The moment you thought about quitting wrestling

[1SinN6]

during hardy vs hardy match at mania, matt with two tee's hit his head off the steps, thought nothing of it untill a doctor ran out and quickly stoped the flow of blood, then a tiny gash on cena which a doctor ran out and cleaned him up, then orton then punk........when this happenes during fantastic match like punk vs rey that kills the flow of the match.

nwa wcw early 90's was u/pg ffs and flair was bleeding like there was no tomorrow.

 

Shame you didnt really understand the thread. Find us a good picture

[Supremo]

The Orton push/burial of early 2009 typified this trend better than any other single thing I can think of. A character and angle that really did have that feel of Austin in early 97 all over it, thrown away because of the insistence that every big PPV these days has to have a 'happy ending', regardless of whether it actually makes the fans happy or not (regardez the blank faces in the picture). It's ironic that the man who proved a heel can go over at Wrestlemania and still make the company shitloads of money in the aftermath refused to acknowledge that by putting over the most promising heel to come along since him nearly a full decade later.

Do you seriously think that the problem with that match was the result?

 

Oh, it was a shit match, but yeah, in the context of this thread the result is all that matters. Austin/Michaels at Wrestlemania 14 was pretty shit considering the hype, but all that anyone remembers is the cool ending, Tyson twatting Michaels and Austin getting the torch passed to him.

Orton's potential had already fizzled out weeks before his Mania bout with Triple H though. Neither the quality of that match, nor the result, could've salvaged him by that point.

 

 

That's the real point of reference that's required when discussing Orton's botched push. Right there and then was the last time I was ever duped into being excited about professional wrestling. I allowed myself to think they were actually going to make something out of Randy, I genuinely believed he was set to be the next Stone Cold, and then in twenty seconds everything turned to shit and I haven't cared about anything they've done since. Even when Nexus tore shit up, deep down inside I knew they'd eventually fuck it, which they did.

 

Here's the deal. If the UFC was scripted, and the people in charge of it had the same mentality of those in WWE, then Tim fucking Sylvia would still be the World Heavyweight Champion, Matt Hughes would still be Welterweight Champion, Rich Franklin would be still Middleweight Champ and Tito Ortiz would still be Light Heavyweight Champion. But luckilly, because it's a shoot, other guys have won those belts and the UFC has been forced to make stars out of them. That's the greatest discrepancy of the two, and why I've all but given up on professional wrestling these days. The fact that it's scripted means they will always stop anyone new from ever getting over, meaning they'll never be any new stars, and everything will forever stay the same. If Vinny Mac was scripting UFC then Brock Lesnar as we know him now would've been jobbed out to someone like Heath Herring and Chael Sonnen, far from becoming a massive star thanks to his talents on the microphone, would've been punished for being better than they wanted him to be, and probably booked to look like a tit on NXT.

 

Wrestling is proper shit.

Edited September 13, 2010 by Supremo

[King Pitcos]

If Vinny Mac was scripting UFC then Brock Lesnar as we know him now would've been jobbed out to someone like Heath Herring and Chael Sonnen, far from becoming a massive star thanks to his talents on the microphone, would've been punished for being better than they wanted him to be, and probably booked to look like a tit on NXT.

Isn't Brock Lesnar the most stupid example you could possibly use to make that point, considering he was pushed as an unstoppable monster pretty much from his debut and for the entire two years he was in WWE? Wrestling wasn't a shoot in 2002 either, like.

[AshC]

[jimufctna24]

If Vinny Mac was scripting UFC then Brock Lesnar as we know him now would've been jobbed out to someone like Heath Herring and Chael Sonnen, far from becoming a massive star thanks to his talents on the microphone, would've been punished for being better than they wanted him to be, and probably booked to look like a tit on NXT.

Isn't Brock Lesnar the most stupid example you could possibly use to make that point, considering he was pushed as an unstoppable monster pretty much from his debut and for the entire two years he was in WWE? Wrestling wasn't a shoot in 2002 either, like.

I think what he is trying to say more is if Vince got his hands on someone multi talented like a Lesnar for example who made a name for himself in another sport instead of getting a fair shot at glory then Vince would use the fact that wrestling is scripted to make a fool out of him based on him making him a name out of himself outside of the WWE fish bowl and not being Vinces own creation

 

Vince doesnt take to kindly too them outsiders

 

Edited September 13, 2010 by jimufctna24

[Supremo]

If Vinny Mac was scripting UFC then Brock Lesnar as we know him now would've been jobbed out to someone like Heath Herring and Chael Sonnen, far from becoming a massive star thanks to his talents on the microphone, would've been punished for being better than they wanted him to be, and probably booked to look like a tit on NXT.

