd know it from watching this show. Apart from a below-par handicap match with Taker (and the questionable booking around the otherwise decent HHH vs Booker match), pretty much everything on here works to some degree right from the fast-paced cruiserweight opening match between Matt Hardy and Rey Mysterio. The three-way for the tag titles featured some of the best technicians in the company at the time, Hogan vs McMahon was an excellent hate-filled streetfight, Jericho vs Michaels was everything you hoped it would be, Austin vs Rock was a real "end of an era" moment and Angle and Lesnar put on a worthy main event to close the show out. Good stuff.
7. WRESTLEMANIA 30 (2014)
A solid show elevated up the list by the main event which saw WWE finally acknowledge the reaction Daniel Bryan had been getting from the fans and put him over to win the title in a real feelgood moment (similar to Guerrero and Benoit ten years earlier). Aside from that, Cena and Bray Wyatt had a much better match than they really had any right to, Lesnar vs Taker was a real "holy shit" moment due to the end of the Streak (the rights and wrongs of which have been debated endlessly elsewhere) and even if the Divas match and battle royale felt a bit like filler, this was a Mania that left you with a good feeling overall.
6. WRESTLEMANIA 22 (2006)
Another Mania which delivered despite coming at a time when WWE had gone a bit stale creatively. Rey winning the title in a great match against Orton and Triple H plus a vicious streetfight between Shawn Michaels and Vince McMahon were the highlights but add in a great MITB match, a hate-filled brawl between Mick Foley and Edge, the Divas title match between Mickie James and Trish Stratus and a better than expected match between Triple H and John Cena and that's six good reasons to watch the show right there. Even the two below-par matches (Candice Michelle vs Torrie Wilson and the Boogeyman vs Booker T) are at least kept nice and short so as not to spoil things too much.
5. WRESTLEMANIA 14 (1998)
True, there have been better technical Wrestlemanias but WM14 pretty much symbolised everything that made the Attitude Era so watchable. The main event with Austin pinning Shawn for his first title run is a real "passing of the torch" moment while Taker vs Kane and the New Age Outlaws vs Cactus Jack and Terry Funk are both entertaining wild brawls. Essentially, this one is a riot from start to finish and that's what makes it so enjoyable. As with WM3, it's very much of its time but for the sheer atmosphere and excitement, this one is hard to beat.
4. WRESTLEMANIA 20 (2004)
Like WM30 a decade later, this is remembered for the feelgood moment at the end when Chris Benoit and Eddie Guerrero, written off as "vanilla midgets" in their WCW days, both won their World and WWE Title matches and celebrated in the ring at the end. Subsequent events make it more of a sad thing to watch nowadays but it was a great moment at the time. There was plenty more to recommend about this Mania too including Evolution taking on the Rock 'n' Sock Connection in a high-octane brawl, Taker and Kane lifting the roof off the place (even though the match was solid rather than spectacular) and even the Goldberg-Lesnar non-match being enlivened by Stone Cold sending them off with a couple of Stunners much to the crowd's appreciation. Good stuff.
3. WRESTLEMANIA 10 (1994)
It's funny how sometimes the best Wrestlemanias come at a time when WWF/E as a whole isn't in good shape. In early '94, the company was basically a ship without a rudder with several big names having departed and the PPV's the previous year being somewhat underwhelming to put it kindly. Yet somehow they pulled a real rabbit out of the hat with WM10 capped off with Bret Hart winning back the title he should never have lost the year before and Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon both cementing their legacies as main event players with an awesome ladder match. Further down the card, Bret and Owen Hart had a technical masterclass in the opener and Randy Savage (in his last WWF PPV match) and Crush's wild "Falls Count Anywhere" brawl is good fun too.
2. WRESTLEMANIA 3 (1987)
Pretty much the gold standard by which all Wrestlemanias are judged, WM3 was the first real classic Mania and still holds up well today. The crowd was off the hook for the main event of Hogan vs Andre, matched only by a technical classic between Randy Savage and Ricky Steamboat. But every match on the card had a big main event feel about it with a solid build-up and good storytelling and that's what makes this the best of the early Wrestlemanias by a long chalk.
1. WRESTLEMANIA 17 (2001)
Take the fast-paced action of WM14, add in a good dose of quality technical wrestling (the only thing WM14 fell down on slightly), a packed out enormodome atmosphere and you've got the best Wrestlemania to date. The main event between Austin and Rock (despite a slightly screwy ending) is an all-out classic but the TLC match between the Hardys, Dudleys and Edge & Christian runs it close as do the matches between Triple H and the Undertaker and Angle and Benoit. In fact, the whole card is solid and every match keeps your interest. Let's just say that it'll take something very special from WWE to move this from the top of the tree in the future.
