Current WWE

[Sean Liska]

It's true that it's basically impossible for the WWE to lose money under its current business model, money pits like the network and the film division notwithstanding. But every single business indicator is in a steady state of decline.

I see this all the time, but it's not really true. Every PPV this year except for Elimination Chamber has been up. There have been several months where house show business was up over the previous year. TV ratings were very healthy over the summer before they added the killer third hour. We're six months removed from, by far, the most successful wrestling show of all time. Next year's Mania will again shatter gate records. Saturday Morning Slam and The Main Event have been successes for their networks.

 

Yes, we can sit and worry about USA cancelling them, but it's USA that wanted another hour of prime time WWE content.

 

I think there's a lot that's good about the current product, but when you're producing 6 hours of important TV each week, it's impossible to keep people excited and wanting more. Early 90s AJPW would have struggled. But you could make a 20-hour Best of WWE 2012 comp that would be pretty great.

[NintendoLogic]

Over the long term, it's absolutely true. There are year-to-year fluctuations, but the trend for everything is downward. Overall, wrestling in America is less popular than it's been since the advent of television, possibly ever.

 

The main thing propping up the WWE's PPV business is special attractions like The Rock and Brock Lesnar. And their only real day-to-day draw is falling apart physically. They may not be in any immediate danger, but the future looks pretty bleak.

[Matt D]

I think there's a lot that's good about the current product, but when you're producing 6 hours of important TV each week, it's impossible to keep people excited and wanting more. Early 90s AJPW would have struggled. But you could make a 20-hour Best of WWE 2012 comp that would be pretty great.

What years would have a better 20 hour comp, wrestling wise?

[S.L.L.]

I posted this on a group on Facebook when someone mentioned another bad WWE ratings and reasons why, including what else was on TV. And always hearing Vince is gonna shake things up..

 

Wanted to know what you all thought about this, any other reasons or comments about it?

What's weird is that for all the posts I've seen on this subject over the years, very few people actually seem to want to talk about it. A lot of people want to talk about pet peeves they have with the WWE, and feel the need to ascribe greater significance to them than they actually have. Others want to talk about symptoms of the problems like they're the problem themselves, and getting rid of the symptoms will make the actual problem go away. Still others want to talk about surface level things happening concurrently to actual problems like they are the problem, and if you change it, everything will be better. But almost no one wants to address the actual problems.

 

Just chew on this for a second....for years, people swore up and down that the brand extension was an awful idea, that it was bad for business, and that WWE would be a lot better off if they got rid of it. This was an extremely common talking point among people complaining about modern WWE. You could throw a penny at a message board and hit a good ten or twenty guys who seriously believed this. I can pull quotes if you need it, but I'm sure pretty much everyone here has either heard someone make this claim, or has made it themselves. I, on the other hand, argued rather stridently that the brand extension was a scapegoat, and that the real problems were deeper than that, but a lot of folks didn't want to hear it.

 

Well, it's October 2012, and while the brand split is still here, it's pretty much on paper only. Everyone fights on every show, everyone competes for every title...if there's any real difference between Raw and Smackdown besides one generally being more important than the other, it disappeared a long time ago.

 

And that's why everything's better now!....Right?

 

I don't like to say "I told you so", but as long as we're on the subject, I told you so.

 

What I'm getting at is that there's something about this topic that makes people squeamish. I can't put my finger on it, but for some reason, people don't want to look too hard at what's wrong with WWE in the past 5-10 years. They don't want to talk about real problems. So if you want to know what I think, the first thing you need to know is that if I'm going to talk about this at all, I am going to talk about real problems, and as we go over what you wrote, I think we should ask ourselves, "Is this a real problem?"

 

We have a PPV this weekend built and named after a match that at one time was basically called "Hell's Chamber" by JR. There will be multiple matches in this cell and 0 people will bleed? Whether or not Ryback wins, Punk should be a mess after that match...That says it all for me...there is nothing they can do to "shake this up" as long as they worry about what sentatorial candidates think of their product..

Is this a real problem?

 

Now, don't get me wrong. I love me some blood in my professional wrestling matches, and I don't like that they've taken it away from me. That being side, a friend of mine said something that sums up the issue rather nicely - "I'm less bothered by the fact that they don't have blood than the fact the they do have their writing staff". It's something I dislike, but I have a hard time seeing it as a make-or-break element for them. Even if Punk bleeds buckets at the PPV, I don't see how it's going to "shake up" the company in a long-term, meaningful way. So if we're looking at things on that level, it's not a real problem, though I personally wish it would change.

 

Did WWE give a FUCK about that stuff in the late 90's? Hell no, and it got them attention, good and bad, leading to BIG ratings and incredible TV.

Austin, Rock, McMahon, and Foley got them attention and big ratings. And yes, I realize that they were able to do that in part by having looser content restrictions, but lots of wrestlers the world over swear and bleed. Most of them don't draw Austin/Rock/McMahon/Foley-level money. And all of the attempts to recreate that era by recreating it's content have been dismal failures, which should tell you something.