Isn't Brock Lesnar the most stupid example you could possibly use to make that point, considering he was pushed as an unstoppable monster pretty much from his debut and for the entire two years he was in WWE? Wrestling wasn't a shoot in 2002 either, like.

Not really, no. My point was that in the past two to three years the UFC has made a tonne of new stars that they can healine pay per views with, primarilly because the shoot aspect of their product all but forces them to. If somebody goes on a winning streak, or somebody boring like Rashad Evans or Lyoto Machida happens to secure a title, they're practically left with no alternative but to invent and create ways in which to portray them as a star and make money out of them. Things naturally progress like in any sport, with guys surpassing what's came before them and taking the slots once held by guys who're now past it.

 

WWE on the other hand doesn't have that type of motivation to keep making new stars, they can pick and choose whoever they want whenever they want, and as such they choose no-one whatsoever. Nothing progresses, nothing gets refreshed, everyone stays in the same slot forever. My point wasn't that Vince McMahon wouldn't notice Brock Lesnar's potential, it's that since they pushed Brock in 2002 and then I guess Cena and Batista in 2005, there's been absolutely no new main event stars worth getting genuinely excited about. Three in a decade. Fucking hell. UFC usually creates the same amount in about six months. They allow people to make stars out of themselves and then work with what they have. WWE does everything in their power to stop people becoming stars and works directly against everything they have. It's absolutely retarded. Chris Leben's had the personality of a star for almost five years, but unfortunately for the UFC it wasn't until recently that he's put enough wins together that they can start focussing on him and putting him in featured fights. WWE doesn't have that problem, they pick whoerver they want, hopefully the most talented guys or those with the most potential, give them the win streak required and then push them concurrently. They don't, though. They pick the most talented or guys with the most potential and do everything in their power to make them look like twats on NXT, just so they can chuckle backstage. Meanwhile their roster, particularly on top, is the most stale pile of shit known to man. Even Shaumus and Nexus, who're the supposed, "new stars," still can't catch a break and aren't pushed anywhere near the level they could and should be. They booked Nexus to lose at Summerslam, for fuck's sake. It was mind blowing.

 

Sure, if Brock was just getting into the WWE today there's still a chance, given his size and athleticism, that Vince would give him the same monster push he did back then. But if he did, it'd be a huge rarity in today's climate and that's the problem. New stars coming through should be the norm and they should come in all shapes and sizes. They shouldn't happen about once every five years and always feature identical gigantic guys. That's when it becomes a boring pile of wank.

[buba3d]

during hardy vs hardy match at mania, matt with two tee's hit his head off the steps, thought nothing of it untill a doctor ran out and quickly stoped the flow of blood, then a tiny gash on cena which a doctor ran out and cleaned him up, then orton then punk........when this happenes during fantastic match like punk vs rey that kills the flow of the match.

nwa wcw early 90's was u/pg ffs and flair was bleeding like there was no tomorrow.

 

Shame you didnt really understand the thread. Find us a good picture

i did however it didn't show up

[Carbomb]

To address the topic a couple of pages ago, I actually stopped watching WWE for a couple of years because of Hassan. It was bad enough they were making out that a guy who doesn't want to be discriminated against because of hysteria was a heel, and it was even worse when they ran the UT angle, effectively saying: "Don't believe any of them - they're all terrorists."

Edited September 13, 2010 by Carbomb

[DebbieHardy]

This is the moment I did quit watching wrestling:

 

 

Haven't watched anything since.

 

This!

 

I thought about it but I love wrestling too much, still it just ain't the same without ol' HBK

[tiger_rick]

WWE on the other hand doesn't have that type of motivation to keep making new stars

I don't think it's about motivation, I think it's about an inability to make new stars. First and foremost, they aren't willing to sacrifice their current stars to make new ones. That isn't a choice Dana has to make in a legitimate sport.