Wednesday, 23 December 2015
Andy's Wrestling Review 2015
So it's been a while since I covered wrestling on the blog but I thought I'd do a bit of a review for my thoughts on the last 12 months. We'll do this show by show so let's kick off with the obvious...
WWE RAW/SMACKDOWN: Well, the year started with a babyface Royal Rumble winner being given the Rock's seal of approval and still getting booed out of the ring and, apart from a couple of decent moments, it really didn't get much better from there. For the majority of 2015, Raw and Smackdown (let's be honest, they're pretty much interchangable nowadays) have been a convoluted mess of bad booking, misused characters and storylines that nobody cares about.
Credit to WWE, after a horrendous Royal Rumble mis-step, they did come up with two solid PPV's in Fast Lane and Wrestlemania (which was way better than I was worried it was gonna be) but the trouble is that they stumbled off into the fog without a compass straight away afterwards. Seth Rollins winning the title should have been the catalyst for him to finally become the man to carry the company on his back but awful booking saw him pretty much get cut off at the knees due to the terrible "Corporate Champion" character they saddled him with (yeah, that old chestnut...more on that later).
It did look like things were getting better in the run-up to Survivor Series - even before Rollins' injury threw the whole title scene into chaos, Raw had a couple of episodes which were the best for months. And the title tournament, combined with several of the old guard taking time off through injuries, gave a lot of people hope that this was a golden opportunity for WWE to give someone new the ball and see if they could run with it but the end result at Survivor Series was an absolute mess - Roman Reigns winning the title wasn't the end of the world as at least he'd been built up a bit better than 12 months ago but for him to then instantly lose it to Sheamus (a decent wrestler but so far from being over as a heel that he might as well be under) was a total turn-off.
Speaking of injuries...I will give WWE some leeway and say that the number of wrestlers being put on the sidelines over the last 12 months really hasn't helped them at all - Rollins we've dealt with already but 2015 also saw Daniel Bryan's injury woes continue and it looks as though we may now have seen the last of him in a WWE ring. Likewise, John Cena ended up having to take time off on the back of probably his best year in wrestling to date and add to that the likes of Randy Orton, Tyson Kidd, Cesaro, Sting, Sami Zayn, Hideo Otami (yeah I know the last two are technically still on NXT but you're seriously telling me they wouldn't have been called up to the main roster by now if they'd stayed fit?) all being absent for long periods (not to mention the part-timers like Undertaker and Brock Lesnar) and it leaves you at a serious disadvantage.
But even an injury crisis is still no excuse for some of the abysmal booking from WWE in the last year. The main problem is the continuation of the Authority storyline that has been running for close on two decades now and which I think I can safely say that 95% of WWE fans are sick to the back teeth of. Evil authority figures worked in 1999 because Vince McMahon was awesome in the role but it's got so watered down now that nobody buys it anymore. Seriously guys, just drop the whole thing and let the lead heels on your roster try to get over on their own. Add to this a mix of good workers being held down in the midcard (Dolph Ziggler, Cesaro, Adrian Neville), the title scene being clogged up with has-beens like Big Show and Kane and the fact that a lot of the upper card feel as though they're in the wrong roles (I've already mentioned about Sheamus bombing as a heel, I'd add to that that I would turn Dean Ambrose heel as he just seems to have a natural knack for playing the bad guy which is being wasted in his current role. I'd also turn Wade Barrett face - his Bad News gimmick was starting to get him over last year before WWE dropped it and gave him the dreaded King gimmick which is doomed to fail unless your name's Jerry Lawler). Even guys who do start to get over like the New Day faction get their heat killed off when creative tries to take credit for something that's been created naturally and try to take charge of it themselves, usually failing. Even a reboot of the Divas division, which was badly needed, somehow got screwed up by creative as they introduced too many new faces at once leading to the likes of Becky Lynch and Sasha Banks simply getting lost in the shuffle.
I don't think there's any quick fix to WWE's problems going into New Year and with ratings currently at a two decade low, it's gonna take time to turn things around. My suggestion would be that the creative team badly needs to be cut from the 20-odd people who are currently on there to just one or two - giving the storylines a bit of clarity would be a good first step to the ship being righted. My suggestion would simply be to give the book to Paul Heyman but unfortunately he's gone on record as saying that becoming a booker again doesn't interest him.
I guess we'll see but as the Royal Rumble approaches I can't say I'm exactly optimistic about Raw getting much better in 2016...
