General Pro Wrestling News and Discussion Thread Part Deux!

I shouldn't say they have no confidence. Bryan and Sheamus are on the radar, and I wouldn't really mind if Daniel Bryan took the strap off Punk, I just don't think that is going to happen for a while. I don't see Punk dropping the title until later this year, if at all. He's surpassed Mike's streak for longest current title reign now...so as long as fans are still invested in him, I think creative will keep the strap on him. I suspect Triple H is behind Sheamus' recent push.

 

I find it hard not to mentally apply Hornswoggle's music whenever Sheamus wins a match. The guy went from being an ass kicker who made WWECW exciting during his brief tenure on the brand to becoming one of the fastest WWE Champions of all time (defeating Cena nonetheless) and after a prolonged stale period WWE repackages him as this happy go lucky face who finishes his opponents by doing a dancing kick into them. It's hard to take his serious promos seriously when he goofs around so much.

As for Ryback, I'm convinced things went down like this:

Vince: I'm concerned about the big guy/normal guy ratio, get me the biggest possible guy you can find that we have under contract.
Smithers: That would be Ryan Braddock sir, one of your FCW/NXT farm talents and cannon fodder for John Cena during the Nexus storyline.
Vince: Right, we're going to go with Ryback which was something he used to be known by as it's a mononym and it makes it easier for us to apply prefixes. I want the seamstresses to find him a spandex one piece that is a couple of sizes too small so we can stress how awesome this guy's physique is. We're going to put him on a undefeated streak where he will utterly dominate and seldom speak
Creative Goon: Vince, WCW already did that with Goldberg and you kn... (cut off)
Vince: Shuuuuuttuuup! This guy is bigger, stronger and unknown, we can do whatever we like with him and the fans will have to buy into it, we'll have him squash two of the smallest local guys we can find each week and we'll have him do a Samoan drop with a bit of theatrics as a finish - simple and something we can perhaps call the "Muscle Buster" to capitalise on his physique
Creative Goon 2: But Vince, the muscle buster isn't how you describe, it's actually a.. (cut off)
Vince: Yooooouuuu'rrrrreee Firrrrrreeeeeed!
Creative Goon: Damn and he was only two days away from retirement...

 

Stephanie should be involved in that conversation since she's head of creative, but otherwise that probably was close I saw somewhere that Goldberg was asked about Crimson calling him out on Impact last week. He replied "Crimson who?" He was also asked about Rybeck...I don't think he cares one iota.

I'm amazed that fans accepted and embraced face Sheamus so much. He was such a dominate and hated heel, then boom after he was in the dog house in 2010 and some of 2011, they repackage him as a face and he's well embraced by the fandom. I've even marked out a bit for him here and there. The attempted record thing notwithstanding. But then of course they did the same thing with Orton and others.

 

Anyone else think No Way Out will end with Vince screwing Cena and helping Big Show win? Even though that would make no fucking sense?

 

The way things have been going lately...that would not be surprising.

 

Stuff like this happens all the time, especially if you've got a known heel working a suspicious face run. However, Vince has made it clear that he isn't interested in performing as an on screen character for extended periods of time, hence the repeated angles in recent years that have been implemented in order to write him off TV.

I'm wondering if they'll use Show's KO punch to Vince at Raw as the exit from TV.

 

Even more migraine inducing is that Vince was brought back on camera to "evaluate" Big Johnny! Once again he was about to be fired but seems to have weaseled out. How they will explain Vince's continued on camera presence (if they even do) will be interesting. I think he was brought on to merely push Big Show's heel character, and to increase Big Johnny's heel status. Like I said before...they're basically doing the same thing with Johnny's heel character as they did with Michael Cole. They know we hate the character, but don't care because he's big time over as a heel.

I think this perhaps has been the most "messy" time of the so called PG era.

 

I guess no one here watches Smackdown? Not too surprising given how much the WWE have neglected it compared to how they try to pull out all the stops for the Super Show.

