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[NintendoLogic]

The secondary belt is a concept that has outlived its usefulness. They made sense in the territory era as a way for determining a promotion's number one contender for the NWA title and give the wrestlers something to feud over when the world champion wasn't around. They also arguably made sense in an earlier time of national promotions as a way of giving viewers title matches in the days when the world champ hardly ever wrestled on TV. Neither rationale is compelling today. An undercard feud doesn't need a belt to be meaningful, and there's no clear rationale for why someone would choose to go after the TNT or TBS title rather than the men's or women's world titles. They only really exist because that's just the way it's always been done.

[strobogo]

Sammy's reign has been a dud but I think it's less the reign and more that he's not a likeable face at all. The swap with Cody was a pretty weird detour that didn't make sense at the time and makes even less sense with the hindsight that Cody was leaving.

[Timbo Slice]

On the bright side, watching Wardlow steamroll Scorp next week is gonna be fun. 

[Tetsujin]

3 hours ago, NintendoLogic said:

The secondary belt is a concept that has outlived its usefulness. They made sense in the territory era as a way for determining a promotion's number one contender for the NWA title and give the wrestlers something to feud over when the world champion wasn't around. They also arguably made sense in an earlier time of national promotions as a way of giving viewers title matches in the days when the world champ hardly ever wrestled on TV. Neither rationale is compelling today. An undercard feud doesn't need a belt to be meaningful, and there's no clear rationale for why someone would choose to go after the TNT or TBS title rather than the men's or women's world titles. They only really exist because that's just the way it's always been done.

10000% agre, I've always have felt that way. If I had a wrestling company, I would divide my roster in three main divisions: main stars, rookies and tags, and I would just have my main title, tag/tríos titles and a developmental title. I'd probably stablish a rule of "if you win ten succesful defenses with the rookie title, you have become worthy of the main leagues" or something like that.

[El-P]

1 hour ago, Timbo Slice said:

On the bright side, watching Wardlow steamroll Scorp next week is gonna be fun. 

Hopefully it doesn't happen. It would be a waste of both Scorpio and Sammy by proxy. Wardlow doesn't need this belt at all during the MJF feud.

[KawadaSmile]

You can absolutely set up the feud, have Wardlow look like a million bucks, keep the belt on Sky and not make him look like a goober.

[PeteF3]

It would behoove MJF to have Wardlow win the title, though. He still owns his contract and I don't see him just letting him out of it.

[DMJ]

Its all in the booking for me.

To me, if your World Champion is a babyface, you gotta put the secondary title on a heel so I'm glad its on Scorpio. That being said, he seems colder than he should for a guy who just won a championship. I'm not sure who they should've went with instead or who I'd have preferred really aside from Miro getting it back upon his return.

I'd also just add that I don't agree at all that secondary titles should've gone out once the territories died or World Champions started to appear weekly. The TV Title still felt like a big deal in the mid-to-late 90s in WCW and it made total sense that guys like Booker T, Benoit, and Alex Wright competed for it. It made less sense when Lex Luger had the title in 96'. Same for the Intercontinental Championship - though, things get a little spotty around 99' and then mostly worse from there (because, hey, WWE's booking, for the most part, gets spotty around 99' and mostly worse from there).

On a side note, the last great IC Title feud that comes to mind immediately, for me at least, was probably HHH/The Rock in the summer of 97', but I could see the argument that, booked properly, we should've had even better feuds involving Jericho, Benoit, Guerrero, Angle, and others in 99' and 2000...only, IIRC, they had these constant title changes, things got muddied up with the European Championship still around, and you still had Chyna, D'Lo, Road Dogg and Val Venis regularly involved in the division, with none of them necessarily blending well with the Radicalz (or at least not as seamlessly as Angle did). 

[KawadaSmile]

The Miz/Dolph Ziggler in 2016 for the IC title was legit one of the best feuds of that year in wrestling, on a very good show. SmackDown was loaded.

[DMJ]

Yea, I'm sure there are more than a few that people would also call great. Maybe an idea for a new thread ("Great Midcard Title Feuds Post-2000") as its completely unrelated to AEW.

I personally despised the Ironman match they had and have never really been a huge Rollins fan, but Ziggler/Rollins was a well-received feud in other corners of the internet that weren't here. 

[KawadaSmile]

I didn't mind Tay/Sammy as a couple but I am getting fed up with their online pictures saying "yeah we have so much sex lol we so craaaaayzeee" and them getting tattoos of their names, specially because I end up knowing that against my will.

It truly feels like stuff people in their late teens would do and they are basically my age. Just a recipe for being unlikeable as shit, and considering how their on-screen characters are related, it's even worse - they are faces.

[El-P]

53 minutes ago, KawadaSmile said:

I didn't mind Tay/Sammy as a couple but I am getting fed up with their online pictures saying "yeah we have so much sex lol we so craaaaayzeee" and them getting tattoos of their names, specially because I end up knowing that against my will.

It truly feels like stuff people in their late teens would do and they are basically my age. Just a recipe for being unlikeable as shit, and considering how their on-screen characters are related, it's even worse - they are faces.

As I said before... 

Honestly, when Tay showed up the only thing I was waiting for was for PVZ to smack her already. Sammy is 100% a natural heel anyway.

And really, getting tatoos of your lover's name is a BAD idea. I was just reading on a sociology book that 85% of relationships end up in a separation. (and really now, Sammy was proposing to his former girlfriend during a show, that sequence has aged like milk ) 

 

[KawadaSmile]

The thing that bugs me is that Tay is someone who you can easily root for. She might get booed against PVZ solely by associating with Sammy.

[El-P]

2 minutes ago, KawadaSmile said:

The thing that bugs me is that Tay is someone who you can easily root for. She might get booed against PVZ solely by associating with Sammy.

