thatvinylgeek

Inspired by @BomberPat, this thread may die a very quiet death, but it gave me food for thought.

If this year's mania was only a one night event such as it was in the past, would it have worked?

Putting some very rough rules in place...you can't change or add any matches, only remove, the matches and outcomes took place exactly as they did, and assuming the main event tag from night one took place on the go home Smackdown, what would your perfect card look like?

I have had a go, and I think it has made me realise that with the amount of belts they have now it is bloody hard to book it over a single night without leaving championships off the card. I have added timings and a rough running order to this, and I still can't get it below 4.5 hours. 

Timings are with entrances and victories, and it would mean no Snoop or other celeb shenanigans. I think the crowd would be completely burnt out by the end...but here's my card:

WWE Women’s World championship: Rhea Ripley (c) vs. Becky Lynch - 40 mins

WWE Undisputed Tag Team championships: 6-Pack Ladder match - 40 mins

WWE Intercontinental championship: Gunther (c) vs. Sami Zayn - 40 mins

WWE World Heavyweight championship: Seth Rollins vs. Drew McIntyre - 30 mins

WWE Women’s championship: IYO SKY vs. Bayley - 35 mins

WWE United States championship: Logan Paul vs. Kevin Owens vs. Randy Orton - 35 mins

Bianca Belair, Jade Cargill & Naomi vs. Damage CTRL (Asuka, Kairi Sane & Dakota Kai) - 20 mins

Undisputed WWE Universal championship: Roman Reigns vs. Cody Rhodes - Bloodline rules - 50 mins

What do you think? Would you change anything? Does this just prove we need the two nights now?
 

37 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

On that point, one of the things Cena was brilliant at was subtly playing the "heel" role in a match without actually working heel, if that makes sense. If he was with a "Cena sucks" crowd, he wouldn't play into it that much, but if he were in a situation where the crowd aren't just booing him but are cheering for his opponent, he would allow them plenty of opportunities to shine, and would modify his own offence slightly. Rob Van Dam at One Night Stand and CM Punk in Chicago are the big obvious examples, but I remember a match he had against Wade Barrett in the UK, where he slowed down the Five Knuckle Shuffle to really look like he was rubbing it in the crowd's face, and generally give it much more of a heel than a babyface delivery, following the old adage that a babyface speeds up while a heel slows down. Never going so far as to actually be a baddy, or to make his fanbase turn on him, but enough to play to the crowd in the building on the night. Eddie Guerrero was similar - if you watch him as a babyface, the Three Amigos is about being smooth and technically proficient, whereas as a heel the transition between each suplex is slower, and the suplex itself has a lot more snap to it, so the same move is used with different intent.

In terms of generational differences, it's hard to say Cena "suffered" given that he became the biggest star in the company in spite of people booing him, but he had the drawback of being the first real post-WCW top star when the audience had shrunk and were generally a lot "smarter" than they had been historically, and came off the back of a few years of the company re-educating the audience as to what good wrestling looked like - before him, we had Benoit, Guerrero and Angle, all of whom we were told were top stars because they were the best technical wrestlers in the world, and, in Benoit and Guerrero's case, had worked hard for years to earn their way to the top. So then John Cena comes along, who's nobody's idea of a technical wrestler, and is on top very early in his career, and he's not fitting the bill - made worse by his Wrestlemania feud with Triple H, where, while JBL had always acted genuinely concerned that Cena could easily beat him in a fair fight, Trips in his infinite wisdom builds the feud around outright saying that John Cena isn't very good at wrestling, and presenting himself as the technical expert (which, in Triple H's case, seems to mean "does an Indian Deathlock sometimes"), knowing full well that "technical wrestler" was something the company had spent the previous three or four years teaching us to respect and care about. 

They then spent the next decade trying to re-re-educate the audience back into the Hogan vs. Monster Of The Month formula, but the genie was out of the bottle, and by the time CM Punk and Bryan Danielson came along, they basically ushered in another cultural shift towards a faster paced, more indie-influenced style, and Cena's US Title run was him trying to show that he could still hang in that environment.

 

I complain a lot about how WWE don't let their heels cheat or generate genuine heat any more but, that aside, I think the days of most matches being a pure "babyface gets beaten down, then comes back in the third act" are behind us not just because of changes in wrestling, but because of MMA. Too many people know what real fights are more likely to look like, and don't buy a guy getting beaten up for fifteen minutes then pulling it out of the bag after all that, and need a little more back-and-forth, a few more hope spots and false comebacks peppered in. 