 

UFC is red hot right now. They have the pick of the best athletes after pro-football, a position Wrestling used to be in. They have a massive fanbase who will purchase PPV's regardless of the content and a big casual audience who will buy the big shows. Making stars is easy in a real sport. if you beat the other guys, you are the star. There's no difference between Joe Rogan telling us Paul Daley (or whoever) is the next big thing and Jerry Lawler telling us John Morrison (or whoever) is the next big thing. In theory. In reality, Rogan is legit, the sport is legit and Daley's record is legit. It's way easier. Anderson Silva is a massive star because he's a brilliant fighter. He doesn't even speak the lingo. In pro-wrestling, you will never get a guy like that over.

 

I'm not going to argue that WWE couldn't do a much better job getting guys over but it's not that easy, especially given the direction they've gone in. There are things they could take from the UFC too but outright comparing it to UFC just isn't fair because UFC have got a ton of advantages that come from being at the peak of your popularity. It'll be interesting to see whther the popularity of the UFC drops. I'm absolutely sure that if they were a pro-wrestling company, the fact that their PPV's are identical in terms of the theme, the format, the commentary, etc would be criticised as being the same old formula. Main Events like ones Anderson Silva had prior to his last outing would go down like a fart in a lift. And can you imagine the reaction to a headliner as dominant as George St. Pierre? "Spoiler: St. Pierre wins."

 

UFC is formulaic but they can afford to be because they have the one thing pro-wrestling cannot ever buy. Reality. You can't write the sort of spontinaity that makes UFC brilliant at it's best.

[Dirty Eddie]

Making stars is easy in a real sport. if you beat the other guys, you are the star. There's no difference between Joe Rogan telling us Paul Daley (or whoever) is the next big thing and Jerry Lawler telling us John Morrison (or whoever) is the next big thing. In theory. In reality, Rogan is legit, the sport is legit and Daley's record is legit. It's way easier.

 

But it's much easier for WWE to decide that Morrison (just to stick to your random example) is the next big thing and just have him beat everyone. WWE can decide to push Morrison hard, have him beat everyone in the mid-card cleanly and move into a permanent main event spot. They just don't do it though, by choice. If anything WWE has it much easier because there is no chance of their 'chosen guy' getting beaten out of no-where by a lower level guy, killing his momentum.

 

Your first statement was spot on though, that WWE won't risk sacrificing their top guys to build up new ones. That isn't a Pro Wrestling Vs MMA issue though, it's just WWE being too cautious or stubborn to do it, not the fact that they can't.

Edited September 13, 2010 by Dirty Eddie

[tiger_rick]

Making stars is easy in a real sport. if you beat the other guys, you are the star. There's no difference between Joe Rogan telling us Paul Daley (or whoever) is the next big thing and Jerry Lawler telling us John Morrison (or whoever) is the next big thing. In theory. In reality, Rogan is legit, the sport is legit and Daley's record is legit. It's way easier.

 

But it's much easier for WWE to decide that Morrison (just to stick to your random example) is the next big thing and just have him beat everyone. WWE can chose to push Morrison hard, have him beat everyone in the mid-card cleanly and move into a permanent main event spot. They just don't chose to. If anything WWE has it much easier because there is no chance of their 'chosen guy' getting beaten out of no-where by a lower level guy, killing his momentum.

I agree it's easier. I said a long time ago that WWE has a massive advantage on UFC because a) They can decide on the result and b) They can always provide the satisfactory outcome.

 

That said, it is much harder to catch on in pro-wrestling. For whatever reason, it takes an almighty effort for guys to catch on in pro-wrestling. How many guys in pro-wrestling have been genuine draws in the last 20 years? Even guys who were incredible at it like Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels never were. Compare that to the number of guys who draw big numbers in UFC. It's difficult to argue that wrestling should be able to make stars like UFC when wrestling has only been as popular as UFC is now 3 times in the last 30 years, and in three very definable, and relatively short, periods.

[Vamp]

Making stars is easy in a real sport. if you beat the other guys, you are the star. There's no difference between Joe Rogan telling us Paul Daley (or whoever) is the next big thing and Jerry Lawler telling us John Morrison (or whoever) is the next big thing. In theory. In reality, Rogan is legit, the sport is legit and Daley's record is legit. It's way easier.

 

But it's much easier for WWE to decide that Morrison (just to stick to your random example) is the next big thing and just have him beat everyone. WWE can decide to push Morrison hard, have him beat everyone in the mid-card cleanly and move into a permanent main event spot. They just don't do it though, by choice. If anything WWE has it much easier because there is no chance of their 'chosen guy' getting beaten out of no-where by a lower level guy, killing his momentum.

