Official Pro-Wrestling Thread (WWE, TNA, ROH etc.)

[sledger]

Yeah but theirs comedy and theirs stupidity and jobbing to Hornswoggle is absolutely stupid.

WWE is mostly stupid this days tbh.

 

[duffer]

Watched the Shaq edition of Raw. Random thoughts:

- Shaq is a don. Did everything right, was funny, entertaining, worked the crowd and most importantly did a good job putting people over. Rest of the show reminded me why I stopped watching WWE tbh. Did everything they could've hoped for from him.

- The commentary is an utter utter joke. Where the **** is JR? Their job is to make what we see in the ring seem important and these guys showed no intentions of doing anything like that and in the case of guys like Kendrick(last year he was the new HBK apparently) they did a great job of burying him.

-Massive lol at the booking for the Beat the Clock. The two young studs with Main Event potential (Swagger and MVP) both made to look inadequate and not relevant, while Cena is still being pushed to the moon and Trips needs a guy to take him out with a weapon before the match, interference during the match and to miss a pinfal by a second just to make it seem acceptable that he didn't win? Michael Cole's "one second on the clock can he get the pin!" should be youtubed and played on repeat over and over again.

-Next week, Triple H in the ring with two up and coming guys. Looking forward to that. Ah well, at least you guys can look forward to more of the same guys in the Main Event for the next few months. They're protecting the people who don't need it and doing their best to damage the guys who could carry the torch. If any of MVP, Swagger, Morrison, Kingston do get hugely over it will have to be in spite of the E's booking rather than because of it.

At least Jeremy Piven is going to host the show next week. Guy is bloody hilarious on Entourage and in interviews. Wonder how long they can rely on the celebrity hosts though.

 

[sledger]

The celebrity host thing will run for a while, but I don't think it has that much longevity personally. Problem with it is, pretty much all they can do with it is face characters, and authority figures are always much better as heels imo. All they can do with the guest hosts is pretty much....

1) Guest host shows up, cuts promo.
2) Interupted by ****y Heel who shoots on the host.
3) Host says "tonight I'm calling the shots", and books said heel in a match they really don't want.
4) Heel complains and looks shocked.
5) Heels jobs match, guest host celebrates in ring with HHH/Cena.

 

[duffer]

The celebrity host thing will run for a while, but I don't think it has that much longevity personally. Problem with it is, pretty much all they can do with it is face characters, and authority figures are always much better as heels imo. All they can do with the guest hosts is pretty much....

1) Guest host shows up, cuts promo.
2) Interupted by ****y Heel who shoots on the host.
3) Host says "tonight I'm calling the shots", and books said heel in a match they really don't want.
4) Heel complains and looks shocked.
5) Heels jobs match, guest host celebrates in ring with HHH/Cena.

Heh, swap HHH/Cena with Cryme Tyme and you don't even need to watch the show.

 

[sledger]

Heh, swap HHH/Cena with Cryme Tyme and you don't even need to watch the show.

Yeah, tbh this has pretty much been the pattern since the whole guest host thing began. If they could get a host who was genuinely disliked by the general public (someone like K Fed maybe, mind you, his work with the E a few years back was truly crimgeworthy) then it might work a bit better, but even so there are still only so many ways this can be worked. I hope that the whole thing is over by say...Survivor Series, but even if it is, I dunno if I can be bothered to make myself watch RAW anymore, will still follow the results no doubt, but cba to watch,esspecially whilst at uni.

 

[duffer]

Piven could make an awesome awesome heel. He's that funny you wouldn't need to write anything for him, he'd bring awesome nasty to the show. Even if it's only for one episode at least you know the episode is going to be reasonably entertaining, even if the wrestling will be terrible.

 

[sledger]

Piven could make an awesome awesome heel. He's that funny you wouldn't need to write anything for him, he'd bring awesome nasty to the show. Even if it's only for one episode at least you know the episode is going to be reasonably entertaining, even if the wrestling will be terrible.

Yeah tbf I wouldn't mind the whole celebrity thing if the quality of the wrestling was decent enough, but it's just poor.

What was the whole thing with Kofi and Kendrick btw? Gathered that Kendrick was absolutely buried, but I read that this happened in less than 10 seconds? And if so, how was it that Kofi didn't win the beat the clock challenge?