Great minds 😉

I think a lot of this is that Cena is a product of his time, and the influences of the generation before him. We are getting to the point where him, The Rock, Sting and a few others are the last of the breed of the wrestlers with the "less is more" mindset, something Punk spoke about on his interview last week. I think a lot of matches nowadays no matter the heel face dynamic are very much 50/50 from a work-rate point of view and they share the burden for pretty much the entire match, whereas once upon a time it would be that the heel would do most of the heavy lifting and remain in control for the majority of the match with the babyface having a couple of comebacks and being cut off, before ultimately firing up for the win, hence Hogan's point and invulnerability sections, and Cena's five moves of doom. When they came you knew what it meant and what was going to happen next.

In the current product there is much more of an element of surprise and false finishes to try to keep people on their toes and suspend the element of disbelief, people will win a lot more with other moves and roll ups then they ever did, even after hitting counter pining combos on each other, one may end up with a 3 count, that kind of thing never happened before.

I think it's why matches like Hogan v Warrior were a bit off back in the day as noone was playing the heel role, and having the majority of the offence, back then this felt very different. Even back at WM18 Hogan knew that the match with Rock was not going to work unless that role was very clearly defined so they called the audible and it turned into a pure pantomime match which is exactly what it needed.

I also think it's why a lot of people don't like LA Knight (but I may be wrong), because he tries to work in that style against people who work in a very different way and it's very jarring.

I am not saying either is right or wrong, both are perfectly valid and have their fans, but I def think we are in a very different time where (for a lot of the midcard especially), no one particularly wrestles as a heel or face once the bell rings, and Cena def does.

1 hour ago, DavidB6937 said:

I haven't heard that song in years, and just realised it really has nothing to do with WrestleMania whatsoever

 

Always thought Slam Jam was far superior personally 😉 

I remember picking the cassette up from the local Asda for £1.29

1 minute ago, waters44 said:

I’m going to pick this up I think. Does anyone know - can you download other users created wrestlers? I remember you could ten years ago so I would just download the old ECW guys that others have created. Just wondering if that’s still a thing in these 2K games 

Yeah, the creation scene in the 2K games is insane, people are able to make creations that look better the in game models in some instances (just have a look on youtube for some of the last years AEW and TNA creations).

Also you can create your own brands in Universe mode, so can pretty much setup your own promotions as well with dedicated rosters

This might just be me...but also to the mainstream AEW fan, Okada might not BE that big of a deal. They are always told he is something special when he appears, but he hasn't really backed it up with any true Okada worthy performances in the promotion. He had the tag, and then the match with Bryan which was billed as the greatest thing ever, but then fell a bit flat even before the injury at the end.

The guy is amazing, I know he's amazing, YOU know he's amazing, but the people who have only seen him in AEW have yet to really see it, and I'm not sure having him as a heel off the bat is the right way to demonstrate it either.

Whereas with Ospreay, each time he has been brought in has had highlight reel matches that immediately make people take notice (whether you are in to his stuff or not).

This will have to do for now

For me Cody's return at WM a couple of years ago...loved it...from Seth acting like an idiot in the ring, to the lights going out...then "wrestling has more than one royal family", the music was right, then the logo appeared and the realisation that were keeping his presentation the same kicked in

Just an all round great moment for me

I thought (and I'm paraphrasing):

"What does it matter who sits at the head of the table, when neither of you has done any cooking for the last 2 years"

Was a great line

We really want to Cody, it's the others we don't

Could one way to maybe partly slightly salvage it, be to have The Rock as a ref/enforcer (although it doesn't solve the "just not at Wrestlemania line". Cody called and told him Roman always cheats via interference and that is not proper behaviour for any "Head of the table". Rock then prevents shenanigans from taking place during the match, counts the 3 for Cody.

Solves some problems
1. Roman gets mad that Rock chose Cody over blood and demands a match with Rock
2. Rock gets to steal the spotlight and raise and shake Cody's hand at the end
3. Cody gets his singles match (albeit with the Rock still interjected)

Drew just telling the truth in the promo was fun, more of that will do.

1 hour ago, Kfogg1991 said:

I really can't believe it honestly. When I watched the situation play out on smackdown my jaw hit the floor and the real sadness and disappointment for Cody when you saw the rock whispering something in his ear and his face just looked betrayed and hurt. It genuinely makes you think what did they honestly think would happen when this played out, we were so fucking angry last year when Roman won and beat him because the absolute right thing they should have done was have Cody win and finish his story and also end it for Roman but it went that way and we trusted them to rectify and do the right thing this year even though we weren't happy with it, we accepted and just counted the days down until mania this year.

He becomes the only person to win back to back rumble's which felt right and he truly deserved it after last year and just being solidly fantastic as a talent and in ring he just gives it all and is so entertaining but they have made him look like a cock and it absolutely seems online it's sucked the life and good will we gave them in the worst way.