NXT
Raw's parlous state is even more mind-boggling when you consider how well the junior arm of WWE, NXT, has been booked in the last 12 months. Every week they put on an hour of television that's fast-paced, well-told and with good wrestling to boot. The main contenders are made to look like serious threats and they're getting the sort of rabid following that's reminiscent of ECW back in the day. And the fact that they've got such a talented roster down there with guys like Finn Balor, Sami Zayn, Bayley, Hideo Otami and Samoa Joe, may just be the key to saving Raw.
The trouble is that when NXT stars get called up to the main roster, they often get abandoned to mid card purgatory - just look at Adrian Neville, Sasha Banks, Tyler Breeze and the Ascension. The fact that this could happen to the likes of Balor, Zayn and Bayley in the near future is worrying and unless WWE realises the goldmine they've got in their developmental territory, they're doomed to continue making the same mistakes again and again.
For now though, let's just enjoy NXT and hope that it doesn't get crippled from above in the near future. They've put on at least four classic PPV's in the last 12 months (Revolution, Rivals, Brooklyn and London), all of which would be in my Top 10 for the year (well, Revolution technically took place in the dying days of 2014 but you get my drift). Long may the quality continue.
IMPACT
Impact/TNA have had a weird 12 months. They've not done anything massively earth-shattering...but at the same time they're making steps forward after a calamitous few years financially. I wouldn't say their booking has quite got back up to the standard it was in early 2012 yet but they're definitely moving in the right direction.
The good stuff - the title scene this year has been generally pretty solid with a now face Bobby Lashley having a better than expected second run with the belt to start the year off before a rejuvenated Kurt Angle won it and finally EC3 (definitely the company's star performer this year) taking it in June up until Bound For Glory and the Title Series that followed.
The Wolves have definitely been a huge plus for TNA this year as well with some very entertaining feuds against the likes of the Revolution, Bobby Roode & Austin Aries and the Hardys. The only problem is that the tag team division at the moment is basically just them and TNA really needs to bring in some extra numbers to give them new challengers.
The Knockouts division has also come on in leaps and bounds this year with the likes of Gail Kim and Awesome Kong delivering as usual but even some of the less gifted members of the roster really raising their game to the point where I genuinely think TNA now (just to say) has a more solid and well-rounded womens' division than WWE, not least because it's booked well (with one exception which we'll come to in a bit).
The bad stuff - every faction that has appeared this year seems to have backfired massively. The BDC was a decent idea until everyone associated with it left within a few weeks of each other and just left it looking like it was hobbling along on its last legs for several weeks until MVP's departure from the company finally brought it to a merciful end. Likewise the Dollhouse have been a misfire in what was otherwise a decent year for the Knockouts' division. The original idea of them being creepy voodoo girls had potential but over the year they've just been watered down into a poor man's Beautiful People (not helped by Taryn being injured so much). Really, come 2015, the whole idea needs to be quietly abandoned and the four girls in question, all of whom unquestionably have talent, should be allowed to try and get over on their own without some hokey gimmick like this holding them back. There's also been a couple of goofy storylines which should have been deep sixed like James Storm pushing Mickie James in front of a train and Eric Young (who's otherwise had a very good year following his heel turn) stealing Chris Melendez's leg.
I think the main problem with TNA is the continuing uncertainty over their future and the closing days of 2015 see them exactly where they were a year ago, about to move to a new network and facing the prospect of a total creative reset. It's cost them a bit in terms of talent departures (Samoa Joe, Austin Aries, Low Ki, James Storm, MVP, Magnus) and they're gonna need to do a bit of roster rebuilding in the new year. Getting Mike Bennett and Maria Kanellis in from ROH is a good start - we shall see what else follows...
OTHER STUFF
I can't really say too much about ROH as I haven't seen a lot of their stuff but the one PPV I did catch ("Best In The World") I really enjoyed. They've got a good roster with the likes of AJ Styles, Jay Lethal, the Briscoes, Adam Cole, ReDragon, the Kingdom and the Addiction but like TNA they're currently facing cutbacks after losing their TV deal and going to an Internet only broadcast. Hopefully they can keep hold of a lot of their best wrestlers and keep moving forward in 2016.
I haven't seen too much of GFW other than their appearance on Impact over a few weeks in the summer. Jeff Jarrett has assembled a decent roster there with the likes of PJ Black, Magnus, Shelton Benjamin and Sonjay Dutt on board and I'll be interested to see if they manage to get some shows out there for people to see in the new year.