Agreed, she's a natural babyface. I sure hope she doesn't get booed though (I mean, I'm a heel fan, always have been, and I like PVZ already), we don't want another screwed up Cody dynamics. Sammy has never been booed thus far though.

Now gotta say this, people on social media actually talking shit about a personal relationship and probably mostly giving shit to Tay because of course they would, these people are just common assholes who should mind their own fucking business. I'm sure there's borderline harassement taking place.

[KawadaSmile]

3 minutes ago, El-P said:

Now gotta say this, people on social media actually talking shit about a personal relationship and probably mostly giving shit to Tay because of course they would, these people are just common assholes who should mind their own fucking business. I'm sure there's borderline harassement taking place.

Absolutely. A lot of it has to do with people still not over Sammy's previous relationship (which itself is something very... odd, to say the least). I never really understood how or why people felt entitled to harass others because they were dating someone they don't particularly like. Shipping wars, man.

[strobogo]

8 hours ago, DMJ said:

Its all in the booking for me.

To me, if your World Champion is a babyface, you gotta put the secondary title on a heel so I'm glad its on Scorpio. That being said, he seems colder than he should for a guy who just won a championship. I'm not sure who they should've went with instead or who I'd have preferred really aside from Miro getting it back upon his return.

I'd also just add that I don't agree at all that secondary titles should've gone out once the territories died or World Champions started to appear weekly. The TV Title still felt like a big deal in the mid-to-late 90s in WCW and it made total sense that guys like Booker T, Benoit, and Alex Wright competed for it. It made less sense when Lex Luger had the title in 96'. Same for the Intercontinental Championship - though, things get a little spotty around 99' and then mostly worse from there (because, hey, WWE's booking, for the most part, gets spotty around 99' and mostly worse from there).

On a side note, the last great IC Title feud that comes to mind immediately, for me at least, was probably HHH/The Rock in the summer of 97', but I could see the argument that, booked properly, we should've had even better feuds involving Jericho, Benoit, Guerrero, Angle, and others in 99' and 2000...only, IIRC, they had these constant title changes, things got muddied up with the European Championship still around, and you still had Chyna, D'Lo, Road Dogg and Val Venis regularly involved in the division, with none of them necessarily blending well with the Radicalz (or at least not as seamlessly as Angle did). 

Could it be that he hadn't had a singles match on TV since March 10th, 2021? 

[MoS]

AEW apparently broke the wrestling gate record for the Forum for their L.A debut. 

[Timbo Slice]

They need to announce their Bay Area dates for that next week. My guess is that they run the SAP Center in San Jose because Meltz, but them selling out the Cow Palace could be fun from a historical perspective, even if that place is a dump. 

[funkdoc]

The announced revival of Gatoh Move makes me wonder if Emi Sakura is done with AEW. They practically treat her like the female QT Marshall except even worse since she’s stuck on Dark all the time. Plus there was that Shida article talking about the lack of support for Japanese wrestlers - she specifically mentioned how Emi didn’t really know English and had nobody in the company helping her find a place to live etc.

Supposedly WWE hasn’t been much better on this in recent times, but still…makes me wonder if we’re heading for a joshi-less division down the line, if my thought turns out to be true

[Matt D]

18 minutes ago, funkdoc said:

The announced revival of Gatoh Move makes me wonder if Emi Sakura is done with AEW. They practically treat her like the female QT Marshall except even worse since she’s stuck on Dark all the time. Plus there was that Shida article talking about the lack of support for Japanese wrestlers - she specifically mentioned how Emi didn’t really know English and had nobody in the company helping her find a place to live etc.

Supposedly WWE hasn’t been much better on this in recent times, but still…makes me wonder if we’re heading for a joshi-less division down the line, if my thought turns out to be true

Is she training people (Jade or people like Skye Blue or anyone else) on the side too? I wasn't sure if she was just someone there for people to get 5-7 minute match experience against or to work with in tags or what. 

[funkdoc]

It’s been assumed she was mainly hired as a trainer since she has an arguably WON HOF-worthy resume there - she’s one of the key figures in the modern joshi revival.  No hard confirmation of her role in AEW though

[Matt D]

5 minutes ago, funkdoc said:

It’s been assumed she was mainly hired as a trainer since she has an arguably WON HOF-worthy resume there - she’s one of the key figures in the modern joshi revival.  No hard confirmation of her role in AEW though

We get a lot of talk about people training with Dustin or QT or (lately) Danielson but I haven't heard a lot about Emi along those lines, though it's a no brainer, yeah.

[NintendoLogic]

I was under the impression she was brought in mainly to be a player-coach. Kenny Omega was the one mainly responsible for handling the women's division and the joshi women in particular, so his absence probably makes things rougher than they would be otherwise.

[sek69]

4 hours ago, NintendoLogic said:

I was under the impression she was brought in mainly to be a player-coach. Kenny Omega was the one mainly responsible for handling the women's division and the joshi women in particular, so his absence probably makes things rougher than they would be otherwise.

If for no other reason Kenny is very fluent in Japanese so without him (and with Shida going back to Japan for a while recently) the communication barriers for Emi would probably be pretty rough. There's always going to be the whole "wrestling is a universal language" deal, but there's only so far that can take you working a 5 minute Dark match.

[Matt D]

2 hours ago, sek69 said:

If for no other reason Kenny is very fluent in Japanese so without him (and with Shida going back to Japan for a while recently) the communication barriers for Emi would probably be pretty rough. There's always going to be the whole "wrestling is a universal language" deal, but there's only so far that can take you working a 5 minute Dark match.

I really enjoy her teaming with Bunny/Nyla/Diamante/etc. but…