It says everything when after 24 hours the video on YouTube had more dislikes than any other video in history 

This hurt my brain

1 hour ago, JNLister said:

There's nothing wrong with doing Rock-Reigns at WrestleMania.

There's a lot wrong with putting all that effort and storyline logic into building up Rhodes-Reigns and then doing Rock-Reigns.

I think it's this.

Rock v Roman is fine, and was a dead cert to happen at some point, but I don't think the plan was to do it this year. After the rumble it was 100% telegraphed that Rhodes was going after Roman to finish the job, other wise why waste the back to back rumble wins as well, if the plan was for him to challenge Seth there were other ways to get there.

Then with the injury to Punk, the Vince fallout and seemingly Brock being banished I guess it threw all plans into chaos and left them reeling trying to do something to divert the attention. 

Even though I am 99.9% sure he is just gonna turn up on Raw and accept Seth's challenge I am slightly intrigued that he didn't confirm that on Smackdown and alluded to still coming after Reigns. Is there ANY chance at all that he could challenge and beat (stupid as it may be) Roman at the Chamber and then have his first defense at Mania, or beath Seth and then beat Roman at Backlash to put the nail in the coffin...which completely wastes splitting the belts.

Both are stupid ideas which won't happen, but we are in a very weird place right now...

Three generations view points...

Me a 42 year old grumpy man - Meh, what a waste of Cody's character building

My 30 year brother who is actually going to mania is now (ever so slightly) disappointed....disappointed about going to mania...madness

My 11 year old twin girls who LOVE Cody - "Why is he fighting the man from Jumanji" 

Which surely goes to show they are only doing it for themselves to save face in the press and not the fans. 

It's Bayley's story to finish now! 

12 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

The Steve Austin talking to the camera at the 30 second mark is the stuff of nightmares, jesus christ!

I am so glad you made that gif @Hannibal Scorch I couldn't be bothered but so so wanted to....whoever approved that needs sacking! The Hogan one is pretty offensive as well

40 years of WM showcase

Special ref matches back

Casket and Ambulance matches...

Hopefully be another strong year

https://wwe.2k.com/2k24/features/
 

Ospreay v Alexander 3 at All In...🙄 

Taylor Rotunda (AKA Bo Dallas) has been posting lots of Bray type videos on youtube saying something big is coming soon...and it did make me think of that this week. However pretty sure he is still under WWE contract, and his vids are showing Braun Strowman and Alexa Bliss...so very LONG shot...Looks more like a way for WWE to bring a Bray type act back.

Videos here for reference.

1 hour ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

To be honest Gooshy I think you are been unfair. That segment was much worse than you have described. For all of Kenny's in ring ability, his promo is consistently dreadful. Stumbling over words, says nothing with any real conviction, and this one is one of the worst. 

For some reason I have always found Kenny's Engish promos shocking, much preferred his delivery in Japanese when he was in NJPW

Surely a lot if this is generational...the product has shifted so much from where we were when Punk was last around and I would think so has a huge percentage of the audience. 

I'm 41, I love the guy, always have, and really enjoyed his promo this week....however I now have 10 year old twins who have no clue who he has and are failing to see why Daddy is so excited about him being back as he is "boring".

Heck even my 26 year old brother remembers punk being very different when he was last in WWE and talking about Ice Cream bars and plastic cups as he could relate to it a bit more when he was younger. 

I guess for me I haven't changed or gone from childhood to adulthood in his absence so I am still enjoying the same smirking nudge nudge wink wink guy he always was...however I completely get why a large majority of the audience are either apathetic or completely baffled as to why he's coming in and throwing random digs at their new heroes

So if LA Knight is done with Roman now (or soon) could we see him winning the Rumble and deciding to face a (by then) heel Seth on night 1 of Mania? Leaving Cody to do the Shawn type chase through elim chamber to get his rematch? 

It might not be very exciting but I always thought HHH's knee drop was a thing of beauty, and looks evil when sold right. I think the fact he tends not to roll off it makes it look all the more effective

14 hours ago, wandshogun09 said:

Speaking of Samoa Joe, for all his hard hitting offence, my favourite thing he does is probably this 😂

Literally came here to post that Joe's "walking away" or "nope" is genius

27 minutes ago, air_raid said:

Forgive me if its been posted in the thread already, if not, I assume everyone's already read from other sources that the new intro voice note was recorded by Copeland and the voice is Beth?

Yeah I saw that, nice touch, and when they bring her in and run a divorce angle she can change it to "I thought I knew him!"