 

As far as incredible TV goes...well, I agree that it was not credible. It definitely had it's moments, but most of it was awful, and I'll take the WWE of recent years where there was at least good wrestling to go along with the bland booking. I think this is pretty safely not a real problem.

 

Plus, as I mentioned last night, we have the following. Before I mention them, i will say what these athletes do is incredible and something I admire them for and could never do. That being said.:

 

1. Wrestlers who work a whole match together in the back piece by piece and then perform it, instead of an idea and then going on feeling takes something away in the match. I know some of them cant do it another way...make them learn. Punk and Danielson surely could do it, encourage it.

I have never heard this to be a thing that actually happens in current WWE until just now. In fact, I'm disinclined to believe it's actually the case, if only because, if it were, there would be a ton more people bitching about it online than there currently are. It also suggests creative cares about the matches enough to micromanage it on that level, which seems unbelievable to me. I'm gonna have to ask for some supporting evidence on this claim. Otherwise, it's not real, and by extension, not a real problem.

 

2. No Competition. As long as TNA isnt close in terms of popularity (which it isnt) nothing will change. Plus, TNA is most of a hard core product that I like, but they need better overall ideas and bookers. A huge "shakeup" there could be the real answer.

I'm tempted to call this a real problem, and obviously, TNA finally getting their shit together would do nothing but good for wrestling. But the more I think about it, the less I'm sure. True, the WWF was once spurred to get their act together due to the competition of WCW, but that was after WCW was a major competitor to them for a few years, and they almost went bankrupt during that period as well, so even if that was a part of it, it wasn't the whole thing. Moreover, as good as WCW's competition was for the WWF, the WWF's competition clearly did not have the same effect for WCW. Honestly, I don't think competition alone is going to be enough to inspire. Not a real problem, but it was at least worth thinking about.

 

3. The talent really has no formal national training like the past territorial system. Up through the last boom and the beginning of the down period, the lead dogs in the WWE were the end of the group that went through all those tough times in the territories and worked hard for what they got, partied hard and performed hard. It was a different type of person then, if you get what I mean. Did these guys train hard and work harder than I ever could. Yeah they did, but almost NONE of them went through what the old guys went through, even getting into the business meant taking a ton of lumps, like being beaten in. But that is America everywhere anymore..dont make anyone really bust their ass for it, you might hurt their feelings or get sued for it.. Bull shit...

Austin spent about a year going between two towns run by the same promotion before getting signed by WCW. I don't know offhand what he did between USWA's Dallas office folding and the WCW signing, but he really wasn't some grizzled vet of the territorial scene, and he still became a huge money star.

 

The Rock was trained by his extended family, spent less than a year in the USWA when it was a feeder promotion for the WWF, and then got called up there. Yeah, he was clearly unready when he first arrived, but he learned on the job and became a huge star.

 

I know literally nothing about what HHH did between getting trained by Killer Kowalski and getting signed by WCW. Wikipedia says he debuted '92, which was basically the last year the territories existed in any real form. Unless he had some Portland run I don't know about, he wasn't a territory guy.

 

Foley and Taker would qualify, but even then, amongst your five biggest stars, three of them were not really territory vets. Two of those three were amongst the biggest stars in wrestling history.

 

The territorial system has basically been replaced by the indies today, and while it's not a perfect replacement, it's a functional one, and the fact WWE seems more open to looking there for talent these days is clearly a good thing. As for the guys who have come up through WWE-regimented channels, some have been good, some have been bad, and some of the bad ones may have benefited from the territorial system, or even the indies. But WWE having an in-house developmental system hardly seems like a bad idea in and of itself. Indeed, with the death of the territories, that seems like one of the most rational things to do. Either way, the territories are dead, so even if this was a real problem, it's not like there's really a solution.

 

4. Finally, the company itself. They arent a wrestling company anymore, they are an entertainment company. Shit, they arent World Wrestling Entertainment anymore, they are simply WWE. The word itself is gone They have TV writers with no wrestling background booking for the most part, writing scripts for guys to read...how can I get really behind that? You can memorize a script..good for you..where is the passion in your character and drive.

The fact that a wrestling company is being run by people who want nothing to do with wrestling is a very, very real problem, and I probably shouldn't have to explain why. The TV writers are bad, but thre reason why they're there is even worse.

 

I really believe to change it, stop watching it and they'll be forced to change to stay alive..the same way I feel about Pirates fans here in Pittsburgh, you want true change..stop going to fireworks night with Boyz II Men Performing...

If that was all it took, things would've changed a long time ago. And that's a real problem - they just don't care. Every now and then, something will happen to make them care a little - like they just did - and it'll make things change a little - like it just did - and then they'll give up go back to doing whatever requires the least amount of effort. And then people will complain about it, but they'll get it wrong because they were complaining about it in whatever way required the least amount of effort. So I guess the moral of the story is that we and WWE deserve each other.

[Victator]

Well, it's October 2012, and while the brand split is still here, it's pretty much on paper only. Everyone fights on every show, everyone competes for every title...if there's any real difference between Raw and Smackdown besides one generally being more important than the other, it disappeared a long time ago.

