Just one of wrestling's problems today

TNA, WWE, it doesn't matter. The male wrestlers are putting me to sleep these days. Coming from a guy who's watched wrestling his entire life, that says a lot. Right now, my favorite wrestlers are in the Knockouts division. I think they're bringing it. I don't blame the talent, even though The Rock's one night return promo blew everything else this past 6 years out of the water. I blame the writers and/or bookers, partially. I just posted the following paragraph as my Facebook status:

You know, one of the problems with wrestling these days... They think that by putting a championship belt on somebody, that makes them a big star. In the old days, the stars made the championship worth something, the championship didn't make the stars. It's not a damn crutch for the writers to use. Make some good rivalries and people will give a shit again.

You all know what I'm talking about. They forgot how to put together an interesting story, so they rely on our cherished, prestigious, and historic championship belts. I don't know about today, but a few years ago, I wrote that the typical story went like this:

"Boring generic guy in undy-tights wants da belt. Nuh uh! Other boring generic guy in undy-tights wants da belt! Grr." They do this for a month, PPV, belt swap, next opponent. Maybe I'm spoiled from my childhood memories, but things sure feel different nowadays. When I was growing up, the world heavyweight championship had prestige because guys like Hogan, Savage, Flair, Sting, Austin, Rock, Taker, etc. had it. They made the belt, it didn't make them.

WWE gave the belt to Sheamus even more quickly than Cena had won it before. TNA is just as bad. As much as I try to support TNA, there's only so much I can overlook. Lately they've been dropping the belt to anybody who comes into the company.

As a devoted WCW fan, it shames me to reference the "WCW 2000" era, but I suppose anybody in the company would be less humiliating a champion than David Arquette. I remember Chris Jericho explaining why Vince Russo's ideas worked in the WWF but not in WCW: In the WWF, Vinny Mac would always be there to tell him if it's a bad idea. TNA needs somebody like that. Somebody who knows what works and what doesn't. Like... a random guy off the street. Haha, let me stop.

So anyway, there's my rant.

By the way, I hope I put this in the right section. I noticed that like 99% percent of the topics on these forums are news headlines...

LOL a random guy off the street... I get your drift.

Great points.

Which really isn't working. Didn't really work 20 years ago, probably less effective now.

No Fucks to Give (Dash) wrote:

Which really isn't working. Didn't really work 20 years ago, probably less effective now.

Didn't work 20 years ago? That's a lie.

The Rock n Wrestling era made wrestling huge and guess what happened then, celebrities were everywhere.

Meh.

How about we get Miley Cyrus, Miranda Cosgrove and Victoria Justice in a triple threat match?

Justin Bieber vs Aaron Carter?

You know what's funny? If I recall, on the Rise and Fall of WCW DVD, somebody (maybe Vince) was saying (I paraphrase) "We had used celebrities in WWE before, but they never participated in a match like WCW did with Jay Leno. Oh we would never do that."

Now they look a little hypocritical, don't they? To WCW's credit, Karl Malone was actually pretty good for an amateur. It was idiotic to have the nWo win the match, but I'm getting off topic...

that's because Karl Malone is the mailman...he delivers

*end of lame joke*

The Sexy Vixen wrote:

How about we get Miley Cyrus, Miranda Cosgrove and Victoria Justice in a triple threat match?

Justin Bieber vs Aaron Carter?

Miley has the fire in her. She'd win with a 720 Chokeslam off the top. Yes. My friend likes her so I made her in SVR 11. Cause he made her look like a whore.

Anyways. I hate who TNA has a Security Guard with a title belt.

Funny enough i say sometimes the viewers are to blame.

Sorry but peoples attention span has become WAY shorter, notice how angles are dropped quick? Champions change quickly? because people grow bored quick, then again i'm bored with it all as a whole.

Lastly we just need to blame ourselves. Sorry but if you don't like it, don't watch it.

I have YET to see anythign Kong has done in the WWE. Why? Because i don't like it, i don't support it, i think it's bullshit so i don't watch it.

