goc

It's not even so much that he "left on good terms" as that it's not like when Steve Austin left and it was a big huge deal. It was like "oh CM Punk wants to go home? Ok, tell someone to rewrite Raw." It's not like they aren't rewriting it 2 hours before the show every other week anyway.

His argument about the Bryan push was pretty much solely about numbers. And it wasn't even his argument, he was just saying why WWE doesn't get behind him. They think his ratings numbers, house show attendance & merchandise sales aren't enough for him to be a top guy. I'm not even sure they are being inconsistent here. One of things that made them finally get behind Punk was the fact that his numbers were always better than his push. Bryan is one of the 5 most featured guys they have, if his numbers are below their expectations for that I could see why they wouldn't want to get behind him more.

Said this in the other thread, but I still think they can turn this around by having Bryan win the Elimination Chamber and then face HHH at Mania. I know everyone keeps saying "he needs to win the title on the big stage!" but I think defending the title against HHH and beating him clean to end the storyline is just as big a moment as winning the title at Mania over Orton, when people are burnt out on that matchup, would be.

Yea I just listened to that interview and that seems like where his major problem is coming from. People can talk about him having "fuck you money" and not care about the money, but the interview clearly shows he cares about how much The Network is going to change the PPV pay structure. And that no one knows yet. And they canceled the meeting about how it was going to work and still haven't told anyone. So I can see why that would piss him off, and knowing he is going to leave in a few months and thinking that the rest of his PPV checks are going to be shitty, might as well just go now. It's not like he can't come back whenever he wants.They always take people back, they took back Sable and she meant NOTHING when they brought her back after she was much more of a pain in the ass.

Luger had been the last efficient draw of the NWA though, against Ric Flair. He was an established star already. Of course Vince fucked it up by making him a happy choker at SummerSlam. I don't understand why so many times in wrestling the bookers think you can just drag out the hot challenger a little bit longer. It happened to Luger in WCW and WWF. WWE still does it all the time. I don't even know if that's what they are doing to Bryan or just don't want to give him the title. I'd much rather go back to the time when people were complaining about too many title switches than now where they kill guys like Ryback because they are so stuck to a long title reign.

As far as Punk leaving, if he is actually gone for good, I am not sure it ultimately hurts the WWE that much. Bryan already seemed like he was about to take his spot as "the guy behind Cena" and I don't think he was ever going to be able to do another good heel run, so he was pretty much stuck as lame pandering babyface until the end of time. It doesn't hurt Punk either because I don't think he'll really miss WWE that much and if he misses wrestling I'm sure he'll eventually do a match or two somewhere a few years down the line for some person willing to pay way too much money to do an indy show with CM Punk on it.

That might not be smart enough to do HHH challenging EC winner Daniel Bryan but it's right there waiting for them and nothing else they can do with Bryan or the title would get a better reaction on the show. It's even better than Bryan finally beating Orton clean since they've already established that Bryan can beat Orton. The ultimate goal for Bryan vs The Authority should have always been Bryan winning the title and HHH challenging him for it. They fucked it all up but they could actually wind up taking a big shitty detour and still making it where they need to go. Then they can still recoup their Batista money by having him be Bryan's first challenger. Heel Batista is money anyway.

I don't think anyone should read too much into a poster that also includes masked Kane prominently.

I actually want them to do Bryan vs HHH for the title now. There was some talk of them changing plans to have Bryan win the Elimination Chamber, stick with that. Then do Bryan vs HHH for the title with HHH not trusting anyone else to get the job done. There is no better way to ensure a great crowd reaction than leaving that match to the very end of Mania. Who cares how they screw Batista out of his Rumble prize, they can still do Batista vs Orton, Lesnar vs Taker and Cena vs Bray Wyatt. Might as well have the last 3 matches be Taker vs. Lesnar, then Batista vs Orton then HHH vs. Bryan.

I almost feel like CM Punk is a victim of his own success. He is a much better character as a heel but he's too popular as a heel and ends up being more over than his opponents so they have to turn him babyface where his promos usually feel weak and pandering and he quickly becomes stale.

I don't like the PTP breakup, mostly because I think Titus has a much better chance to breakout as a babyface than a heel. EDIT:And just to go off an a tangent, I think Hunico is a really terrible fit as Sin Cara. I think they should have tried to use someone else under the mask if they were really intent on keeping it around, they'd already seen what Hunico could do with it and should have realized the guy is not cut out to be a high flying babyface wrestler. At this point, you can't really make ANOTHER switch and I don't think there is any way the character gets over the way they want unless he's doing ACTUAL flashy babyface offense.