I think things would be better if they fully did away with the brand extension. That would mean merging the belts* and ending all pretenses of separate brands.

 

Right now is the worst of both worlds.

 

*You could keep the United States and Intercontinental titles. Since at this point the U.S belt is basically occupying space, the European belt occupied.

[S.L.L.]

Well, it's October 2012, and while the brand split is still here, it's pretty much on paper only. Everyone fights on every show, everyone competes for every title...if there's any real difference between Raw and Smackdown besides one generally being more important than the other, it disappeared a long time ago.

I think things would be better if they fully did away with the brand extension. That would mean merging the belts* and ending all pretenses of separate brands.

 

Right now is the worst of both worlds.

 

*You could keep the United States and Intercontinental titles. Since at this point the U.S belt is basically occupying space, the European belt occupied.

 

I agree with that. But even after that, the shows are still gonna suffer from the same general malaise they were suffering from before.

[Victator]

The main issue is fixing the shitty writing on Raw. Right now things have improved greatly, but its too early to tell if it sticks. It seems like losing Gerwitz did a lot of good.

[Matt D]

It has to be counterbalanced by going three hours though.

 

At one point Raw would be the only thing I'd always watch because it was live so you had the surprise and the unknown. Now I can't imagine watching it on anything but youtube.

[Coffey]

Well now I just want S.L.L. to write about the real problems facing WWE. Don't leave us hanging!

[S.L.L.]

The main issue is fixing the shitty writing on Raw. Right now things have improved greatly, but its too early to tell if it sticks. It seems like losing Gerwitz did a lot of good.

Yeah, I do need to give them this much: I only have one really close friend who's still a die hard wrestling fan, but when we get a PPV, we usually invite a bunch of other guys who are at least open to the idea of watching wrestling to join us. Some of them have started to get into it themselves, but not to any serious degree. But now...well, we were thinking of buying Hell in a Cell anyway since we hadn't bought a show in a while, but my friend's cousin actually called him without prompting saying that we had to get this one because RYBACK IS CHALLENGING FOR THE BELT! "Guy challenges for a belt because he's won a lot of matches convincingly" may not be the deepest storyline in the world, but it can work, and it's better than the "guy challenges for the belt because he's repeatedly lost to the challenger, and we won't let this goddamn feud end until we put the belt on the challenger after making him look as weak as we possibly can" storyline that they've run constantly with every belt for years now.

 

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Point is, I like a lot of the immediate post-Gerwitz direction. I like that they're giving the fresh, over, but untested guy a title shot instead of playing it safe with another Cena match (and I'm saying that as someone who really likes the Cena/Punk match-up). I like the job they've done of putting him over as a serious contender, especially Cena's promo this week where did a great job putting him over as someone you should care about in a way no one ever did for Cena himself. I don't know where the Cena/AJ thing is going, but the set-up was surprisingly smart. I like that they have a tag division again, even if it is a hastily thrown together one. The matches themselves seem to be better than they've been since they went to a three-hour show, with Bryan/Ziggler being the obvious highlight.

 

But will it stick. Well, my experience is that it never sticks, so I'm not optimistic.

 

Well now I just want S.L.L. to write about the real problems facing WWE. Don't leave us hanging!

I knew I was forgetting something.

 

OK, I'm gonna try and keep this simple. I'll probably fail, but I'll try. Here are three very real problems that face WWE:

 

1. THEY JUST DON'T CARE

 

I touched on this a bit already, but it bears repeating. It's stunning just how little thought and effort seems to go into these shows. Time was that giving a guy like Ryback a title shot would've been seen as a very simple and straightforward booking move, but nowadays, it feels like a master stroke of creative genius, because we've sunk to a level where finding a new challenger for a champion after he's disposed of him - even when other guys have been logically positioned as potential contenders - is actually considered too much effort for creative to handle. Let me put this into perspective: I've read people complaining about the Sheamus/Big Show feud. Now, I admit the build has been nothing to write home about, but I'm still excited about it for two reasons. One is that it looks like a really good match on paper. The other is that, before it was announced, I was pretty much just taking it for granted that they were going to run Sheamus/Del Rio again. I mean, I shouldn't have been expecting that, what with the fact that they've already had a million matches against each other, Del Rio lost them all, and there's no logical reason for him to still be challenging at this point. But on the other hand, that's exactly how they book title programs nowadays, so that's exactly what I expected. At least Sheamus/Show is a new match-up. We're lucky we got that much out of them. It almost makes me long for Vince Russo, who may not have good ideas, but at least had ideas. I'm not saying they need to be wildly experimentative. I'm usually the first to defend the use of very commonplace wrestling tropes because the whole reason they became commonplace was because they worked. But they've somehow sunk below even that. That doesn't work at all, and it never will. And when you look at the rest of the problems I list, you'll probably find this is behind most of them.