I was shocked they opened the show with A.J. on her own--the roster must be paper thin right now and I'm not complaining. She plays Crazy Chick much better than I ever would have expected which plays a big part in the unpredictability of the three-way match. No one anywhere can predict where this storyline will go at NWO and that's a good thing considering how utterly predictable other parts of the card are (SuperSheamus pins Ziggler, Santino strips down Ricardo (and this is coming from someone who finds Ricardo oddly entertaining), Ryback squashes THREE local talents in about 3 minutes...Zzzz). Was hoping to see A.J. and Vickie get into more of a fight or even a full match but the two segments were surprisingly good even considering I can't stand anything about Vickie or Sheamus, the latter of whom had to ruin a perfectly good segment by showing up on my TV screen.

 

I somewhat agree, WWE has taken a huge step backwards in the last couple of months. I remember last year where Wrestlemania 27 was a joke (with exception to the Taker/Triple H match, but that's one match out of an entire PPV) and Extreme Rules was the superior effort. WWE also decided that The Miz had been champion long enough (he hadn't nearly peaked) and had John Cena utterly destroy him in a laughable rematch at Over The Limit (which was easily one of the worst PPV's WWE has ever produced). In fact, nearly everything from Royal Rumble until Money In the Bank was badly booked - MITB was where WWE started to get things right, indeed the weeks leading up to the PPV were some of the most exciting in the last decade, it was clearly a PPV sell that WWE got right and the PPV more than delivered.

Fast forward and we've had hits and misses, but the PPV's up until Extreme Rules (Wrestlemania 28 was an awesome effort) have delivered this year and a pattern of doing things right was emerging... But now, it's as if WWE has suddenly come down with a case of amnesia and forgotten the critically acclaimed booking that they have performed steadily from the beginning of this year up until recently. It's not about money, because WM28 did an astronomical buy rate and they've been up in profits in the last couple of quarters.

Why don't they just take the next steps already and have John Cena unify the two world titles, release a grotesque new spinner belt, have Skip Sheffield (I mean Ryback) end the streak, send CM Punk and Daniel Bryan to tag team division oblivion, hire some more cancelled comedy show writers, partner with McDonald's and create a clown character based on Ronald McDonald that a talent such as Chris Hero or Claudio Castagnoli is wasted on playing, give David Otunga a world title run, humiliate Jim Ross a lot more, give a Diva an early menopause gimmick, pay some of the cast from Jersey Shore to train as wrestlers, bring back the Tim White suicide attempt videos, hire a ton of talented cruiserweight wrestlers for the next muscular anomaly to destroy, go all the way and have Vickie Guerrero billed as Piggy Guerrero and finally completely outlaw any and all mentions, spoken hints or references to professional wrestling including renaming Wrestlemania to "Super Sunday" and the ring to "the physical debating zone".

 

Maffew from Botchamania tweeted the other day, something that I'd never thought I'd see from him...that Impact Wrestling was the best weekly wrestling show on television!


Smackdown? What's that?

As for Unifying the World Title...I think that ship has long since sailed. Vince seems quite content on having one champion on each show still. I'm still pleasantly surprised we're even getting a redesigned title, since he reportedly views the belts as nothing more than show props now.

This I think is what happens when no one is around to solidly challenge Vince McMahon. He has no challenge, no reason to be creative in the first place. Impact Wrestling seems to refuse to step up to the plate despite trying any number of things over the last few years, I dunno. We're in a current state of meh, I don't see how we are going to get out of it. I mean how the hell do you botch the return of Brock Lesnar? Oh yeah...by involving him in a power struggle story arc with Big Johnny. Sigh. CORNETTE FACE!!!

Kevin Nash is disappointed that he didn't have a chance to face Punk and thinks he could have helped to put him over (not that Punk ever needs it) and he wants ONE MORE MATCH!!! Despite the fact that after he had the match with Paul he was gushing and thanking everyone on twitter afterwards, he seems disappointed. I just don't think the condition his body is in right now he could have a decent match with anyone.

http://www.prowrestling.net/artman/publish/WWE/article10025748.shtml

 

^ I'm kind of glad that Kevin Nash and CM Punk haven't had a match, because I just can't see how present day Nash could work with Punk unless it was a street fight or something along those lines. At the same time, despite the potential for a terrible match, I'm disappointed that there was no match because it would have justified all that crap back at Summerslam.

