Did that really happen?

[The Cutting Edge]

@Chris B its kinda the chicken and the egg, what came first the dodgy booking or apathy to work hard.

Once they're both in that cycle it's hard to get out, but I think if Ambrose got the chip on his shoulder early instead of "oh well fuck it" got motivated things might've changed but when he returned they knew he was leaving so no point trying.

[stewdogg]

2 minutes ago, Chris B said:

With some people, I think there's an element of performing roughly to the level they're being given. Give Mox some motivation and a reason to be there, and he'll turn it up. Book him in a gasmask, and he'll underperform. 

Same thing, I think, with Nakamura. If he's booked as a big deal, he'll perform as a big deal - look at his NXT run or NJPW time as an example of that. But if you want him bumbling around the midcard, he's going to perform at exactly that level, and concentrate on his surfing instead*.

Some people are motivated to prove themselves with the brass ring thing. Others will take the approach 'well, if you've seen how good I am and you don't want that, fine - if you want me to do this instead, I'll do this.'

 

 

 

*To be fair, I'm the guy that thinks Nakamura should have won the Rumble and been the Lesnar-beater out of NXT. While I haven't seen any of his run since his AJ feud, it sounds like he's been as half-arsed as his booking since then.

Whilst I agree with the sentiment about needing motivation, it is unprofessional to maybe half-arse things if they're not going your way. I will not disagree that having Mox in a gas mask was ridiculous, didnt they stick needles in his bum too? Maybe I made that up?

[garynysmon]

Big Boss Man coming out to 'hard times' in 1999. (6.32 in)

When he returns I'd like him to bring back that theme tbh.

 

[Chris B]

29 minutes ago, The Cutting Edge said:

@Chris B its kinda the chicken and the egg, what came first the dodgy booking or apathy to work hard.

Once they're both in that cycle it's hard to get out, but I think if Ambrose got the chip on his shoulder early instead of "oh well fuck it" got motivated things might've changed but when he returned they knew he was leaving so no point trying.

During Ambrose's final run is exactly when he did get in shape, cut his hair, etc. And he got the gasmask gimmick as a response. 

[Supremo]

56 minutes ago, The Cutting Edge said:

On the Moxley thing, I've said before but AEW got a much better version than WWE had to work with, not saying they didn't do there part in fucking him up at times but the skinny body with thinning floppy hair, and somewhat lazy attitude (look at Austin podcast).

His last 6months he got in solid shape, sorted his hair, grew a beard and actually looked like a tough badass, too little too late on both parts, AEW have booked him better still think they had a better template to build on.

Whilst there’s definitely something to this, I always think back to how white hot he was after the Shield initially split up. As good Jon Moxley was when he arrived in AEW, I think I’d still prefer the guy who got out of that taxi to a Stone Cold pop at Night of Champions 2014. It was clear then who the obvious choice was, but he was being distracted by ghosts and having monitors explode in his face weeks later.

On topic:

Edited January 29, 2021 by Supremo

[The Cutting Edge]

8 minutes ago, Chris B said:

During Ambrose's final run is exactly when he did get in shape, cut his hair, etc. And he got the gasmask gimmick as a response. 

Think at that point he'd made it known he wasn't resigning.

Jinder vs Brock I can't even imagine How'd that look, Jinder had stinkers with everyone at that point, Brock would've had to slap him around and end it quick 

[WyattSheepMask]

1 hour ago, Supremo said:

 

On topic:

Funny you should bring up Jinder as WWE Champion, as for some morbid reason I decided to rewatch this the other day after listening to the first part of Wrestle Me covering WM33.

In the space of 49 days, a mere 7 weeks, Jinder Mahal went from being beaten in the Pre-Show Battle Royale by Mojo Rawley, complete with getting smacked about by 'annoying fuck and NFL player' and future 'annoying-fuck, NFL player and Wrestlemania host' Rob Gronkowski, to beating (then) 13 time World Champion Randy Orton to lift the WWE Championship in front of a Chicago crowd who ironically cheered Jinder throughout the match in a "yeah, go on Jinder, I mean, you're not going to win, but yeah, go on" sort of way.