 

[sledger]

Just finished watching ECW with Christian vs Zack Ryder as the main event. What a match! Zack Ryder is nothing special but he looked like a huge star out there. Christian is fast becoming like Chris Jericho and Shawn Michaels in that he can have a great match with just about anyone. Watch the main event of ECW, it's the best match on television this week.

Yeah am beginning to agree with this. Makes it all the more infuriating that he didn't get the push he deserved about three years ago which led to him leaving the company. The guy is a great performer, like you say, can carry nearly anyone to a decent match, and is a really excellent performer on the mic as well.

Get the horrible feeling that he won't ever reach the top in the E anymore, I imagine he has impressed a lot of people backstage with his work since his return (as he has looked really really good), but I get the feeling that the E are now determined to only push the likes of Zack Ryder and Sheamus and all the other new guys showing up with stupid/horrible gimmicks and protect HHH and the like, and as a result Christian might get lost in the mire and end up in the same role as Jericho was back between 2003-2005 as the "fodder challenger" or helping put over guys who are much less talented and less deserving of top spot than he is.

That said, a heel turn and a feud with Edge would really be something I would want to see.

 

[duffer]

Yeah tbf I wouldn't mind the whole celebrity thing if the quality of the wrestling was decent enough, but it's just poor.

What was the whole thing with Kofi and Kendrick btw? Gathered that Kendrick was absolutely buried, but I read that this happened in less than 10 seconds? And if so, how was it that Kofi didn't win the beat the clock challenge?

It wasn't a beat the clock match.

Kendrick got on the mic and said "hey Lawler you made look stupid last week, I'll show you blah blah blah" and then got punked. Their typical "comedy" burial segment. Funny how everyone on the roster has to go through it at some stage apart from a select few. Just rolled eyes when it happened tbh.

 

[sledger]

It wasn't a beat the clock match.

Kendrick got on the mic and said "hey Lawler you made look stupid last week, I'll show you blah blah blah" and then got punked. Their typical "comedy" burial segment. Funny how everyone on the roster has to go through it at some stage apart from a select few. Just rolled eyes when it happened tbh.

Haha what a load of crap.

If that had been booked by anyone remotely interested in wrestling that would have been the match of the night, on paper anyway, their styles would play off one another brilliantly. Why they can't give two guys like that a proper program is madness, we never get any good mid card feuds anymore. Gone are the days when we have a decent match/feud for the IC/US titles it seems, unless somehow a top star ends up holding one of them. This sort of burial doesn't really do Kofi any favours either, he gets no real exposure and minimal credit for burying a guy who is widely seen as a total weener, oh well, he'll still pick up a check for an easy nights work so I don't suppose he'll care too much.

It's actually getting to the days where I would rather go and see a house show than a live wwe event tbh, last year when I went to see Smackdown I was a bit gutted that it wasn't a TV taping, but looking back on it I'm glad, managed to dodge a bullet there. Shame ROH don't do any tours, would defo be up for going to one of their shows.

 

[Athlai]

Do you reckon when they made the WWE games they accidentally gave up all their best storylines?

 

[sledger]

Do you reckon when they made the WWE games they accidentally gave up all their best storylines?

In some cases perhaps, a lot of the storylines that make it into games are even more farcical than the ones that happen in real life though tbh.

 

[duffer]

Haha what a load of crap.

If that had been booked by anyone remotely interested in wrestling that would have been the match of the night, on paper anyway, their styles would play off one another brilliantly. Why they can't give two guys like that a proper program is madness, we never get any good mid card feuds anymore. Gone are the days when we have a decent match/feud for the IC/US titles it seems, unless somehow a top star ends up holding one of them. This sort of burial doesn't really do Kofi any favours either, he gets no real exposure and minimal credit for burying a guy who is widely seen as a total weener, oh well, he'll still pick up a check for an easy nights work so I don't suppose he'll care too much.

It's actually getting to the days where I would rather go and see a house show than a live wwe event tbh, last year when I went to see Smackdown I was a bit gutted that it wasn't a TV taping, but looking back on it I'm glad, managed to dodge a bullet there. Shame ROH don't do any tours, would defo be up for going to one of their shows.

That's exactly the reason why I hate these type of squashes. You make the guy who loses look horrible but at the same time don't go anywhere near putting the other guy over because no-one will remember or take the match seriously. A proper feud and dedicated match can actually put both guys over, but unless they have two major ego's feuding they won't bother trying to put both guys over.