 

I disagree with this somewhat. Admittedly the WWE can decide who they want to try and push, which for the UFC is more difficult to do (although not impossible, they can set a guy up with a series of matches they'll presume he'll win and make them seem a bigger deal than they perhaps are) but that doesn't mean the push is going to work. Sure they can give Morrison a string of wins and have him beat everyone in the midcard, but that doesn't mean he'll get over. If someone in a legit sport beats people then its impressive but we all know wrestling isn't real. Wrestling runs the risk of pushing someone too hard and having a an backlash because of it. That and it takes more than a bunch of wins for fans to care about a wrestler, and if they don't care about a wrestler than a bunch of wins won't matter. Goldberg beat everyone on his rise to the top of WCW, but if somebody else had that push than they might not have gotten as over, but he had the attributes needed and the push happened at the exact right moment in time. Everyone knows wrestling's fake, a guy winning a bunch of matches doesn't make the audience care. The wrestler needs a personality, somethign that makes the mstand out, and they need an it factor or some charisma or some such talent. Getting the balance between pushing a guy and not over-pushing him and findign someoen with the right personality to strive is a very difficutl thing to do. Plus with UFC the sense of unpredictability is always, to some extent, there. Purely because its real. The WWE have to create that sense of unpredictability and that's a very rare thing to amanage to do. Eric Bischoff used to look for one unpredictable moment a week which shows you how rare it is. With no competition to shrow a spanner in the works its even more difficult.

 

I'm not saying its impossible to get new people over and that the WWE shouldn't try. But I do think that it can be a lot more difficult than the internet and dirtsheet writers (I'm not aiming this at you personally but its more an overall trend) sometimes appreciate. Look at how many TV dramas there are out there which fail, there's a quite a few more than ones that get critical acclaim. The main reasons for TV dramas failing is because of the characters. Getting people to give a damn, really give a damn, is a difficult task, especially in today's age. That's why reality TV became so popular amongst TV execs, that's why that genre of television gets so many viewers, because gettign people to care about real people as opposed to characters is much, much easier.

[Carbomb]

I still say a huge problem with the way WWE's been attempting to create stars in the last few years is that nobody's been given that decisive, main-event moment since Cena and Batista. Austin had the WM13 match with Bret, Triple H had the Royal Rumble win over Cactus Jack, Cena had JBL and Batista had Triple H. Since then, none of the new main eventers have been given that one, decisive win that cemented their places; I still don't 100% buy CM Punk as an established, perennial main-eventer because of the nature of his first two title wins, and the fact that he's never really beaten anyone of solid main event stature decisively. Swagger's been nothing but a lame duck, and Sheamus, whilst he's running with the ball he's been given, was initially the lamest duck of them all - it's only after he got the belt they gave him the Triple H beatdown, but they seem determined to undermine that with him running away all the time. Not every heel has to be a chickenshit, and I don't see why a guy as hulking as Sheamus should be.

[Supremo]

UFC is red hot right now. They have the pick of the best athletes after pro-football, a position Wrestling used to be in. They have a massive fanbase who will purchase PPV's regardless of the content and a big casual audience who will buy the big shows. Making stars is easy in a real sport. if you beat the other guys, you are the star. There's no difference between Joe Rogan telling us Paul Daley (or whoever) is the next big thing and Jerry Lawler telling us John Morrison (or whoever) is the next big thing. In theory. In reality, Rogan is legit, the sport is legit and Daley's record is legit. It's way easier. Anderson Silva is a massive star because he's a brilliant fighter. He doesn't even speak the lingo. In pro-wrestling, you will never get a guy like that over.