 

2. WHEN EVERYONE'S A SUPERSTAR, NOBODY IS

 

There's this whole talking point now that says "the wrestlers aren't what draws, the brand is", and what's really frustrating about it is that it's so obviously false, and yet WWE themselves clearly believe it. What's worse is that it probably didn't happen accidentally, either. A while back, TomK wrote this:

 

In the May 26, 2008 Observer, Meltzer wrote about drawing in the WWF:

 

Wrestling today is a huge entertainment brand event and it is the brand name, and not the wrestlers, who are the primary draw. SummerSlam tops 500,000 buys because it's SummerSlam. They did the same business last year without Hogan as they did the year before with Hogan wrestling Orton, so the days of any individual making a huge difference all by himself are over and I think that's a big part of the issues, because McMahon essentially told him that

Later in same issue he pointed out that in recent PPV when they had Cena work a match on the lower part of the card, you could see people leave after the Cena match.

 

Mcmahon has decided that no one should make a difference and yet Cena is the guy who makes a difference.

 

I think the conclusion is that at this point (for better or worse) that Mcmahon has decided that it is a better business move to coast on the brand name and not put all the eggs in one basket, not have one person anchor his promotion. But that said Cena is the one guy on the roster who they could build around. Loss’ statement about Cena’s period being short is accurate. He’s the one guy who they could anchor the promotion around, but the promotion would rather sail without an anchor.

 

Perhaps more importantly, he also wrote this:

 

Huh? These have always been the criticisms of Vince's product and this has always been Vince's dream from the start. He's taken wrestling out of the "smoke filled back rooms" and turned it into a modern corporate product. He's created a highly controled enviroment where management/the promotion means more than the interchangeable talent. This has been the goal he has been working toward his entire adult life.

I might argue that he probably wasn't consciously working towards it, because Vince is too much of an unstable coke fiend to be much of a long-term planner. But his more likely conscious plan of "how can I most easily gain constant access to cocaine and loose women?" dovetails very nicely into "how can I make my wrestling promotion be all about me?" And by God, he found a way.

 

And now, I'm going to roll out one of my most quoted pieces, which I wrote in the immediate aftermath of Mania 23, when I thought - and try not to laugh at this one - that wrestling was about to enter another boom period. Most of what I wrote in that post blew up in my face spectacularly, but this remains as true today as the day I wrote it:

 

[John Cena]'s your Hogan/Austin-type company ace in this situation, whether people want to admit it or not. One thing that really has not yet happened with Cena that did happen with those guys is that the WWE has not really presented themselves as "The Cena Show". By this, I mean that Hogan and Austin both became the clear cut "main characters" of their shows, and everything on the show reflected them, what they believed, what they did, and what they represented.

 

When Hogan was the star, the WWF was all about being a live-action Saturday morning cartoon. Hulk Hogan was a real-life He-Man, only so kickass that he never turned back into Prince Adam. He was a proud Christian American, and he fought for what he believed in. To that end, he WWF presented patriotism and basic Christian values as the standard for morality. The other faces all became little Hogans: positive role models portrayed through broad, cartoony characters. The heels became anti-Hogans: classic cartoon bad guys, intensely immoral and often *GASP* foreigners who didn't care for the good ol' U.S. of A., again portrayed through broad cartoon-friendly gimmicks. It all was for the benefit of Hogan. He was the star, and the presentation of the show reflected that.

 

When Austin was the star, the WWF became something of - as Michael Cole used to say - an action/adventure series. Steve Austin was your classic anti-hero, with roots planted firmly in the wild west. He was deeply individualistic. He wanted to be who he was, and he didn't like when people tried to force him to be someone else - especially when that someone else was someone like Mr. McMahon. He wasn't evil, and he was more ammoral than immoral, he just wasn't going to play by somebody else's rules when he knew they were wrong. This made him gruff and unwilling to trust anybody, but he was still clearly good. He drank beer and gave people the finger and otherwise lashed out to show he wasn't going to be held back by anyone. The WWF of this era was all about standing up for yourself, and the importance of being free to be an individual. The other faces all become little Austins: characters who refused to conform to the demands of a heartless society, and became themselves, often represented through a distrust of authority and breaking "The Man"'s rules to show they didn't control them. The heels became anti-Austins: conformists whose "moral" behavior mask their true immoral nature, often representing skewed versions of traditional virtues, or characters otherwise bound to the control of society. It was all for the benefit of Austin. He was the star, and the presentation of the show reflected that.

 

But this hasn't happened with Cena. He's presented as the top guy. It's not like he's a Chris Benoit-type undercard champ. But the show doesn't reflect him as the star, and when you have a star that big, that's usually what happens.

Yet, five years later, it still hasn't happened, and at this point, I think I can safely say it never will. You can understand why I got everything else in that post wrong. WWE was handed a new boom period on a silver platter. I did not consider the possibility that they would turn it down.

