The Official UKFF RAW thread (part 2)...

[Supremo]

To be fair, AJ’s tag match on this Monday’s show is probably the standout performance of the last three to five years. AJ and Penta vs. The Judgment Day was surprisingly great fun. Never has it been clearer that the best use of Styles in 2025 is in some form of Tag Team.

Seth and Becky make me draw comparisons to Toni Storm and Juice Robinson. Toni and Juice feel like the smartest, funniest, most charismatic couple in pro-wrestling. You imagine they’re wildly fun to be around, full of energy and great ideas. Seth and Becky are the antithesis. Two absolute whoppers. Loser central. You’d cancel plans if you knew they were going to be there. The worst instincts in the game.

“They’re going to make me the top heel, so I’m planning on keeping the same music and look, and just adopting the promo cadence of Triple H from 2003…where I….talk…extra…slowly….ah.”

”Excellent choice. You know that Becky Hogan thing that about seven people go on about on Twitter? I’m going to make reference to that on international TV and try and incorporate it into my act.”

”We’re geniuses.”

[Guest]

1 hour ago, RedTwoster said:

Possibly, but he’s still having good matches. I’d say the problem of diminished returns is bigger for other WWE wrestlers - when was the last time AJ Styles had a standout match, for example? 

He's having fine matches. I don't feel as strongly about the whole as Goosh does, but I think what he said is basically accurate. When you compare his work to people like Drew, Gunther, Zayn, Owens - even Cody, he's the guy I'm least interested in seeing of that lot. 

You may be right about AJ, but he is nearly 10 years older than Rollins and he's not constantly at the top of the card.

 

[LaGoosh]

9 hours ago, RedTwoster said:

I hate the Seth Rollins character, but I don’t agree with your assessment of him as a wrestler - particularly not this last part. You have his cage match with Cody, his singles matches with Dean Ambrose and Roman Reigns and his bout with John Cena

I don't like any of those matches. The only singles match he's had that I've enjoyed is the lumberjack match with Ambrose and that was because it was filled to the brim with gaga and wackiness - but you could have replaced Rollins with anyone and that match would still have been fun.

Fundamentally, Rollins does not tell in ring stories. He does moves and near falls. He has nothing unique or specific to him at all in his in ring style. He does the same mid-late 2000s indies style he's always done but there are loads of people who do that style way better than him. If he was a mid-lower rung journeyman this would not be an issue. But when you're consistently pushed as a top star for a decade plus then you need to be a lot more than what he is. The fact that people think he is good highlights just how far the quality of the matches in WWE has fallen over the past 10 years. Rollins is dependable and will always give you a dependably average match with nothing offensively and noticeably bad. He hits all his spots and time cues. But he definitely is not a good wrestler.

I think the one thing that always summed him up to me was during his first title run where he got injured and had to drop the title. He got injured doing a top rope sunset flip powerbomb through a table on Kane and completely blew his leg out. I guess it never occured to him that as the top heel Champion his job was to get heel heat and sympathy for the babyface - but no, he had to do a top rope sunset flip powerbomb through a table because that is all he can do. He doesn't know how to do any of the stuff that he actually needs to. He's all bullshit.

Edited May 21, 2025 by LaGoosh

[Supremo]

To this very day, the most impressive thing about Seth Rollins is that he’s got an amazing hot tag in him. Going crazy in those Shield tags was as good as he ever got.

He’e essentially AR Fox with better connections.

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

53 minutes ago, LaGoosh said:

Fundamentally, Rollins does not tell in ring stories. He does moves and near falls.

Calm down Cornette. Moves and near falls is the wrestling now. We do occasionally get a match that tells a story but it's not usually in WWE. A typical big WWE match is designed around a series of promos, at least one of which will lead to a big pull apart brawl, followed by a contract signing where there will usually be someone put through a table, then there are the big sing along intros then the moves and near falls then someone wins, then it gets rinsed and repeated for a couple of months. All of it together is the story, not just what happens in the match. WWE is very much in the "Tell not show" phase now. 

Rollins is passable at all of the things. He's been on top through loyalty not talent, but that is hardly a new phenom, see Calloway M as an example. 

All of this is why WWE is not for you my friend. 

[d-d-d-dAz]

I think Seth is athletically impressive, and is a good enough canvas for other wrestlers to paint their stories on in matches.

But I don't think I've ever seen a match where it felt like he was the lead, the main character, and I actually enjoyed it.

The Cody cell match is a good example. It was thrilling, but mainly because of Cody's injury and his story.

