Royal Rumble 2014 Discussion

[King Pitcos]

Aside from what happened in the arena last night, moaning on forums and in hashtag form is about the sum total anyone here can really do.

Or turn the telly off, stop following wrestling, and stop buying tickets, pay-per-views and merchandise. If WWE lands at the O2 in May and no fucker's there, that sends a message. But people don't really want to stop watching or send a message, they just want to moan for a bit because their favourite didn't win.

[Sphinx]

I find it easy to stop watching Raw. I might watch highlights if I can but it's so underwhelming and The Authority are so shit that it's not worth it until Mania season. I'll dip in and out. But benno's point was surely that regardless. of whether I tune out, ratings won't be affected for teo reasons. A) I don't have a BARB box, and b) I stream shows or download them anyway. And that's the same with a load of hardcore wrestling fans. But we spend money in different areas like live shows, DVDs and we will The Network.

 

I agree that Bryan isn't a main man. He is closer to a "B+ player" than a bona fide star main eventer. His size does go against him, though that could be remedied a bit with a real strong showing against Lesnar. Once he wins the title and has a respectable run with it, I reckon the crowd reactions will simmer. As Gladstone said, Reigns is where the main event material is at. I hope they play up the elimination record on Raw.

 

I don't give two fucks about Batista. There's a chance the people who tuned in for his return will go "oh, this isn't the same. He looks weird, he's huffing and puffing and he's got shite tattoos. Oh well" and tune out again, especially with the crowd shitting on him.

[King Pitcos]

But we spend money in different areas like live shows, DVDs and we will The Network.

And every penny we spend on WWE sends a message. "More of the same please, Vince!"

[Stylin_and_Profilin]

Given all the constant shilling of the WWE app and the general social media interaction being stuffed down our throats every 10-15 minutes on RAW isn't there a very strong chance that the WWE management are acutely aware of exactly what they are doing in terms of the whole Daniel Bryan thing?

 

Even if their are egos involved and all the talk of him being held back because of certain agendas people have at the end of the day Vince has always been about money and at the end of the day he is so red hot just now they must have something up their sleeve for him in the medium-long term and all this stuff just now is just working us? It's obviously not a size thing as they pushed Mysterio hard and gave him the belt at WM, likewise Guerrero and Benoit. So what could be the problem?

 

Especially with the WWE Network launch in the very near future and such a lot riding on it it would be business suicide to completely derail and ignore a guy who is so over right now. I've only been watching off and on the last few months but the guy is getting reactions that Austin and the Rock would be doing well to get in the late 90's.

 

In regards to the apathy in terms of the Rumble i think the WWE has made a rod for it's own back. Obviously they cannot pre disclose #1-30 ahead of time as it takes away the mystique and whole surprise of the concept but at the same time people are sitting waiting for a big surprise, whether it be a major star returning or just an old boy appearing for a brief bit of nostalgia then when it doesn't arrive it feels a bit of an anticlimax. Felt a bit sorry for Mysterio last night in that sense; wrong place at the wrong time. Likewise the timing of eliminations when Punk was eliminated left the rest of the Rumble match pretty flat for me as it seemed a forgone conclusion that it was going to be between Reigns or Batista to win as nobody else left was noteworthy.

[Sphinx]

I know, I get that. I'm not taking any stand though. I'm not going to deprive myself of, say, watching WCW PPVs I missed out on the Network because I like Daniel Bryan and I don't think many would. I'm not a boycotting type and it'd never gain enough momentum. To be honest, I personally don't care enough for the situation to do that given my above thoughts. Like Ian said though, if anything happened they'd just tease Taker vs. Sting or something and people would flock back. We 'hardcore' wrestling fans want it to be as good as our rose tinted memories. We hold out for it and would be back in a heartbeat if they can make us go back to the giddy excitement that provokes the imagination.

[King Pitcos]

Given all the constant shilling of the WWE app and the general social media interaction being stuffed down our throats every 10-15 minutes on RAW isn't there a very strong chance that the WWE management are acutely aware of exactly what they are doing in terms of the whole Daniel Bryan thing?

Probably, yeah. It's telling that the "yes movement" started a week or two ago, Bryan was doing radio interviews last week about the machine holding him down, and that he was tweeting about the same thing right after the show. There's something up.

[John Tenta Blues Explosion]

There's something in the idea that in every single creative industry (and as uncreative as it can be, wrestling technically is one) is eventually staffed entirely by people who hate its main fanbase. Why wouldn't you, really? They're always going to be the first people to criticise the show, to point out how it's not as good as it used to be, how this doesn't make sense, how that character said something directly contradicted what he said seven years ago, etc etc etc. And what can the staff do? They can do the "lol u are comic book guy" gag once, twice, three times, but after that all they can really do is put earplugs in and just wait for a new generation of fans to turn up.