 

It's too bad. I probably would've really liked The Cena Show. I realize, of course, that not everyone feels that way, but whether you like Cena or not, the one thing everyone seems to agree on is that throughout his run on top, he has been booked terribly, and personally, I read that as a desire by the company to not have a big star wrestler on their regular roster by any means possible. Part of me wants to take a conspiratorial bent with it. Part of me feels like when Triple H failed to become a Hogan/Austin/Rock-level star, he decided that "well, I'm clearly the best, so if I can't be a huge star, I guess nobody else should be, either". That's a childishly simplistic way of looking at things, obviously, but again, it dovetails nicely into the whole "it's the brand, not the wrestlers" thing, especially as he shifts towards a primarily backstage role.

 

But like I said, the idea is obvious bullshit. There is no brand without the wrestlers. The fact that they've yet to run a wrestling-free PPV despite it being all about the brand should tell you something. The fact that they dig retirees and part-timers out of the mothballs to headline WrestleMania because they spent the rest of the year not caring about their roster should tell you even more. They've trained viewers to not care about the current crop of superstars, and people respond to that by tuning out.

 

3. IT DOESN'T MATTER!

 

I love The Rock. Honestly, I do. But when he announced that he would challenge for the WWE Title at the Rumble, it really did hammer home how little anything in this company matters right now. I said my piece on that particular incident a while ago, but it really is emblematic of how WWE presents their shows nowadays. I'm reminded of a No DQ match between Rey Mysterio and Jack Swagger in 2010. That was my WWE MOTY that year, but if any of you have forgotten about it - or didn't realize it had happened in the first place - I wouldn't be surprised. As Phil Schneider noted:

 

I remember really digging this, it is kind of a victim of the 2010 style of wrestling TV, if a crazy around the arena brawl out into traffic ending in the ocean happened in Mid-Atlantic in 1983 it would be a legendary moment in wrestling history. Here it was kind of forgotten after a week.

Nothing is presented as important. Nothing that happens is worth remembering, even when it is. Don't invest emotionally in this wrestler. We'll forget about him in a few weeks. Don't get excited about this match or this angle. They won't lead anywhere. Don't think of titles as something important. The important thing is that The Rock is challenging for it, and he's important, because he was a big star when we were important. But we're not important anymore. Pay us no mind.

[El-P]

Great post.

 

As someone who follows from a distance, didn't Ryback get the title shot @ HITC because Cena got legit injured or something ?

[Matt D]

3. IT DOESN'T MATTER!

 

I love The Rock. Honestly, I do. But when he announced that he would challenge for the WWE Title at the Rumble, it really did hammer home how little anything in this company matters right now. I said my piece on that particular incident a while ago, but it really is emblematic of how WWE presents their shows nowadays. I'm reminded of a No DQ match between Rey Mysterio and Jack Swagger in 2010. That was my WWE MOTY that year, but if any of you have forgotten about it - or didn't realize it had happened in the first place - I wouldn't be surprised. As Phil Schneider noted:

 

I remember really digging this, it is kind of a victim of the 2010 style of wrestling TV, if a crazy around the arena brawl out into traffic ending in the ocean happened in Mid-Atlantic in 1983 it would be a legendary moment in wrestling history. Here it was kind of forgotten after a week.

Nothing is presented as important. Nothing that happens is worth remembering, even when it is. Don't invest emotionally in this wrestler. We'll forget about him in a few weeks. Don't get excited about this match or this angle. They won't lead anywhere. Don't think of titles as something important. The important thing is that The Rock is challenging for it, and he's important, because he was a big star when we were important. But we're not important anymore. Pay us no mind.

 

To me this is key to a lot of what's been said before. There are good matches every week. I think there are pretty much a couple every week and it's been an extremely strong ppv year when it comes to matches and I'm not sure most people would feel that way, because it's all superstars matches where nothing matters or something in a poorly booked feud.

[goc]

Great post.

 

As someone who follows from a distance, didn't Ryback get the title shot @ HITC because Cena got legit injured or something ?

Yes that's why in reality. Cena wasn't cleared in enough time for them to feel comfortable advertising the match, even though I think he IS cleared now. In storyline, it was pretty much just Punk had to choose between Cena or Ryback and then Punk didn't choose so somehow Cena decided to give the match to Ryback.

[Boondocks Kernoodle]

And now, I'm going to roll out one of my most quoted pieces, which I wrote in the immediate aftermath of Mania 23, when I thought - and try not to laugh at this one - that wrestling was about to enter another boom period. Most of what I wrote in that post blew up in my face spectacularly, but this remains as true today as the day I wrote it:

 

[John Cena]'s your Hogan/Austin-type company ace in this situation, whether people want to admit it or not. One thing that really has not yet happened with Cena that did happen with those guys is that the WWE has not really presented themselves as "The Cena Show". By this, I mean that Hogan and Austin both became the clear cut "main characters" of their shows, and everything on the show reflected them, what they believed, what they did, and what they represented.