Seth is the base of the pyramid, that allows others the strength to shine. But he should never be center stage, he's nowhere near good enough.

[LaGoosh]

4 minutes ago, d-d-d-dAz said:

Seth is the base of the pyramid, that allows others the strength to shine. But he should never be center stage, he's nowhere near good enough.

This is an interesting point and kind of ties into my point where if Rollins was a lower rung/mid card guy he would be perfectly acceptable. Unfortunately when your consistently pushed as a top star you can't really be that base anymore. You have to be much more.

Also at some point you have to realise that cackling is not a personality.

Edited May 21, 2025 by LaGoosh

[SuperBacon]

I mean you could argue he was the MVP of last year's Wrestlemania over the two huge main events...

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

8 minutes ago, LaGoosh said:

Also at some point you have to realise that cackling is not a personality.

You forgot about the sartorial elegance of his wardrobe. That's what he thinks personality is. It isn't, but that's what he thinks. 

[tiger_rick]

2 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

All of this is why WWE is not for you my friend. 

Ultimately, it's this. There is no great wresting in WWE. I'm not just saying that as an AEW bitch, but comparing WWE to, well, WWE, what they call pro-wrestling just isn't. As Dazzler says, it's athletic and impressive but it's just so overly choreographed - and not in a DDP palm pilot way - towards creating moments or telling a bit of these great stories and it makes 99% of it all meaningless and unwatchable.

I've long accepted that it's not for me but I do have a little chuckle when industry experts hand out 5* matches like voucher codes for Hello Fresh. This definitely applies to AEW too. 

[SuperBacon]

11 minutes ago, tiger_rick said:

There is no great wresting in WWE

This statement very much depends on what you consider wrestling to be doesn't it?

Its all so subjective.

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

It's not subjective it's about placement of emphasis. For WWE there is less emphasis on the second W and more emphasis on the E.  They see themselves as an Entertainment company above all else. Actually that's not true. If they could change the E to a C for Content then that would be accurate. They churn out content, relentlessly, remorselessly in search of clicks, likes, and ad revenue. That's why Logan Paul fits in so well. 

[Supremo]

Even as someone cursed with a taste for WWE’s product, it’s more about the characters and the bullshit than the matches. I’m happy with AEW being where the best wrestle, whereas WWE is the revolutionary force in Sports Entertainment.

I’d be hard pressed to think of any specific WWE matches I’d go five stars on in recent years. Maybe Drew and Punk in Hell in a Cell? Nothing else springs to mind.

Although obviously that all changes at the weekend. Logan Paul vs. Jey Uso and John Cena vs. R-Truth on the same show! Super J Cup stuff! Modern day Mania X-7! Move over, Canadian Stampede!

[The Gaffer]

2 hours ago, LaGoosh said:

Also at some point you have to realise that cackling is not a personality.

[tiger_rick]

2 hours ago, SuperBacon said:

This statement very much depends on what you consider wrestling to be doesn't it?

Its all so subjective.

To a point, yes. Obviously, it's my opinion in the most part. But I do think anyone could look objectively at what wrestling is now and see it's just not what it was. Hardly anyone can throw a punch for starters. Then the fact that it's a contest, the idea that it's an event that's being recorded and broadcast, the live audience existing and being part of the show rather than a backdrop to the hard camera and most importantly, any sense of struggle, of fighting to get control or fighting because you just hate the other person - it's just not there. I don't see a whole lot of WWE but this has been coming for a long time, certainly back to when I last had a spell of watching regularly, and what I do see now, albeit in clip form, is this stuff I really hate because it's just not wrestling. IMHO, obviously.

Now, much of that applies to AEW too. I'm never gonna lie about that. But, I do think they do a much better job, in the really great matches, of creating a sense of struggle by the wrestlers being given much more licence to work how they want, by their being far less emphasis on talking, looking around and getting that one big TikTok moment in that's the only thing that really matters. In their mediocre matches, there is a much stronger emphasis on the outcome, the build and the aftermath which runs through the product, which is why it works better as a wrestling heavy company.

2 hours ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

It's not subjective it's about placement of emphasis. For WWE there is less emphasis on the second W and more emphasis on the E.

There's an element of that. But they still do produce a hell of a lot of W. As I've said many times, I thought that the biggest change once Triple H took over, given what a wrestling purist he is, lol, would be a much greater emphasis on the work and the presentation of it as a wrestling show. For a guy who spent the early 2000s trying to recreate what was great about JCP and Mid-South in his shitty matches and 4 Horseman knock-off faction, his inability to be any different to Vince is pretty telling.