Amazing Red is backstage at No Way Out apparently, I'm going to predict that he will be one of two wrestlers to be squashed by Ryback tonight.

 

Another PPV that I predicted accurately, not to mention one that had a terrible main event. The steel cage match itself was fair largely due to Big Show who carried the match and performed the high spots. The finish was just ridiculous, no sooner had Cena escaped the cage and won the match, he was back on his feet as if nothing had happened. He sold absolutely nothing despite being dominated the entire match, whereas Big Show sold the effects of the match and limped quietly to the back.

This is becoming a rather annoying pattern which must piss off a lot of the guys in the back, given that Cena is apparently excused from having to put other guys over by selling the effects of their offense post-match. His superhuman comebacks are nothing new, but his complete ignorance when it comes to selling the effects of a match are ruining the suspension of disbelief element that is crucial to professional wrestling.

Interestingly enough, Cena's opponents have done 80% of the work in his last three PPV matches. The Laurinaitis match at OTL wasn't really a match, but Laurinaitis did all the selling whilst Cena walked around the ring smiling like a jackass and pouring water down Laurinatis' crotch. I'm thinking there is a possibility that Cena is really banged up and needs and extended leave of absence to recover (perhaps even have surgery) but both he and WWE are choosing to delay because it's bad for business - which isn't exactly the truth given that WWE will still sell Cena merchandise regardless of whether he is performing or not.

Then again, there is the possibility that WWE has finally realised that John Cena is incapable of working an entertaining match unless he is in the ring with someone like CM Punk, Brock Lesnar or Triple H and therefore they compensate by shortening the wrestling element of the match and filling in the gaps with interference and other distraction tactics.

 

Well I am glad that john cena won tonight no more big johnny.
So the aftermath should be interesting. Over all 4 out 5 for a ppv.
How long do you think cm punk can hold onto the title.

 

I said that I think Punk will hold onto the title until at least Survivor Series. There's no real reason to take it off of him, unless Daniel Bryan gets REALLY over as a heel and creative have no choice, much like Punk as a face last year.

Cena was injured supposedly last year and WWE chose not to give him any rest. I believe we had a conversation about that. I think we mentioned as well he appears to be banged up. They really do depend on him too much for no real reason at all...even when they have CM Punk right now as their hottest commodity.

I doubt we've seen the last of Big Johnny.

 

Please please please let the end of People Power coincide with the end of the crappy booking. I'm definitely not holding my breath on that happening.

Oh and this for good measure:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ou_Uat454Cg&feature=player_embedded

Somebody needs to make one of these for the pasty white idiot, too.

 

In all fairness "sheep" it wasnt a chair shot to the head only the back and it was only a single shot. 20 seconds is about right for that.

 

Using that reasoning, a lot of moves and finishing holds should be no-sold as well since they look less painful than a chairshot to the back.

 

It's interesting, given that the back can absorb a lot more impact than the head. I always assumed that when the headshot ban came in, that the favoured chairshot delivery would be the thrust to the ribs, throat or stomach with the chair smash shots being reserved for limbs.

 

So is AJ and Kane going to be like the "Anti" Lita and Kane? As in the one DIVA that actually wants to be with Kane? I have to say...as annoying as I first found AJ and this whole story line...she's really doing one hell of a job selling her facial reactions and emotions.

 

^ In particular, her psychotic stare at CM Punk as Kane carried her off last night was very effective. I think the idea might be that she is obsessed with CM Punk and is playing games with Daniel Bryan and Kane so they drop the ball, thus making sure Punk remains champion.

Of course, since Punk is a face he'll probably catch onto it eventually and tell her to stop, thus AJ will invariably cost Punk the WWE Championship by siding with Daniel Bryan once again.