Everywhere i go i hear complaints but yet everyone buys the DVD's, everyone buys the PPV's everyone buy's the merchandice.......If you don't support the product, don't support it.

But Don't go off supporting the product.....yet you don't like where it's at.

That's my two cents.

In my opinion, TNA is far better than anything WWE has put on in about 3 years.

You have variety as a WWE fan to not even care the TNA exists.
Raw
Smackdown
NXT
Tough Enough
Superstars

So, I don't know why they'd need more.

I think WWE has been getting worse and worse since they bought WCW. Don't get me wrong: Lots of cool stuff happened between 2001 and 2004, but the decline in quality has been gradual. In 2004, my interest picked up temporarily when The Undertaker returned to his "dark" persona. However, I think by around 2005 to 2006, WWE became "unwatchable".

That isn't to say that I've completely tuned it out. Wrestling is my addiction, so Impact alone wouldn't be able to satisfy me for a whole week. I'd go nuts from boredom in between Thursdays. So I watch Raw as well as Impact.

Like I said though, they to be creative and come up with a better storyline than "I want to be champion". Having grown up with the more theatrical Attitude Era, this is very generic and unappealing. Let's face it: Gangrel might not have been a spectacular athlete or Macho Man on the microphone, but he was very over, because his gimmick was so cool. The fire, the lights, the bloodbaths...

Rowdy Roddy Piper was never WWF champion, but he got over because he had something called a personality. I go back to my original point. Championship belts aren't supposed to make the stars. The stars are supposed to be what gives the belt its prestige and glory.

kharma_chameleon wrote:

In my opinion, TNA is far better than anything WWE has put on in about 3 years.

You have variety as a WWE fan to not even care the TNA exists.
Raw
Smackdown
NXT
Tough Enough
Superstars

So, I don't know why they'd need more.

explain how TNA is better besides some matches and certain talent. let's see how you can say TNA 09-now is better than WWE...

TNA isn't the greatest thing ever, but WWE has fallen off it's perch.

TNA COULD be a lot better than WWE. But with the way the keep snatching up all of the WWE castoff's, TNA will forever be in the WWE shadow.

I'm trying not to start a debate over promotions, but for the record, yes. TNA is certainly better than WWE. It's not as good as WCW or the WWF, but it's way better than WWE.

No Michael Cole; no "anonymous Raw GM"; no HoF with Drew Carey in it; no generic jobbers holding title belts with the exception of, ahem, Gunner; they embrace the term "professional wrestling"; weapons; cussing; female wrestlers* instead of models, and the women wrestle for more than 2 minutes; less corny storylines; and finally; my hero, STING.

*WWE does deserve credit for picking up Kong/Kharma, but I hope her entrance gets a bit shorter.

WWE has the following going for it: It owns the vast majority of wrestling history; James Johnston (best entrance music composer of any wrestling promotion ever); the aging stars of yesteryear like Taker and HHH; and Vince McMahon (Sometimes I question his sanity these days, but he at least USED TO be a genius wrestling promoter).

I certainly have my complaints about TNA -- for example I don't like the backstage interview style they use these days (wrestler is talking to some nerd who is off-camera), but in my opinion, the good things outweigh the bad things.

I don't like the cheesy peek-a-boo spy camera angle that you get during locker room and backstage segments. It's like, dude ...you didn't see the camera there this whole time?!

Don't like it, but I don't hate it.

I miss gimmicks. Everyone is too real now.

why are ppl saying TNA has good storylines? THEY DONT

What I said was TNA's storylines are less corny than WWE's storylines. They're still not great. For example, despite my constant praising of the Knockouts division, I don't like the Angelina Love & Winter "trance" storyline very much.

Dead wrote:

why are ppl saying TNA has good storylines? THEY DONT

TNA wrestlers atleast have interesting developing characters. They have a sense of purpose. The storylines are intriguing and have depth. Unlike WWE where there are no storylines. Just John Cena who has a supporting villians to over come.

The entertainers in WWE smile too much, and have no characters. It's disgusting.

-CJ.