And yes, been to both an SD and a Raw house show and loved both of them. So happy I got to see Eddie and Benoit wrestle before their tragic ends. Will always remember those shows fondly.

 

[Athlai]

I've always thought that beating the heavy's were the best at putting a new(ish) guy over. There is just something about watching a smaller guy beating a bigger guy that earns respect.

 

[sledger]

I've always thought that beating the heavy's were the best at putting a new(ish) guy over. There is just something about watching a smaller guy beating a bigger guy that earns respect.

I used to think this was ok, but it's been so many times. Last straw with it for me was Evan Bourne delivering a promo to Kane about how he was going to beat the crap out of him, just er...looked stupid. Also this wouldn't be a great way to put over a guy who was over 6ft tall lol.

 

[sledger]

That's exactly the reason why I hate these type of squashes. You make the guy who loses look horrible but at the same time don't go anywhere near putting the other guy over because no-one will remember or take the match seriously. A proper feud and dedicated match can actually put both guys over, but unless they have two major ego's feuding they won't bother trying to put both guys over.

And yes, been to both an SD and a Raw house show and loved both of them. So happy I got to see Eddie and Benoit wrestle before their tragic ends. Will always remember those shows fondly.

Wish I had managed to get to a house show during the "Smackdown 6" era, bet it would have been off the charts.

 

[Athlai]

I used to think this was ok, but it's been so many times. Last straw with it for me was Evan Bourne delivering a promo to Kane about how he was going to beat the crap out of him, just er...looked stupid. Also this wouldn't be a great way to put over a guy who was over 6ft tall lol.

Thats why they should feud Big Show with the big boys and make him look solid enough and then use him to push up anyone else. You don't get bigger than Big Show.

Kane is meh ever since he lost the mask for me.

 

[duffer]

The most awesome part of those shows is you can really see who the best workers are. The guys who rely heavily on their partner or the ref to make a match happen and the guys who are just naturals and can make any match ebb and flow nicely.

Would've loved to see Eddie wrestle as a heel because most of his memorable fights have come working a heel style and I hate seeing so called big matches interrupted by comedy spots(see 99% of Flair matches).

Michaels was also an absolute natural in the ring, had the crowd wrapped around his finger even the haters. Benoit was just intensity on another level. I don't think there was anybody who worked as hard as he did over their entire careers. Taker's entrance was also spine tingling awesome.

Shame I never saw Bret wrestle though. Would've been something to see him at work.

 

[sledger]

Thats why they should feud Big Show with the big boys and make him look solid enough and then use him to push up anyone else. You don't get bigger than Big Show.

Kane is meh ever since he lost the mask for me.

Yeah Kane is pretty fail these days, lack of mask + so many failed/dire storylines involving marriages and miscarriages = credibility shot to pieces.

Tbh though, Big Show is pretty meh as well imo, seems like a nice guy, but just isn't great to watch, not bad by any means, but when your finisher is "big punch", that's just dire imo.

 

[sledger]

The most awesome part of those shows is you can really see who the best workers are. The guys who rely heavily on their partner or the ref to make a match happen and the guys who are just naturals and can make any match ebb and flow nicely.

Would've loved to see Eddie wrestle as a heel because most of his memorable fights have come working a heel style and I hate seeing so called big matches interrupted by comedy spots(see 99% of Flair matches).

Michaels was also an absolute natural in the ring, had the crowd wrapped around his finger even the haters. Benoit was just intensity on another level. I don't think there was anybody who worked as hard as he did over their entire careers. Taker's entrance was also spine tingling awesome.

Shame I never saw Bret wrestle though. Would've been something to see him at work.

Yeah, agree, Taker's entrance was something totally unreal and it blew the roof off the arena, glad I got to see him before he finally retires. He was a prime example of how to work a match though, him facing Big Show was not the most spectacular thing ever, but it flowed fantastically well, minimal ref involvement.

I hate the comedy spot thing as well, mind you, Eddie got a fair few of those when working as a heel as well. His ladder match vs Rey at Summerslam was pretty damn good, but was interrupted horribly by his "son" Dominic trying pathetically to push him off the ladder, and then it ending with Vickie making the save and allowing Rey to pick up the win. If ever there was a feud that didn't need a particular storyline to make it better that was it, but the E managed to work in one of the most ******** storylines ever into what had up to that point been great viewing, wish they would realise that in some cases less is more.