Others who deserve an honourable mention are House of Hardcore (I watched a couple of PPV's over the year and really enjoyed them) and PWG (their "Battle of Los Angeles" is definitely well worth a watch). Over here in the UK, I've seen good shows by RPW and Southside this year and would definitely recommend both to anyone who likes decent wrestling.
So there ya go - 2015 wrestling in a nutshell. Hopefully the New Year will see Raw finally pull out of its creative tailspin, TNA finally get their ship properly steadied, NXT continue to be its usual awesome self and ROH and GFW both get deals to put their programming out there. It should be interesting as always either way...
WWE RAW/SMACKDOWN: Well, the year started with a babyface Royal Rumble winner being given the Rock's seal of approval and still getting booed out of the ring and, apart from a couple of decent moments, it really didn't get much better from there. For the majority of 2015, Raw and Smackdown (let's be honest, they're pretty much interchangable nowadays) have been a convoluted mess of bad booking, misused characters and storylines that nobody cares about.
Credit to WWE, after a horrendous Royal Rumble mis-step, they did come up with two solid PPV's in Fast Lane and Wrestlemania (which was way better than I was worried it was gonna be) but the trouble is that they stumbled off into the fog without a compass straight away afterwards. Seth Rollins winning the title should have been the catalyst for him to finally become the man to carry the company on his back but awful booking saw him pretty much get cut off at the knees due to the terrible "Corporate Champion" character they saddled him with (yeah, that old chestnut...more on that later).
It did look like things were getting better in the run-up to Survivor Series - even before Rollins' injury threw the whole title scene into chaos, Raw had a couple of episodes which were the best for months. And the title tournament, combined with several of the old guard taking time off through injuries, gave a lot of people hope that this was a golden opportunity for WWE to give someone new the ball and see if they could run with it but the end result at Survivor Series was an absolute mess - Roman Reigns winning the title wasn't the end of the world as at least he'd been built up a bit better than 12 months ago but for him to then instantly lose it to Sheamus (a decent wrestler but so far from being over as a heel that he might as well be under) was a total turn-off.
Speaking of injuries...I will give WWE some leeway and say that the number of wrestlers being put on the sidelines over the last 12 months really hasn't helped them at all - Rollins we've dealt with already but 2015 also saw Daniel Bryan's injury woes continue and it looks as though we may now have seen the last of him in a WWE ring. Likewise, John Cena ended up having to take time off on the back of probably his best year in wrestling to date and add to that the likes of Randy Orton, Tyson Kidd, Cesaro, Sting, Sami Zayn, Hideo Otami (yeah I know the last two are technically still on NXT but you're seriously telling me they wouldn't have been called up to the main roster by now if they'd stayed fit?) all being absent for long periods (not to mention the part-timers like Undertaker and Brock Lesnar) and it leaves you at a serious disadvantage.
But even an injury crisis is still no excuse for some of the abysmal booking from WWE in the last year. The main problem is the continuation of the Authority storyline that has been running for close on two decades now and which I think I can safely say that 95% of WWE fans are sick to the back teeth of. Evil authority figures worked in 1999 because Vince McMahon was awesome in the role but it's got so watered down now that nobody buys it anymore. Seriously guys, just drop the whole thing and let the lead heels on your roster try to get over on their own. Add to this a mix of good workers being held down in the midcard (Dolph Ziggler, Cesaro, Adrian Neville), the title scene being clogged up with has-beens like Big Show and Kane and the fact that a lot of the upper card feel as though they're in the wrong roles (I've already mentioned about Sheamus bombing as a heel, I'd add to that that I would turn Dean Ambrose heel as he just seems to have a natural knack for playing the bad guy which is being wasted in his current role. I'd also turn Wade Barrett face - his Bad News gimmick was starting to get him over last year before WWE dropped it and gave him the dreaded King gimmick which is doomed to fail unless your name's Jerry Lawler). Even guys who do start to get over like the New Day faction get their heat killed off when creative tries to take credit for something that's been created naturally and try to take charge of it themselves, usually failing. Even a reboot of the Divas division, which was badly needed, somehow got screwed up by creative as they introduced too many new faces at once leading to the likes of Becky Lynch and Sasha Banks simply getting lost in the shuffle.
I don't think there's any quick fix to WWE's problems going into New Year and with ratings currently at a two decade low, it's gonna take time to turn things around. My suggestion would be that the creative team badly needs to be cut from the 20-odd people who are currently on there to just one or two - giving the storylines a bit of clarity would be a good first step to the ship being righted. My suggestion would simply be to give the book to Paul Heyman but unfortunately he's gone on record as saying that becoming a booker again doesn't interest him.
