Wrestling and the Internet

[sek69]

I was reading an interview with Don West, and when asked about the negative reaction Jeff Jarrett gets from net fans, he basically said he must be doing his job (as a heel) well if he's ticking people off.

 

Now I know he's not going to bash his company's owner/booker/champ, but I hear this a lot from wrestling companies small and large that if the net hates someone, it's because the person's so good at heeling. WWE trots this line out when the HHH bashing gets hot and heavy as well. Meltz likes to trumpet how many people in the biz read WO, they have to know the difference between "I hate you because you're a heel doing heel shit" heat and "I hate you because you're using backstage politics to get a push or title you don't deserve" heat.

 

I suspect, however, that most wrestling companies just don't get it. They just view net fans as just another breed of marks, and while that may be true to some degree, you can't just act like they're the foam finger waving five year old who boos all the heels and cheers the faces.

 

Wrestling seems to be going through a weird evolution where there's a new kayfabe where everyone cops to "sports entertainment" but they act like no one knows about backstage politics. Like, you'll see WWE.com talking about additions and departures to "creative" but they'll never admit that HHH has veto power over pretty much everything that happens. Folks from TNA will freely discuss the "booking staff" but any questions about JJ's push will be met with puzzled stares.

 

I'm not saying WWE should devote an episode of RAW to discuss HHH's influence or TNA should devote an Impact! to why JJ deserves a push, but to act like the people who do read about these things are crazy is fairly insulting to people's intellegence.

[Coffey]

It's funny, we're still referred to as being a small demographic, yet, on the flip-side, a lot of people would argue that we're the only ones still watching. Outside of the people that buy a ticket because the show comes to their town, I'd say that the smarks are pretty much the only people still watching. WWE doesn't really cater to kids anymore, at least not like they used to, so it doesn't look like they'll have a ton of fans in the future.

 

When I was growing up, everyone watched wrestling. Everyone knew who Hulk Hogan was. A lot of wrestlers today, like Edge & Christian, were fans during that era. So, what does that mean for the future generation? We're going to have future wrestlers that talk about Steve Austin & The Rock? What's after them though? Nothing, as of now, looks too promising. I know I probably wouldn't follow a product when the top dog's influences were John Cena and Batista.

 

I agree with what Don West said though. It's easier to discuss the negative aspects of things, so that's what a lot of the on-line conversation is about. When you go to places like TSM it's really hard to defend your stance when you're against the majority. You pretty much get labeled as an idiot if you don't agree with everyone else. You're not really allowed to have your own opinion. There's like two types of poster there. The newer guys that just go along with everything in the WWE folder. Then the "established" posters whom tell the newer guys what their opinion is. If it differs, they pretty much get ran off or at least stop posting in the WWE folder. There's not a lot of activity anymore. You can blame it on the board or the current product or both. I think the board reflects the state of the product though.

 

I don't want to say that I like Jeff Jarrett. I don't mind him. I certainly don't see him as a main eventer. I never have and probably never will. That being said, you certainly can't just kick him to the curb. Without him and his dad, there wouldn't have ever been a TNA. I don't think he's the best choice to carry the title but I can see why TNA would keep giving it to him. They're appreciative. At least that's my guess.

 

As far as the companies actually thinking that on-line fans are marks and whatnot, it's tough to say. There is a difference in heel heat and X-Pac heat, but that doesn't mean that they see it. Look at the Dudleys. They always had a ton of heat. As face or heel. Yet, on-line people just constantly called them stale. Still do actually. Yet they were one of the only people on the roster to actually get reactions from the crowd. Kurt Angle's entrance will always ensure a "you suck" chant just like you'll always hear the crowd shout "3D!" when the Dudleys irish whip someone.

[Guest CanadianChick]

When I was growing up, everyone watched wrestling. Everyone knew who Hulk Hogan was. A lot of wrestlers today, like Edge & Christian, were fans during that era. So, what does that mean for the future generation? We're going to have future wrestlers that talk about Steve Austin & The Rock? What's after them though? Nothing, as of now, looks too promising. I know I probably wouldn't follow a product when the top dog's influences were John Cena and Batista.

 

I think that alot of guys who go through the indies (not guys that are picked from the gym or the football field) will say people like Benoit, or Kurt Angle, or Eddie. As you said, a ton of people who watch now are smarks, and a ton of people who want to get in the business are smarks. Even the current crop of WWE wrestlers have a good number of guys who went for the more skilled wrestlers. Sure, Cena, Edge and Christian were Hulkamaniacs, but Benoit, Jericho, and Trips weren't, and that's not even counting guys who didn't grow up in North America.

[Coffey]

I can agree with that. The problem lies in WWE. Smarks, for the most part, know that WWE is no longer the "promised land" so to speak. So they might aspire to work good matches in ROH instead of being a rich and famous jobber in WWE. They wouldn't have a huge risk of getting buried, being limited, etc. in the indies.

 

Can't deny that when people talk about wrestling a lot of times they're generalizing when they're really just talking about WWE (or WWF as a lot of people still call it). I'm curious if that will change in the future. Maybe one day when people say "wrestling" they won't mean WWE but another promotion and the people on-line or whatever will have to explain to them that "there's other promotions too, like WWE."

[sek69]

I agree with West when he says there's more negativity online, but what got me is his suggestion that hating people for playing backstage games somehow equates to good heeling. He's saying JJ gets negativity on the net because he's good at being a heel rather than because of people thinking he's undeserving of his push.

[Loss]

Anyone who works in wrestling is going to say what they think will either earn them favor with everyone else in the business or keep them out of the line of fire of everyone else in the business. I doubt anyone truly believes JJ is a great heel because the Internet hates him; he just knows he has to defend Jarrett somehow and chooses to do so by what seems like a good argument. Or maybe I'm underestimating the fine rose color of those glasses he's wearing -- I just don't believe he could possibly believe what he says.

[sek69]

Presumably you'd be right, but Don West isn't a "wrestling guy" and as such might not be expected to know the unwritten rules like "always take the bullet when someone insults your top guy".

 

Then again, if he could shill that crap on QVC, putting over JJ as a credible main eventer is probably a piece of cake for him.

[Guest Spaceman Spiff]

Presumably you'd be right, but Don West isn't a "wrestling guy" and as such might not be expected to know the unwritten rules like "always take the bullet when someone insults your top guy".

 

Then again, if he could shill that crap on QVC, putting over JJ as a credible main eventer is probably a piece of cake for him.

But he's been doing TNA for a couple years now. Anyone w/ a modicum of intelligence would figure out that sucking up to the higher-ups is a wise idea in any profession, let alone in the wrestling biz.

[sek69]

He's been in the biz long enough to establish that "Don West" and "modicum of intellegence" seldom appear in the same sentence.

[Mad Dog]

I actually thought, aside from the Jarrett thing, that West came off really well in that interview and even seems to be developing a decent mind for wrestling.

[Guest Danny Dubya v 2.0]

I agree with West when he says there's more negativity online, but what got me is his suggestion that hating people for playing backstage games somehow equates to good heeling. He's saying JJ gets negativity on the net because he's good at being a heel rather than because of people thinking he's undeserving of his push.

The problem with West and others is that they think that kind of heat turns people onto the product and keeps them watching to see the heel eventually fail. It either just doesn't register in their brains that such heat bores people as much as X-Pac heat does, or they don't want to acknowledge they've been making this mistake for years now.