 

Wrestling fans (and I mean all of us, not just "smelly stinky smark ones as opposed to cool ones like me") are basically no different to teenage girls with lazy eyes sitting off on Tumblr writing about how "Glee" isn't as good as it used to be and how that makes them suicidal.

 

I think HHH really is the worst guy to have involved in booking at this moment in time as a result. He's an interesting guy. His idea of wrestling at heart is to basically re-enact Harley Race-style touring champion matches, except with the champion not actually doing any touring, over and over again. But he's also got this weird love/hate relationship with the internet. Of course we're all pencil-necked geeks. But then dude's a body builder, and if the internet has taught us anything it's that nobody on the planet better typifies the socially autistic manchild stereotype more than the bodybuilder. I mean have you seen bodybuilding.com?

 

So you get WrestleMania booking where the final three matches on the card are basically 2003-style indie clashes of finisherfinisherfinisherfinishertradedfinishersfinisherotherguysfinisherfinisher

throughtable three count. And you get the idea that wrestling (as a fictional sport) can be promoted as having "good matches" (imagine King Kong Bundy before WrestleMania 2 promising a MOTYC).

 

And you get what's here. You get the deliberate blurring of wrestling (THE MEN IN SUITS ARE HOLDING DANIEL BACK) with the real world (I AS A FAN BELIEVE DANIEL IS BEING BURIED). Which can work, Cena's best angles have used that dorkishness from adult wrestling fans to add a new dynamic to the whole thing. But then in this case... it's just not contained enough. I'm 100% sure positive that WWE wanted some fan reaction like the one you've seen over this, to push Bryan as an underdog. But I can't believe in order to do that they'd be happy to make Batista and Mysterio look like utter fucking twats.

[UK Kat Von D]

I love reading the PPV threads after someone's not won who was 'supposed' to. Really is perfect for mong identification.

 

The live crowd were a bunch of fucking knobs from the start with "This is awesome!" It's not fucking ROH, fuck off. These cunts could have contributed in really making a star last night in Roman Reigns but no.

 

Don't get me wrong, I love Daniel Bryan but he's never going to be the main man and I'm not sure I even want him to be. Reigns, however, has got the fucking lot and I was far more arsed about the crap way he got eliminated than Bryan not turning up, even if he did break the Rumble record - something that got nowhere near the attention it should have done because too many arseholes were crying in the crowd and not recognising that something remarkable was happening.

 

All I can say is with more and more crowds like last night's, I'm fucking dreading the Raw after Wrestlemania. It's going to be unbearable.

 

You say "supposed" to win, but its more a case of who people wanted to win. The fans that night had a favorite wrestler and got pissed off when that wrestler didnt get what the fans wanted them to get. That has always been the core of what wrestling is. Fans should always want a wrestler to achieve a certain brass ring, otherwise its all a bit pointless. I think Reigns did actually make some great strides last night. Sheamus, Batista and Rey where shit all over, Reigns is the only guy that got a positive reaction. The crowd made it seem convincing Reigns could win, as opposed to a pro Batista crowd who might not have got behind Reigns at all

[IANdrewDiceClay]

Cracking posts for John Tenta Blues Explosion there.

[Benno]

[

Or turn the telly off, stop following wrestling, and stop buying tickets, pay-per-views and merchandise. If WWE lands at the O2 in May and no fucker's there, that sends a message. But people don't really want to stop watching or send a message, they just want to moan for a bit because their favourite didn't win.

 

Well my point was more about the BARB boxes but really, people are entitled to have strong views about it even if they do keep watching. You can enjoy facets of the product like Roman Reigns and the Mania season Hogan return and still have a strong opinion about the poor booking of Bryan.

 

Sure there are YouTube videoers dressing up their butthurtness about their favourite losing as something deeper, but equally there's enough people in here, on twitter and in the media from fans to former industry people, articulating it a lot better.

 

Having this kind of negative sentiment, even if it is "just the internet lot" is surely concerning when you're about to launch an internet based network thats going to be your primary revenue stream. It's been loud enough even the BBC are reporting on it.

[King Pitcos]

But I can't believe in order to do that they'd be happy to make Batista and Mysterio look like utter fucking twats.

Maybe not Batista, but Mysterio has made himself pretty much completely expendable these days. He disappears for a year at a time, then comes back and devalues himself for some tag team stuff nobody remembers, then goes again. This time, they even told him to take as much time off as he needs until his leg's properly healed for once, then went "LOL no come back now, little cripple" and brought him in for no real reason. I think they expected the internet backlash to be exactly what it has been, but the one in the arena was stronger than they'd thought.

[King Pitcos]

Well my point was more about the BARB boxes but really, people are entitled to have strong views about it even if they do keep watching. You can enjoy facets of the product like Roman Reigns and the Mania season Hogan return and still have a strong opinion about the poor booking of Bryan.