 

When Hogan was the star, the WWF was all about being a live-action Saturday morning cartoon. Hulk Hogan was a real-life He-Man, only so kickass that he never turned back into Prince Adam. He was a proud Christian American, and he fought for what he believed in. To that end, he WWF presented patriotism and basic Christian values as the standard for morality. The other faces all became little Hogans: positive role models portrayed through broad, cartoony characters. The heels became anti-Hogans: classic cartoon bad guys, intensely immoral and often *GASP* foreigners who didn't care for the good ol' U.S. of A., again portrayed through broad cartoon-friendly gimmicks. It all was for the benefit of Hogan. He was the star, and the presentation of the show reflected that.

 

When Austin was the star, the WWF became something of - as Michael Cole used to say - an action/adventure series. Steve Austin was your classic anti-hero, with roots planted firmly in the wild west. He was deeply individualistic. He wanted to be who he was, and he didn't like when people tried to force him to be someone else - especially when that someone else was someone like Mr. McMahon. He wasn't evil, and he was more ammoral than immoral, he just wasn't going to play by somebody else's rules when he knew they were wrong. This made him gruff and unwilling to trust anybody, but he was still clearly good. He drank beer and gave people the finger and otherwise lashed out to show he wasn't going to be held back by anyone. The WWF of this era was all about standing up for yourself, and the importance of being free to be an individual. The other faces all become little Austins: characters who refused to conform to the demands of a heartless society, and became themselves, often represented through a distrust of authority and breaking "The Man"'s rules to show they didn't control them. The heels became anti-Austins: conformists whose "moral" behavior mask their true immoral nature, often representing skewed versions of traditional virtues, or characters otherwise bound to the control of society. It was all for the benefit of Austin. He was the star, and the presentation of the show reflected that.

 

But this hasn't happened with Cena. He's presented as the top guy. It's not like he's a Chris Benoit-type undercard champ. But the show doesn't reflect him as the star, and when you have a star that big, that's usually what happens.

Yet, five years later, it still hasn't happened, and at this point, I think I can safely say it never will. You can understand why I got everything else in that post wrong. WWE was handed a new boom period on a silver platter. I did not consider the possibility that they would turn it down.

 

I'd be interested to read a more detailed idea of what "the Cena show" would entail. I'm surprised that all these years later, you still think Cena had the potential to be the Hogan/Austin-level megastar if only they had shaped the promotion around him more. I don't think Cena is at that level, and think of him more as the Bret/Shawn-type guy who carries the promotion because there's no better option but isn't going to set business records. He's more popular than Bret and Shawn, but he also has a better marketing/PR machine behind him. I'm not sure that Cena's character is as clearly defined as Hogan's or Austin's (clean-cut everyman with a fleeting interest in hip-hop?), and that's a problem, but even if there was a better idea of who John Cena is and why he does what he does, a large portion of the wrestling fanbase (mostly the mooks who loved the edginess of the late 90s/early 2000s era) has fully rejected Cena and would likely would be even more turned off if all the faces reflected his values, whatever they are. I suppose it could increase the popularity of WWE among children and/or women if they developed acts that appealed to that crowd (and not just goofy comedy acts like Santino but more like, say, the Ultimate Warrior for kids or the Rock n' Roll Express for women) but if still doesn't fix the problem that the top guy isn't that compelling. Cena doesn't, and didn't, tap into any broader part of the culture the way Hogan fit into the larger-than-life action hero archetype of the 80s or Stone Cold epitomized the profane, Limp Bizkit/Jerry Springer late 90s. He, moreso than any other W(W)WF/E top guy since Bob Backlund, is Just A Guy. And that doesn't start boom periods.

 

I should qualify this by saying that I greatly enjoy Cena as an in-ring performer and he's had more ****+ matches than anyone in WWE in the last several years. I just don't think they could have done much to make him a significantly greater box office draw, though certainly ratings and buyrates would be at least a little better with better handling of win, losses, title changes and all the other issues we've been talking about for the last ten years.

[Victator]

I think they were on the verge of a huge breakthrough in 2007. Then something happened...

[Boondocks Kernoodle]

They had very good booking which excited their core fans and they did a celebrity angle which did great short-term business. It didn't even seem like they had sustained their momentum from Mania three months later when Benoit happened. I didn't see the signs of a boom.

[Sean Liska]

So it's been repeatedly established on this board that the last 11 years of post-Attitude WWE has not been good. It's also been decided that the Attitude era was not actually good either. The 80s were a terrible time from an in-ring perspective. So I think the only consistent quality output from WWE in the last 30 years was the Austin-Hart Foundation feud and the first few months of 1998. It's amazing that a few good months 15 years ago has been enough to keep everyone at least keeping up with the product.

[Matt D]

Only show in town?

 

I kid, mostly.

[goodhelmet]

So it's been repeatedly established on this board that the last 11 years of post-Attitude WWE has not been good. It's also been decided that the Attitude era was not actually good either. The 80s were a terrible time from an in-ring perspective. So I think the only consistent quality output from WWE in the last 30 years was the Austin-Hart Foundation feud and the first few months of 1998. It's amazing that a few good months 15 years ago has been enough to keep everyone at least keeping up with the product.