I guess we'll see but as the Royal Rumble approaches I can't say I'm exactly optimistic about Raw getting much better in 2016...
NXT
Raw's parlous state is even more mind-boggling when you consider how well the junior arm of WWE, NXT, has been booked in the last 12 months. Every week they put on an hour of television that's fast-paced, well-told and with good wrestling to boot. The main contenders are made to look like serious threats and they're getting the sort of rabid following that's reminiscent of ECW back in the day. And the fact that they've got such a talented roster down there with guys like Finn Balor, Sami Zayn, Bayley, Hideo Otami and Samoa Joe, may just be the key to saving Raw.
The trouble is that when NXT stars get called up to the main roster, they often get abandoned to mid card purgatory - just look at Adrian Neville, Sasha Banks, Tyler Breeze and the Ascension. The fact that this could happen to the likes of Balor, Zayn and Bayley in the near future is worrying and unless WWE realises the goldmine they've got in their developmental territory, they're doomed to continue making the same mistakes again and again.
For now though, let's just enjoy NXT and hope that it doesn't get crippled from above in the near future. They've put on at least four classic PPV's in the last 12 months (Revolution, Rivals, Brooklyn and London), all of which would be in my Top 10 for the year (well, Revolution technically took place in the dying days of 2014 but you get my drift). Long may the quality continue.
IMPACT
Impact/TNA have had a weird 12 months. They've not done anything massively earth-shattering...but at the same time they're making steps forward after a calamitous few years financially. I wouldn't say their booking has quite got back up to the standard it was in early 2012 yet but they're definitely moving in the right direction.
The good stuff - the title scene this year has been generally pretty solid with a now face Bobby Lashley having a better than expected second run with the belt to start the year off before a rejuvenated Kurt Angle won it and finally EC3 (definitely the company's star performer this year) taking it in June up until Bound For Glory and the Title Series that followed.
The Wolves have definitely been a huge plus for TNA this year as well with some very entertaining feuds against the likes of the Revolution, Bobby Roode & Austin Aries and the Hardys. The only problem is that the tag team division at the moment is basically just them and TNA really needs to bring in some extra numbers to give them new challengers.
The Knockouts division has also come on in leaps and bounds this year with the likes of Gail Kim and Awesome Kong delivering as usual but even some of the less gifted members of the roster really raising their game to the point where I genuinely think TNA now (just to say) has a more solid and well-rounded womens' division than WWE, not least because it's booked well (with one exception which we'll come to in a bit).
The bad stuff - every faction that has appeared this year seems to have backfired massively. The BDC was a decent idea until everyone associated with it left within a few weeks of each other and just left it looking like it was hobbling along on its last legs for several weeks until MVP's departure from the company finally brought it to a merciful end. Likewise the Dollhouse have been a misfire in what was otherwise a decent year for the Knockouts' division. The original idea of them being creepy voodoo girls had potential but over the year they've just been watered down into a poor man's Beautiful People (not helped by Taryn being injured so much). Really, come 2015, the whole idea needs to be quietly abandoned and the four girls in question, all of whom unquestionably have talent, should be allowed to try and get over on their own without some hokey gimmick like this holding them back. There's also been a couple of goofy storylines which should have been deep sixed like James Storm pushing Mickie James in front of a train and Eric Young (who's otherwise had a very good year following his heel turn) stealing Chris Melendez's leg.
I think the main problem with TNA is the continuing uncertainty over their future and the closing days of 2015 see them exactly where they were a year ago, about to move to a new network and facing the prospect of a total creative reset. It's cost them a bit in terms of talent departures (Samoa Joe, Austin Aries, Low Ki, James Storm, MVP, Magnus) and they're gonna need to do a bit of roster rebuilding in the new year. Getting Mike Bennett and Maria Kanellis in from ROH is a good start - we shall see what else follows...
OTHER STUFF
I can't really say too much about ROH as I haven't seen a lot of their stuff but the one PPV I did catch ("Best In The World") I really enjoyed. They've got a good roster with the likes of AJ Styles, Jay Lethal, the Briscoes, Adam Cole, ReDragon, the Kingdom and the Addiction but like TNA they're currently facing cutbacks after losing their TV deal and going to an Internet only broadcast. Hopefully they can keep hold of a lot of their best wrestlers and keep moving forward in 2016.
I haven't seen too much of GFW other than their appearance on Impact over a few weeks in the summer. Jeff Jarrett has assembled a decent roster there with the likes of PJ Black, Magnus, Shelton Benjamin and Sonjay Dutt on board and I'll be interested to see if they manage to get some shows out there for people to see in the new year.
