How do you defend when someone says "stop watching

[Guest TheShawshankRudotion]

Using "The sweet is never as sweet without the sour" doesn't justify the near infinite amount of suck presented by the WWE. There should be a bare minimum of "good" presented on a weekly basis, because putting out something that is sub-par shouldn't be tolerated by any self-respecting individual or group. Putting out great show after great show after great show would numb one after a while to what a great show is, but I don't think I have ever heard anyone say "Why isn't the WWE putting out great shows every week?", so it's not like there is pressure there for the WWE to do that. People HAVE been saying "Why does this suck so much?".

 

This isn't a scenario like LOST where fans get upset when there are just "really good" shows that just further character development and set up lil pieces to the puzzle rather than the "really great" shows that solve mysteries or establish new ones. Shows like LOST recognize that there have to be lows to go with the highs, but they don't reach so low as to provide bad television to make people appreciate the good stuff they churn out.

[Guest Cam Chaos]

When the bad outweighs the good and the best that can be said "well, at least that one moment/match was good" and it's a two hour show... that's pretty pitiful. If I had a juicy medium rare prime cut 18oz steak on a silver platter surrounded by a piles of shit, I'm not going to eat it because it's still surrounded by shit. Now, if I can get the steak by itself, that's an all together different matter. Thanks to the miracle of the net I can do that and everyone else on here can too. That people still choose to look for a needle in a haystack out of choice is as sad as it is an indictment of how desperate and unfortunate their obsession is.

[Loss]

While I understand that point, that's a problem with the presentation in WWE, not with wrestling itself. Good wrestling *always* strives to make the big moments stand out from the pack, and to do that, they have to create a pack. Where WWE fails is in presenting their product as entertainment rather than sport. Game quality is the last thing most sports fans concern themselves with because they have a loyalty to the stars and the teams. Theoretically, wrestling should work the same way. They've created an environment where fans aren't watching because they want to see what's going to happen next and because they enjoy seeing their favorites, but rather because they expect things to be quality. Two totally different things. 20 years ago, people didn't go to wrestling shows to be entertained, in the same way that people don't go to football games to be entertained. Vince made his own bed by turning his product into Vaudeville, because there's no emotional attachment to anyone anymore. The wrestlers sacrifice their bodies to make us laugh and cheer and then we forget about them and want them off TV when they're no longer of use. Steve Austin is the best possible example of that.

[Loss]

When the bad outweighs the good and the best that can be said "well, at least that one moment/match was good" and it's a two hour show... that's pretty pitiful.

I'd be happy with one good match or moment in every show myself. But that much isn't happening. I keep the best stuff and managed to get six weeks of WWE TV (inc. Velocity/Heat when it still aired and the Homecoming special that went over three hours) on one 2:40 tape. And that was with standards not as high as they could have been.

[Guest Cam Chaos]

The sad thing is as a fan you have to settle for only one good thing out of two hours of programming. Programs with 1/4 of their TV time can deliver quality entertainment so in theory WWE should be able to deliver more than your average show and twice as much as a prime time hour long show.

 

Even when the format was opening interview, match, skit, match, skit, interview, tag match, skit, match and the main event match/interview/angle even if the main event was just an angle you could generally walk away being happy with the overall product. Even if one skit involved Mark Henry and Mae Young or PMS you could at least enjoy a Rock interview or a well worked tag match. Now that's not even possible as the tag titles are in the toilet, Rock's gone and even though people in the company recognise the problems, nothing seems to be happening in terms of advancing the product.

 

They are not concerned about insulting out intelligence by having CM Punk come out under some random name in a tag match one week and 6 weeks later come out as CM Punk. Mr Anderson became Mr Kennedy in the space of a week. The Tolands became the Dicks within 3 weeks. They have young guys getting their asses whipped by out of shape 40 year olds and guys with replacement hips, burying them while putting over people that can't contribute week in and week out like their younger adversaries. Hulk Hogan can barely hobble between the ropes but he is capable of beating guys literally half his age.

 

It's one thing to suspend disbelief, it's another to abandon all basic laws of comment sense.

[Guest The Man in Blak]

This leads me to an interesting question that I'll keep my opinion quiet on for now -- if wrestling was great all the time, would the great moments mean nearly as much as they do in the current environment?

The great moments would have whatever significance the WWE wanted to give them. I think I understand what you're implying (if everybody goes out there and wrestles a ***** match, then how do matches stand out from each other?), but the catch with wrestling is that the promotion is external to the match itself. You could line up five ****-***** star matches on a card and give each one proper notice, but slowly start to escalate the importance of matches as the card goes on. Ross & Lawler (or I guess Coach and Lawler now) would be the ones to emphasize how significant the main event is, while upholding matches earlier in the card as being representative of the type of competition in the WWE.

 

The problem is that I'm not sure the WWE is capable of doing that. The WWE is short-sighted and, often times, moronic when it comes to putting together their product. Furthermore, the WWE doesn't highlight the whole card - in fact, there's plenty of times where they continue to hammer home the upper card, even when they should be doing play-by-play for lower card matches. Wrestlers are coerced into working quick TV matches that really have no structure, other than a couple of signature moves and - in most cases - some kind of external interference or ref bump. It's not even wrestling for most of the show - just a sad tease.

 

It's also worth nothing that "good" doesn't necessarily equate "pure 30 minute wrestling match" - there are ways to have good garbage matches, good comedy matches, etc. You wouldn't want to pile up five straight classic matches that were super-intense - the crowd would be completely burned out. But it's not impossible to offer a varied product that has quality.

[Guest Cam Chaos]

Canadian Stampede is a good example. You had a basic tag match to warm up the crowd and fill time as the arena filled up, a heated brawl, a Japanese high flyers match, a stiff bigman match with well timed spots and an entertaining 10 man tag with moments of comedy and tense drama. All were good matches however were examples of different match types that can put together an all round entertaining show.

[Guest Dangerous A]

Canadian Stampede was good, but I wouldn't call Taker vs Vader "stiff". It was an OK big man match, but hardly stiff.

[Guest Cam Chaos]

Stiff by WWE standards of the time. Obviously not by AJPW standards. Everything looked as realistic and effective as possible due to both men's efforts to sell and throw good looking strikes at one another.