I know Dylan and I have repeatedly said that modern WWE has been pretty great from an in-ring perspective but horrible with angles. Maybe not in the last few months but at least from 2007-2011.

 

Working on the revamped 80s project, we have discovered a ton of good-great WWF matches from the 80s so that opinion may be revisited in the next couple of years.

[Loss]

So it's been repeatedly established on this board that the last 11 years of post-Attitude WWE has not been good. It's also been decided that the Attitude era was not actually good either. The 80s were a terrible time from an in-ring perspective. So I think the only consistent quality output from WWE in the last 30 years was the Austin-Hart Foundation feud and the first few months of 1998. It's amazing that a few good months 15 years ago has been enough to keep everyone at least keeping up with the product.

I liked the post-Russo Attitude era. 2002 had tons of problems, but I didn't hate it. I've liked some stuff since too.

 

But yeah, 1997 WWF is the apex of the company for me -- great angles and high match quality involving people who are over.

[JerryvonKramer]

Sean, there are those us -- myself, El-P, some others too -- who have completely given up on it.

 

There's enough footage from the 80s alone probably to last me a lifetime. To be honest, when there's the entirety of any given promotion you care to name from 1985 to watch, I can't see any reason at all to devote any of my wrestling time to watching this week's RAW. Once I've seen all of the 80s sets, all of the 90s yearbooks, every single NWA and WCW PPV, and any other disc here that I happen to have, maybe I'll consider watching RAW again then.

[S.L.L.]

Great post.

 

As someone who follows from a distance, didn't Ryback get the title shot @ HITC because Cena got legit injured or something ?

Yes that's why in reality. Cena wasn't cleared in enough time for them to feel comfortable advertising the match, even though I think he IS cleared now. In storyline, it was pretty much just Punk had to choose between Cena or Ryback and then Punk didn't choose so somehow Cena decided to give the match to Ryback.

 

Admittedly, I forgot about this. Still, going with Ryback rather than, say, Randy Orton, or even rushing Cena back from injury too soon is an uncharacteristically bold move for them these days.

 

I'd be interested to read a more detailed idea of what "the Cena show" would entail.

I actually went on to describe that in that post:

 

Hogan and Austin both became the clear cut "main characters" of their shows, and everything on the show reflected them, what they believed, what they did, and what they represented. What does Cena believe? What does he do? What does he represent? Cena's character is that of a basically good, well-meaning wrestler who would have belonged in Hogan's world, but was placed by creul fate in Austin's world. His general good nature and drive to win endears him to children and women, while the adult males distrust him the way they distrusted every other "moral" figure from the Attitude Era. It's kind of hard to make the show reflect that kind of character without casting a good chunk of your fanbase as heels. His equivalent story is a passion play: the virtuous, hate-free Cena being crucified by a lecherous mob who would rather do away with the man challenging their warped views and continue heaping unearned praise on "heroes" like Shawn Michaels, Triple H, and Kurt Angle, than reconsider their curent ways. It's a good story. As Kevin Cook pointed out, it produced one of the finest matches in wrestling history. But I'm not sure you can turn it into episodic storytelling. Not sure you can build a TV series around The Passion of the Cena.

 

So they would probably have to go an alternate route. Perhaps a reversal of the transition from Rock 'N' Wrestling to Attitude. That happened when bow tie-wearing goodie two shoes announcer Vince McMahon feuded with anti-hero Steve Austin. McMahon attempted to expose Austin as evil, so he could continue with business as usual, but ultimately confirmed Austin was good, exposing himself as evil in the process. So, here, they would flip that, presnting the Attitude era as the norm, Cena as the revolutionary threatening to change that, and an Attitude representative as the "Mr. McMahon" trying to resist the change. The obvious choice is Shawn Michaels, but this is a guy who refused to play heel against Hulk fucking Hogan because Jesus didn't want him to. I can't imagine he'd be willing to essentially play Pontius Pilate if he wouldn't play Paul Orndorff because of Christ.

I then wrote a very long list of wrestlers I thought could play into this and the aftermath. Basically, I concluded that "The Cena Show" would feature Cena as something between Backlund and Dusty - not the heppest cat around, but someone who gets respect because he's a genuinely good guy who gives it all in the ring and proves himself time and again. To that end, characters are judged by the strength and content of their character and their actions rather than mere surface-level sheen. The other babyfaces are a diverse bunch, but they're all honest and hard-working, and worth your respect as a fan for that - Rey, the Hardys, Punk, etc. The heels are all guys trying to pass themselves off as the coolest things on two feet while actually being assholes who want you to feel like shit for not being as awesome as they are - Orton, MVP, Miz, Elijah Burke, Kennedy, and especially Edge, who I saw as being Cena's ideal long-term arch-rival even if I'm not a huge fan of the guy, just because his character at the time was so diametrically opposed to Cena's. Basically, it's the natural follow-up to the Attitude Era. That was all about non-conformist Austin taking on the old broken system, but they all chose to not conform in more-or-less the same way, leaving behind a new conformity that Cena has to deal with. And this new conformity has none of it's old righteous indignation but all of it's base ugliness. They became as bad as the things that they rebelled against (again, best embodied by Edge), and now Cena and his ragtag band of misfits must restore - and keep - order.