It's not so much about "taking liberties" as much as the fact that Brock just lays his shit in and he's scary strong.

Evan Bourne was a pretty hot act for the first 6 months after he debuted. He came back from his injury and was still pretty over for the next year or so. They even tried to elevate him a bit based off his crowd reactions and gave him that program with Jericho that included a PPV match. I'm not sure what happened after that because there were a few months of treading water after that before he started having the really bad injury problems.

I still don't think they should do Lesnar vs Taker. Just for Taker's sake. Brock is a very scary man and Taker looks like he's barely able to maintain one match a year against guys like HHH and Shawn Michaels.

I want them to do Lesnar/Batista at Elimination Chamber with the winner gets the Mania match. Lesnar wins, Daniel Bryan wins Elimination Chamber and then we get Lesnar/Bryan for the title. Not going to happen but it'd be the best way to get out of the crowd turning on the title match. Then I think they should do Bray Wyatt vs Taker and Cena vs Orton vs Batista.

Another thing that makes me think they had a plan that got thrown out the window is the people who were on TV right after SummerSlam and have disappeared. Suddenly Zach Ryder was back on TV and The Primetime Players were getting a push but they disappeared around the time things went off the rails and the focus suddenly switched to a really badly booked Big Show vs. Orton feud & Cena's return. I thought they had brought Zach back just so he could be the guy Randy Orton went nuts on and "put out" with a punt but they didn't even get anything out of him before having him disappear again.

I think they set out with a clear plan after SummerSlam, that was all supposed to lead into Vince vs. HHH/Steph and somehow that whole thing got screwed up and they just threw all the plans in a blender. Then we got Big Show being fired and coming back for weeks with music and no problem getting in the arena with no explanation because now we're not going to have Vince in the angle but we didn't rewrite the whole thing.

I don't really watch that much WWE outside of the PPVs and the TV stuff that gets heavily pimped. But I always find myself enjoying The Real Americans whenever I see them. I really liked their match with Rey & Sin Cara last night and would love to see a good 10 minute Rey/Cesaro match. I feel like Swagger has gotten a lot better since being paired with Dutch & Cesaro too. I think the problem with Swagger for a long time was that he was never a fan and it was just a job to him but it seems like he's having fun with the Real Americans stuff. As far as authority figures go, I wish we had a lot more Brad Maddox and a lot less Steph/HHH. The couple of weeks before SummerSlam where he was the GM in over his head before The Authority really took over was actually an interesting take on the authority figure angle for once.

I think they brought Jake in for a physical to see if he could do the Rumble and he didn't pass so they threw him a bone with the Old School Raw appearance. I have absolutely nothing to back that up but pure speculation however.

It seems a bit much to keep "files" on message board posters just to bust out old links on them any time you feel the need to shame them.

Yes that exact same loser had some crying fit over something CM Punk related. Possibly him losing to The Rock.

I think anyone arguing "no one wanted Batista to come back" are clearly delusional. I think the huge spike in ratings last week proves that wrong. Just because he isn't the guy last night's crowd wanted to see the Rumble doesn't mean it was a bad idea to bring him back. As far as Bryan goes, WWE has the numbers. They know what his PPVs did, they know how his house shows do, they know how his merchandise sells. There have been guys in wrestling before that have a great connection with the live crowd, are always over, but never sell merchandise or draw tickets. Sid being my #1 example. Sid just managed to get more chances on top because of size and look. But the idea that Bryan is "buried" is silly. He's one of their biggest stars. He's been featured as much or more than anyone on their TV for almost an entire year now. They let him get a clean pin on John Cena! No he didn't get the fairytale ending, but he's very far from "buried."

So low rent they couldn't even get in a real YMCA.

I was just wondering the other day "who is booking TNA?" Russo got tired of Bischoff and Hogan and left, then Bischoff & Hogan left too. Bruce Pritchard got fired, Jeff Jarrett quit his own company, Terry Taylor's been gone for a long time. I guess it was really only a matter of time before Dixie tried to get Russo back.

I don't think Cornette has any intentions of ever going back to RoH so I don't think he gives a shit if they're upset that he told everyone what happened. It seems like if most of what he said is true that Sinclair is just going to keep running RoH into the ground anyway.