You're completely wrong here, giving the guys in the UFC nowhere near the credit they deserve for their TV product that surrounds the fights. It's not that easy at all and simply winning fights or having an impressive record doesn't make anyone a star in UFC or MMA in general. It raises their profile, sure, but it doesn't make them a star. There's a shit load of examples of this. Lyoto Machida, for example, was beating people left, right and centre, but the majority of the fans thought he was a boring goon until that one Countdown special when they portrayed him as the Karate Kid, with his dad playing the part of Mr. Miyagi. Next night he was a megastar. Same goes for Rashad Evans. He had a fantastic record, he'd just beaten Chuck Liddell, the biggest star in the sport, then Forrest Griffin for the Light Heavyweight Title, but he still wasn't a true, genuine star until almost a year later when they built a season of the Ultimate Fighter around him and Rampage, fleshing out his character and getting him over. Chael Sonnen's another guy. He kept climbing his way up the ladder, he even got as far as getting a title shot against Anderson Silva, and yet none of my casual fan friends even knew who the fuck he was until a couple of weeks before that fight when the UFC did that brilliant, "He's the most interesting man on the planet," internet campaign, coupled with that month's Countdown Special. He went from almost completely unknown to one of the most famous men in the sport. Sure, his mic skills certainly helped, but in the space of about two weeks they managed to make Chael into more of a star than WWE had made anyone into in years and years. Similarly, Frankie Edgar has beaten BJ Penn twice now, and yet he's not a star yet and he won't be a star until UFC's production team manage to create a character or an angle for their promotional machine to go with in order to truly get him over with the masses. Just winning fights doesn't cut it one bit.

 

I'm sorry, but you're wrong. Making stars in legit sports isn't easier than in scripted ones at all. In scripted sports you get to pick who you want to make a star out of. You can handpick the super charismatic guy, you can single out the incredibly likable or hatable bloke who'll connect on a certain level with the fans, you can have all your criteria checked and alligned before puling the trigger. You can't do any of that in a legit sport. You get what you're given. I mean, Christ, who'd have wanted to be left with the task of making Machida a star?. He was a boring fighter with a boring style who had absolutely nothing of interest to say. He was the worst candidate possible. And yet in the WWE you've got a guy like Daniel Bryan, who'd be easy to make a star out of in comparison, yet they go out of their way to make him look stupid and book him to constantly lose.

 

Fuck, in recent months it's been a bonus for the UFC if the guys they needed to make a star out of could even speak English! And you're telling me it's easier for them? Bollocks.

 

It'll be interesting to see whther the popularity of the UFC drops. I'm absolutely sure that if they were a pro-wrestling company, the fact that their PPV's are identical in terms of the theme, the format, the commentary, etc would be criticised as being the same old formula. Main Events like ones Anderson Silva had prior to his last outing would go down like a fart in a lift. And can you imagine the reaction to a headliner as dominant as George St. Pierre? "Spoiler: St. Pierre wins."

Again, Anderson Silva's recent performances and super dominant champions like GSP are just another two examples of how it's much harder to promote fights and make stars in MMA. You get into situations like this, where either the guy takes the piss in his fights like Anderson has done, or you get a guy nobody can beat like GSP, and from that point forward you have to get creative in how you manage to continue selling their fights in order to make money. These aren't problems in a scripted sport. You'll never get a guy purposely having a bad performance, and if somebody's been on top too long then you can script him to lose the belt. You can't do either in MMA. You have to accept what's happened and do your best to turn it into a postive. In Anderson's case they cleverly made his bad performances part of the storyline, with Chael constantly talking about how he was going to force Anderson to finally step up and have a proper fight, and in the case of St. Pierre they've gone out of their way to constantly make new stars for him to face, in order to keep his fights fresh. Dan Hardy was a nobody and everyone knew he didn't have a chance. But then they did a Prime Time special on him and made him into a star who people genuinely believed could win. That shot of him cackling with Matt Serra like a pair of Batman villains who had the secret formular for beating GSP? Fucking incredible, and at least two hundred thousand buys right there. Seriously, when that fight eventually happened one of my mates was genuinely gutted when St. Pierre mauled Dan Hardy. He honestly thought that Hardy had a chance! That's how good that Prime Time series was at convincing people that Hardy was a worthy contender and that's just another example of how the UFC is light years ahead in knowing how to create interest and build stars.

 

Now watch on Wednesday, when they do it all over again with Josh Koscheck. They've got an unbeatable champion in George St. Pierre, everyone pretty much knows at this point that bar a fluke there's a very good chance he's going to eventually retire as the champion, it should result in people getting bored with him and his fights, and yet I bet my bollocks that after this season of the Ultimate Fighter people will be super excited for that fight. The fact that it's going to be in Montreal already gives me goosebumps. It's going to be utterly amazing.

 

I can't remember the last time I was that excited about pro-wrestling. Actually, to bring it full circle; it was probably when I was tricked into caring about Randy Orton for seven days. Before Shane McMahon beat him up, along with any passion I had left for their product.

Edited September 13, 2010 by Supremo