 

I also thought that they could use the brand split to play up different themes on different shows and give them their own distinct flavor. Like, they all share the big, over-arching "Cena Show" ideas, but Smackdown is really more "The Rey Mysterio Show", and plays up more cartoonish gimmickry than Raw does, and ECW probably eventually becomes "The C.M. Punk Power Hour" or something like that, and is more prone to gritty violence than the other shows.

 

I'm not sure that Cena's character is as clearly defined as Hogan's or Austin's (clean-cut everyman with a fleeting interest in hip-hop?), and that's a problem, but even if there was a better idea of who John Cena is and why he does what he does, a large portion of the wrestling fanbase (mostly the mooks who loved the edginess of the late 90s/early 2000s era) has fully rejected Cena and would likely would be even more turned off if all the faces reflected his values, whatever they are.

This was a point I always struggled to be sympathetic towards. I mean, fan turnover happens. You can't please everybody. As a promoter, I'd be more interested in playing towards a growing young fanbase than a dwindling aging one. I mean, if the new fanbase doesn't actually come, fine. We can abort the plan in the early goings if that's the case. But in 2007, the lights were all green. There was no reason to not at least try.

 

 

Cena doesn't, and didn't, tap into any broader part of the culture the way Hogan fit into the larger-than-life action hero archetype of the 80s or Stone Cold epitomized the profane, Limp Bizkit/Jerry Springer late 90s.

If I thought really hard about it, I could probably link John Cena and Judd Apatow, but it would be really forced and not very convincing. But really, I don't get the sense that you need a larger cultural phenomenon to ride the coattails of to be a star. What cultural phenomenon was Sammartino riding? Being Italian?

 

He, moreso than any other W(W)WF/E top guy since Bob Backlund, is Just A Guy. And that doesn't start boom periods.

Bob Backlund main evented more sold out shows at MSG than any other wrestler ever, so apparently that's exactly what starts boom periods. And Cena is way better on the mic than face Backlund.

 

I think they were on the verge of a huge breakthrough in 2007. Then something happened...

Even with Benoit, 2007 was the biggest money year in WWE's history to that point, and Mania 23 was their biggest money event. Cena was making them money that they had never made before, and they consciously chose not to capitalize on it. That is pretty much modern WWE's problems in a nutshell.

[Grimmas]

I think most of the issues come from having to keep up ratings and having to have monthly PPVs (sometimes with themes). Even if they kept 12 PPVs, but turned 8 of them to 2 hours, I think things would be different. It's insane to try to keep everything important and exciting all the time. Even great TV shows have a few weeks episodes where not as much happens and they are more filler, it keeps the important stuff more important. Also, they have an offseason.

[Strummer]

Just a few thoughts

 

As far as post attitude era stuff I think Raw was much worse in 02/03 than it is now. Not even close IMO.

 

I remember starting a thread in 07 questioning whether the company was in for another boom because they were doing great business and the product seemed hot. I think it was right before Benoit happened. I did get the sense in late 06 early 07 that they were turning things around (at least business wise). Mania was huge that year with the Trump angle that everyone hated. Whether it was a missed opportunity or if it was curtailed by the tragedy is up for debate I guess

[NintendoLogic]

Everybody, don't get too excited, but I saw Resident Evil reading this topic about an hour ago.

 

Anyway, I find the notion that the WWE dropped the ball in not becoming the Cena Show to be off base, not to mention the notion that adult male fans turned on Cena because he represented morality and authority. In fact, it's pretty much the opposite. They hated him because they saw him as a phony, a poser, a soulless corporate creation shoved down their throats. Even in the supposed golden age of 2007, there were dark clouds on the horizon. Look at Backlash, the very first PPV after that record-setting Wrestlemania. It did something like 194k buys, which for the time was disastrously low. What made it even more alarming was the fact that it was the first tri-branded PPV. The WWE had rebounded from its 03-04 nadir, but it wasn't on the cusp of bigger things. It wasn't failing to go all-in on the Cena Show that held them back, it was failing to offer something to people who didn't want to see the Cena Show.

 

Man, that tomk post about the WWE brand taking precedence over individual performers has not aged well at all. You'd have to be out of your mind to watch the past few years and conclude that Cena is just an interchangeable cog in the WWE machine. The current product is more Cena-centric than ever.

 

This was a point I always struggled to be sympathetic towards. I mean, fan turnover happens. You can't please everybody. As a promoter, I'd be more interested in playing towards a growing young fanbase than a dwindling aging one. I mean, if the new fanbase doesn't actually come, fine. We can abort the plan in the early goings if that's the case. But in 2007, the lights were all green. There was no reason to not at least try.

Counterpoint: the Austin heel turn. Sometimes the fans you've driven away never come back even after you reverse course.

 

Oh, and Shawn did play heel against Hulk Hogan. And Bruno Sammartino sold out the Garden more than anyone else.