Of course you can, but treating wrestling like it's a shit job ("some of the people are alright, I suppose") rather than something you're a fan of is mental. Expecting said moaning to custom-build the show into what you want it to be is even worse.

 

If my sister was sat fuming for hours because Phil Mitchell got the drums instead of Janine tonight, I'd tell her to shut the fuck up and ask why she was about to click "add to basket" on an Eastenders calendar on Amazon if the writing decisions upset her that much. If people are spending money on John Cena but they want Daniel Bryan to have his spot instead, they should delete the "champ is here" shirt from the shopping cart and put a beard shirt and a couple of maroon wrist bands in instead.

 

If every cunt moaning went on the WWE website and bought a Daniel Bryan t-shirt to dry their eyes with, it'd do one of two things:

 

1) Sell millions of t-shirts and turn him into the new John Cena.

Or 2) Nothing, because the number of people who are that bothered is negligible.

 

How much money do the people crying spend on Daniel Bryan? Anyone who answers "nothing" has to ask themselves why they think they should dictate the top spots more than the people who buy a ticket for Cena vs Orton and go home with a Cena top and wristbands on.

[Murtz]

I thought the whole PPV was the best Rumble we've had in years. I enjoyed every match, which is something I've not been able to say for quite some time.

 

Bryan/Wyatt

Loved it. Can't remember the last time a heel was made to look so strong against one of the biggest faces around. They even had Bray tell Harper/Rowan that he can handle it, and he ended up handling it. Looking forward to seeing what happens to both now.

 

Brock/Big Show

My brother hated it cause it wasn't much of a match, but that's the exact reason why I loved it. Brock looked like he's not messing about throughout his whole entrance. He's got something that Aura that nobody has had since Undertaker in his Ministry days. I just love it.

 

Orton/Cena

As much as the crowd were trying to ruin this, they ended up making it even more interesting. It was hilarious how they were chanting 'we want divas' and 'this is awful' one minute, yet were on the edge of their seats for the finisher reversals and near falls. Tits.

 

Even though it has been rumoured for a while, I still can't believe Bray is going up against Cena. I remember a few months ago where the whole Wyatt act looked pretty dead, hopefully now he's got his chance he can make the most of it.

 

The Rumble

I really liked it. My favourite Rumble since 2010, mainly due to Reigns dominating. He is just hitting all the right notes at the moment. Fuck Bryan not getting in the Rumble, I would have sacrificed that all day long for Reigns to be made in the way he was. Yeah it would have been better for him to win it, but it could have been a lot lot worse. Just a shame they didn't make the record break seem a big deal as much as they should have.

 

Looking forward to seeing how things shape up for WM30. I'd love Bryan to go for the streak. I don't think Taker has ever been in a streak match where the crowd are totally against him. It would be an amazing spectacle. Fuck it, I now really want this to happen. Nothing else would touch this.

 

Then you could have;

 

Lesnar/Batista for the title after Lesnar kills Orton at EC

HHH vs Punk

Cena/Bray

Other stuff including Orton and co.

 

I think I've built myself up for Bryan/Taker too much in my head

[FLips]

There was a lot I didn't enjoy about the Rumble, and a lot I did. Thankfully, the stuff I wasn't keen on are things that are just for now, like Bryan not being in it and Roman Reigns not having the trigger pulled.

Definitely one that will hold up for later viewings though because aside from the Blandy Orton (yeah I went there) match, everything was quality. Kevin Nash is not a surprise entrant anymore though, he's been an entrant for what seems like the last 4 years.

 

Loved the crowd. I'd take that sort of enthusiasm over a dead crowd any night. Plus it was ALL the crowd, not just a few internet fans. Everyone in the building was in on it.

 

I don't see this logic of having Batista win because he "draws" and makes money though. He wouldn't do either of those things if they didn't pull the trigger on him and have him win his Royal Rumble. He was just Evolution's muscle. Bryan or Reigns could have been made by this, but they chose Batista who looked just as penis-y as everyone said. My mate's casual watching brother was laughing at Batista's skinny little boy legs for ages.

 

I don't think the crowd were that fickle in the Cena match either, it came across to us that they were cheering for any time it looked like the match was about to end. Kick-outs weren't met with YAY or BOO! they were met with apathetic "ohhh". It seemed plain as day they hated the match and just wanted it to finish.

[LEGIT]

How much money do the people crying spend on Daniel Bryan? Anyone who answers "nothing" has to ask themselves why they think they should dictate the top spots more than the people who buy a ticket for Cena vs Orton and go home with a Cena top and wristbands on.

Daniel Bryan fans are different from John Cena fans. It's a different age group. People spend money on Daniel Bryan, but they spend it on a PPV buy or a show ticket. Cena fans are mostly children, so will take up merch. I know a lot of people who like Bryan, but they wouldn't buy his merch. They wouldn't wear any wrestling t-shirts, because it's mainly for kids.