Others who deserve an honourable mention are House of Hardcore (I watched a couple of PPV's over the year and really enjoyed them) and PWG (their "Battle of Los Angeles" is definitely well worth a watch). Over here in the UK, I've seen good shows by RPW and Southside this year and would definitely recommend both to anyone who likes decent wrestling.
So there ya go - 2015 wrestling in a nutshell. Hopefully the New Year will see Raw finally pull out of its creative tailspin, TNA finally get their ship properly steadied, NXT continue to be its usual awesome self and ROH and GFW both get deals to put their programming out there. It should be interesting as always either way...
Thursday, 2 June 2011
Dear Impact Wrestling...
...Please please please stop shooting yourselves in the foot. It's getting painful to watch.
Okay, I'll admit it, I'm a wrestling fan. Have been ever since watching a VHS copy of Summerslam '88 round at a friend's house when I was a littlun. I've seen 'em come and go - the Hulk Hogan/Ultimate Warrior era of the late '80s/early '90s, arguably the WWF's best year ever in 1992 with the rise of Bret Hart and the awesome Ric Flair/Randy Savage (RIP) feud, the slump of the mid-'90s that followed it pretty much straight away, the Monday Night Wars, watching WCW for the first time in the mid-'90s, the rise of Stone Cold, the Rock and DX that put WWF firmly back on top, the fantastic in-ring action that the WWF had in 2000-01 with the likes of Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Edge and Christian and the Hardy Boyz, watching the unthinkable happen as WWF bought out WCW in 2001 but being so disappointed with the way they handled the Invasion angle that I stopped watching altogether. Yup, like I say, I've seen a lot.
I started watching wrestling again in about 2006-7 when I finally started to have access to more than four TV channels. And these days, surprisingly for someone who was such a WWF loyalist growing up, I have to admit it's WCW's bastard son TNA (or Impact Wrestling as it's recently rebranded itself) that I usually watch. Simple reason - it's easier to find it on UK TV plus, if I'm honest, I quite like the more low-rent early '90s feel of TNA than the big Hollywood budget feel of WWE.
The trouble is that, given that Impact is run by largely the same team who were in charge at WCW during the turn of the millennium years when the company well and truly tanked, a lot of the mistakes it's making at the moment are starting to look depressingly familiar. Especially annoying when you consider that Impact is now available on Freeview here in Britain and has therefore actually overtaken WWE (which is only available on pay-per-view) as the most watched wrestling show here.
Case in point number one - earlier in the year, in one of their first shows on Challenge, Impact put out a really good weekly show which really succeeded in getting everybody anticipating their Victory Road event. They then followed it with an absolutely terrible PPV capped off by a 90-second title match between Sting and a somewhat worse-for-wear Jeff Hardy. You'd think they'd learn from a mistake like this but...
Case in point number two - a couple of weeks ago, the company had a big episode of its weekly Impact show where it announced the company name rebranding, promised more in-ring action and less boring between match segments and capped things off with a very good 25-man battle royale as a way of showing they mean business. This was then followed the next week by one of the worst shows I've seen from them where the X Division (a division for the company's cruiserweights) Championship was won by the 300lb+ Abyss, there was about 15 minutes of actual wrestling in a two-hour show and the usual lame-brained skit segments took up way too much time again. Another case of potential squandered.
And I, for one, am getting sick of it. Look guys, business may be a bit shaky for you over in the States but over here you've garnered yourselves a huge section of the TV market by going on Freeview. And so far you're not giving us a lot of reasons to tune in. Here then is my ten point plan as to how Impact needs to turn itself around. It's really not that difficult - you'd think...
1) Start pushing the younger stars. Yes, I know guys like Sting, Jeff Jarrett, Kurt Angle etc were huge stars in their day but one of the things that sunk WCW was that they kept stale old guys at the top way past their sell by date at the expense of the young talent who simply migrated to WWF for a push they knew they'd never get in WCW. Case in point - AJ Styles, great wrestler, loved by the fans yet he's been stuck in the midcard for the best part of a year since the likes of Hogan and Flair came in and brought all their mates with them. It's very reminiscent of the mid-'90s WCW with Sting - seriously, if they gave Styles a push in a main event feud with someone like Ken Anderson then they'd have something well worth watching.
2) Speaking of Anderson, please make your minds up whether he's a good guy or a bad guy. One week the guy's putting in a gutsy-as-hell performance to win the battle royale at the expense of the heel Ray Dudley, the next he's attacking the good guy champion Sting. I know the idea is to have Anderson as a law unto himself but this shades of grey idea isn't helping him build up a solid reaction from the crowd. Give him an identity and stick with it.
