Loss

The Rollins promo was the right call. They have way too many babyfaces, and no real heels at the top. That promo will be forgotten when the time comes to turn him. It was straight out of the Mid Atlantic playbook, where Flair returned after the plane crash and they quickly reinforced him as a heel.

Show me these long Cody Rhodes promos. I presume they probably exist, but I've never seen one. And my point there is that I can't recall seeing him in any type of featured match that isn't a tag match or a multi-person match. I never said we can't assess how "good" he is as a worker -- I said without that, we can't say "Oh, this is this wrestler's ceiling" in terms of card placement.

I think it's presumptuous to say what Cody's ceiling was when he never really came across to me as someone who got the opportunity to cut long promos or strut his stuff in long singles matches.

In his role as the Horsemen manager, maybe not, but the guy had plenty of charisma, and that role was one of many he took on throughout his career. It's just the one he's most known for. I'm not saying that to say he should have been paired with Flair as much as I am saying he has no charisma just isn't really the case at all. You never know how the WWF during this time might have reimagined someone. Who would have thought Percy Pringle would have a long, prosperous career as a WWF manager?

You could, yeah, but I don't expect John Cena to come back and lose his first two or three matches. The tricky thing to navigate right now is that to varying degrees, Zayn, Cesaro, Owens and Styles all need to come out on the winning ends of feuds sometime soon.

If they were smart, they'd take it out on Vince or HHH when they are on camera instead of Reigns. That they aren't shows that at least to a certain degree, they are being worked by someone somewhere.

I think the booking was pretty strong in 1991. There's not an awful lot I would change. I think the key to Ric Flair meeting his full potential would have required the WWF to do so many things that were so anathema to their way of doing business that I'm not sure it could have possibly worked the way we always imagined Flair vs Hogan in the 80s. It's just hard to picture a top heel showing up without Heenan or Perfect, with them presenting it as "He doesn't even work here", uttering the initials "N-W-A" and acknowledging history outside the company. The only things I'd say that I think were more possible within their self-imposed confines that they didn't do were let Flair wear a suit more often instead of wearing his robe and gear all the time, even when he wasn't wrestling, and maybe not teaming him with other heels at Survivor Series where he becomes just a guy on the roster. For all the times they met, we never saw Flair presented as Hogan's equal in the buildup to any of their matches. I realize he's not, but feeding that perception was the key to making the feud work as much as it could. The WWF seemed to realize an in-house manager wasn't the best route and tried to bring in Cornette, but Cornette wasn't interested, and I guess there weren't a lot more options out there.

He's been more than holding up his end of the deal pretty much the whole time. Fans are so stuck on the 2015 Royal Rumble that they can't move past it.

I'd say Styles should feud with Cena when Cena comes back, but Cena will win his first match back and Styles should probably be programmed in something next that he can win.

Not just WWE. Has any wrestling company had GREAT booking on any type of consistent level in the last decade and a half? I'm sure they exist but not in abundance. I could probably count the all-time classic promos in that timeframe on one hand with fingers left too. There have been well-booked feuds in isolation but I mean up and down the card, building things long term while also getting people enthusiastic about the current lineup. Maybe NXT to an extent has done that but even then, I don't see the weekly TV as must-see.

What I mean is that I think there was a time when people cared more about booking, promos and characters than the wrestling. WCW had much better wrestling for almost its entire existence, but that wasn't enough to hold on to their support because people hated the booking so much. I don't think I that would be the case now.

This is a good place to pose this question. Did fans start caring more about match quality organically as part of a changing landscape? Or did everything outside the in-ring just go so far to shit that fans who wanted to keep watching had to adjust their expectations to avoid a constant stream of disappointment?

There are actually a lot of presentation things that bug me, I guess because a stale look and feel immediately tells me "This company is out of touch with its audience."

I don't think wrestling looks like the times as much post-1996, mainly because a WWE show from 2008 and 2016 are virtually identical on an aesthetic level. Only the names have changed. Now there are exceptions -- from 1997-2000, the WWF was a part of the pop culture and fit in well, and guys like Samoa Joe who are my age having bleached blond hair in the early 2000s feels very early 2000s culturally. But if I pop in a match from just about anywhere in 2008, I don't see hairstyles or music or hear topical references that take me back there very much. You could show me an empty WWF ring from 1995, and I would immediately know it was a 1995 show. That type of thing matters to me almost as much as the quality itself.

Edge never met a move he couldn't modify.

That would make him less than the sum of the parts.

Cornette also thought it would work for Sunny and Faarooq in the WWF.

why? Because I have never once had enough time to listen to a podcast from this board in one sitting. And while I enjoy the long shows much of time (and have even done some myself), it would be nice to have at least one show that lasts about the length of a work commute and then it's over.

You could at least refer to me directly. Done with this thread.

That's actually called having double standart. Which is also why John Cena gets a pass despite most of his stuff looking like shit. I love Tenryu (my #6 or 7 I think), but I could do with him throwing a good looking enzuigiri and a devastating powerbomb instead of shitty ones. His sloppyness is absolutely not part of his appeal. Everything else great about him is. Sure it is part of his appeal. He's a little reckless. He's rough around the edges. He's more dangerous for it. Not all of the same flaws are created equally. It's about how that flaw fits into the composite that is the wrestler, and what it adds to or takes away from their entire presentation. It's not "Here is a list of things at which all great wrestlers must excel and all wrestlers must check every category on the list".

I don't understand the gimmick. Are we supposed to hate them for liking Puerto Rico?

Right, that's the point. He's not a particularly polished wrestler, and someone else doing the same thing without his charisma and timing would probably be rightfully called awful. But he makes it work because he's Tenryu, and because the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. To me, it's actually the difference between a good wrestler and a great wrestler -- both have flaws (every single wrestler does), but the great ones can make theirs more irrelevant.