3) I am desperately hoping that the whole "destroying the X Division" angle that's going on at the moment is part of a plan to rebuild it and give them some extra credibility (Mick Foley's announcement that there will be an X Division PPV coming up is a good start). I'll reserve judgment on this one to see how it goes but having the champion Kazarian lose the title to the lumbering Abyss and the Buck Brothers lose in a handicap match to Matt Hardy in the same week is not a good start.
4) You need to build up some credible main event heels. Ever since Jeff Hardy left to go to rehab there's been a very noticeable gap in this area as the main event title picture has been dominated by fan favourites Sting and Rob van Dam and tweener Ken Anderson (see point 2). Yes we've got the whole Immortal faction headed up by Hogan, Bischoff and Flair but all three of those are better used out of the ring than in it and at the moment they just don't seem to have any credible main event challengers in their ranks. There's a few on the outskirts of the scene who could reasonably figure - Jeff Jarrett has the experience even though I think he's past his best by now while Ray Dudley and Matt Hardy are both solid triers who could probably carry a short-term feud with Sting. Failing that, you could just go with point 2 and turn Anderson full-on heel. He's always been better in that kind of a role anyway in my opinion.
5) The tag team division. Now this I think is one of Impact's strong points - the quality of the teams in here is, in my opinion at least, actually better than in the WWE as they seem to have a better team dynamic. The trouble is that there doesn't seem to be any attempt to build up any slow-burn feuds here. Beer Money Inc are, I think, worthy champions - good solid wrestlers and the fans love 'em. But in the last few months they've just been in hot-shot feud after hot-shot feud with the likes of Gunner & Murphy, Ink Inc and Matt Hardy & Chris Harris, all of which have lasted a few weeks at most. Certainly I think all three of those feuds could've done with being stretched out a bit as it feels like we've had a year's worth of programming crammed into a few weeks. C'mon guys, the materials are definitely there - give Roode and Storm a serious feud and watch 'em go. Oh, and on the same subject...
6) Impact is now the number one wrestling programme in Britain. You may or may not have noticed this but you actually have a British tag team on your books (the British Invasion) who are also pretty decent wrestlers. Would it really be too much to ask if you could give them a push?
7) Finally - please please please please please can we see the end of the Jeff Jarrett/Kurt Angle feud. It's been lumbering on so long now that it's got to the point that nobody cares anymore. And I swear if it cuts the amount of promos we get from Double J it can only be a good thing...
So there you have it. I dunno if anyone from the company will read this but I guarantee ya, go with that seven point plan and I think you'll find a lot of fans put off by Victory Road will happily start tuning back in again. Here's hoping...
Okay, I'll admit it, I'm a wrestling fan. Have been ever since watching a VHS copy of Summerslam '88 round at a friend's house when I was a littlun. I've seen 'em come and go - the Hulk Hogan/Ultimate Warrior era of the late '80s/early '90s, arguably the WWF's best year ever in 1992 with the rise of Bret Hart and the awesome Ric Flair/Randy Savage (RIP) feud, the slump of the mid-'90s that followed it pretty much straight away, the Monday Night Wars, watching WCW for the first time in the mid-'90s, the rise of Stone Cold, the Rock and DX that put WWF firmly back on top, the fantastic in-ring action that the WWF had in 2000-01 with the likes of Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Edge and Christian and the Hardy Boyz, watching the unthinkable happen as WWF bought out WCW in 2001 but being so disappointed with the way they handled the Invasion angle that I stopped watching altogether. Yup, like I say, I've seen a lot.
I started watching wrestling again in about 2006-7 when I finally started to have access to more than four TV channels. And these days, surprisingly for someone who was such a WWF loyalist growing up, I have to admit it's WCW's bastard son TNA (or Impact Wrestling as it's recently rebranded itself) that I usually watch. Simple reason - it's easier to find it on UK TV plus, if I'm honest, I quite like the more low-rent early '90s feel of TNA than the big Hollywood budget feel of WWE.
The trouble is that, given that Impact is run by largely the same team who were in charge at WCW during the turn of the millennium years when the company well and truly tanked, a lot of the mistakes it's making at the moment are starting to look depressingly familiar. Especially annoying when you consider that Impact is now available on Freeview here in Britain and has therefore actually overtaken WWE (which is only available on pay-per-view) as the most watched wrestling show here.
Case in point number one - earlier in the year, in one of their first shows on Challenge, Impact put out a really good weekly show which really succeeded in getting everybody anticipating their Victory Road event. They then followed it with an absolutely terrible PPV capped off by a 90-second title match between Sting and a somewhat worse-for-wear Jeff Hardy. You'd think they'd learn from a mistake like this but...
Case in point number two - a couple of weeks ago, the company had a big episode of its weekly Impact show where it announced the company name rebranding, promised more in-ring action and less boring between match segments and capped things off with a very good 25-man battle royale as a way of showing they mean business. This was then followed the next week by one of the worst shows I've seen from them where the X Division (a division for the company's cruiserweights) Championship was won by the 300lb+ Abyss, there was about 15 minutes of actual wrestling in a two-hour show and the usual lame-brained skit segments took up way too much time again. Another case of potential squandered.
And I, for one, am getting sick of it. Look guys, business may be a bit shaky for you over in the States but over here you've garnered yourselves a huge section of the TV market by going on Freeview. And so far you're not giving us a lot of reasons to tune in. Here then is my ten point plan as to how Impact needs to turn itself around. It's really not that difficult - you'd think...
1) Start pushing the younger stars. Yes, I know guys like Sting, Jeff Jarrett, Kurt Angle etc were huge stars in their day but one of the things that sunk WCW was that they kept stale old guys at the top way past their sell by date at the expense of the young talent who simply migrated to WWF for a push they knew they'd never get in WCW. Case in point - AJ Styles, great wrestler, loved by the fans yet he's been stuck in the midcard for the best part of a year since the likes of Hogan and Flair came in and brought all their mates with them. It's very reminiscent of the mid-'90s WCW with Sting - seriously, if they gave Styles a push in a main event feud with someone like Ken Anderson then they'd have something well worth watching.
2) Speaking of Anderson, please make your minds up whether he's a good guy or a bad guy. One week the guy's putting in a gutsy-as-hell performance to win the battle royale at the expense of the heel Ray Dudley, the next he's attacking the good guy champion Sting. I know the idea is to have Anderson as a law unto himself but this shades of grey idea isn't helping him build up a solid reaction from the crowd. Give him an identity and stick with it.
3) I am desperately hoping that the whole "destroying the X Division" angle that's going on at the moment is part of a plan to rebuild it and give them some extra credibility (Mick Foley's announcement that there will be an X Division PPV coming up is a good start). I'll reserve judgment on this one to see how it goes but having the champion Kazarian lose the title to the lumbering Abyss and the Buck Brothers lose in a handicap match to Matt Hardy in the same week is not a good start.
4) You need to build up some credible main event heels. Ever since Jeff Hardy left to go to rehab there's been a very noticeable gap in this area as the main event title picture has been dominated by fan favourites Sting and Rob van Dam and tweener Ken Anderson (see point 2). Yes we've got the whole Immortal faction headed up by Hogan, Bischoff and Flair but all three of those are better used out of the ring than in it and at the moment they just don't seem to have any credible main event challengers in their ranks. There's a few on the outskirts of the scene who could reasonably figure - Jeff Jarrett has the experience even though I think he's past his best by now while Ray Dudley and Matt Hardy are both solid triers who could probably carry a short-term feud with Sting. Failing that, you could just go with point 2 and turn Anderson full-on heel. He's always been better in that kind of a role anyway in my opinion.
5) The tag team division. Now this I think is one of Impact's strong points - the quality of the teams in here is, in my opinion at least, actually better than in the WWE as they seem to have a better team dynamic. The trouble is that there doesn't seem to be any attempt to build up any slow-burn feuds here. Beer Money Inc are, I think, worthy champions - good solid wrestlers and the fans love 'em. But in the last few months they've just been in hot-shot feud after hot-shot feud with the likes of Gunner & Murphy, Ink Inc and Matt Hardy & Chris Harris, all of which have lasted a few weeks at most. Certainly I think all three of those feuds could've done with being stretched out a bit as it feels like we've had a year's worth of programming crammed into a few weeks. C'mon guys, the materials are definitely there - give Roode and Storm a serious feud and watch 'em go. Oh, and on the same subject...
6) Impact is now the number one wrestling programme in Britain. You may or may not have noticed this but you actually have a British tag team on your books (the British Invasion) who are also pretty decent wrestlers. Would it really be too much to ask if you could give them a push?
7) Finally - please please please please please can we see the end of the Jeff Jarrett/Kurt Angle feud. It's been lumbering on so long now that it's got to the point that nobody cares anymore. And I swear if it cuts the amount of promos we get from Double J it can only be a good thing...
So there you have it. I dunno if anyone from the company will read this but I guarantee ya, go with that seven point plan and I think you'll find a lot of fans put off by Victory Road will happily start tuning back in again. Here's hoping...
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