The whole match is completely arse-backwards, with Orton jumping Jinder before the bell and the ref asking Jinder, a crumpled heap in the corner, whether or not he wants to start the match. Oh yes, the valiant heel, that classic piece of wrestling booking. They then proceed to have a 15 minute punch-kick match, complete with plenty of armlocks and headlocks, because that's all that Jinder had at that point, he'd probably had a 15 minute match only a handful of times in either of his WWE stints at that point, as well as Randy sending the Singh Brothers into a different orbit because they're both about 10 Stone soaking wet.

The pinfall happens, and his title celebration plays out to a mixture of cretins actually cheering the dam thing, and everyone else stampeding to the exits. The highlight of the whole thing though - switch to the Hindi Commentary on the network to hear the two lads chanting "India! Number One! India! Number One!". He held onto that belt for nearly 6 months, racking up 2 more PPV wins over Randy, one which had the same distraction finish, the other an 'utter shite even by it's own low standards' Punjabi Prison Match, and 2 over Shinsuke Nakamura, again with the same distraction finish in both matches and a touch of racism talking about Nakamura's eyes, before mercifully dropping the belt to AJ Styles on RAW on the UK tour in November*. One PPV rematch with Styles, meaning that Jinder Mahal had 6 World Title matches on PPV in 2017, then it was back down the card where he belonged, picking up the US Title for 8 days along the way, before making up the numbers with sporadic appearances on Main Event, as well as the occastional RAW or Smackdown.

And you can't lay the blame at Jinder's feet either. He didn't ask to be put in that spot, he didn't politic his way into it, he was put into a position that he was never meant to be in purely because WWE were negotiating a new deals in India. He was thrown into a spot that he was never prepared for, and I'm fairly certain he's said in interviews that there were times where he would just in his car for hours at a time, scared to leave and enter the arena such was the pressure on him, which is actually quite upsetting when you think about it. I don't have anything against Jinder, there are plenty of people far worse than him and he has his place on the show same as others, but that place is nowhere near the top. 

* So no, that match with Brock didn't really happen

Edited January 29, 2021 by WyattSheepMask

[BomberPat]

1 minute ago, WyattSheepMask said:

Oh yes, the valiant heel, that classic piece of wrestling booking.

I can only assume this was purely based on how it was presented on the Indian broadcast.

I did find it interesting that he was still booked as a heel on their latest Indian project - I wonder if they've finally realised that while he might get over as an Indian to American audiences, "Canadian of Indian heritage" isn't going to get over as an Indian national hero in India.

[tiger_rick]

2 hours ago, The Cutting Edge said:

His last 6months he got in solid shape, sorted his hair, grew a beard and actually looked like a tough badass, too little too late on both parts, AEW have booked him better still think they had a better template to build on.

Sorry, what?

He was in WWE when he came back looking absolutely stacked with hair that took years off him. Don't make terrible excuses for their stupidity.

[Mr Butternut Squash]

2 hours ago, Chris B said:

 

Same thing, I think, with Nakamura. If he's booked as a big deal, he'll perform as a big deal - look at his NXT run or NJPW time as an example of that. But if you want him bumbling around the midcard, he's going to perform at exactly that level, and concentrate on his surfing instead*.

 

Not sure I agree with this although Nakamura's a weird one in this regard. There were several moments last year when he was pissing about with Cesaro where he looked far more motivated than he ever did during his world title programs. 

Edited January 29, 2021 by Mr Butternut Squash

[The Cutting Edge]

42 minutes ago, tiger_rick said:

Sorry, what?

He was in WWE when he came back looking absolutely stacked with hair that took years off him. Don't make terrible excuses for their stupidity.

I did say they booked him badly which again they did, I think it was known he was leaving when his contract came up so other than Shield reunion wasn't worth the effort to them, hence too little too late on both parts

[Chris B]

25 minutes ago, Mr Butternut Squash said:

Not sure I agree with this although Nakamura's a weird one in this regard. There were several moments last year when he was pissing about with Cesaro where he looked far more motivated than he ever did during his world title programs. 

I haven't seen any of his stuff in a couple of years, but that's good to know. But I saw a clip recently of a pre-WWE Nakamura against Kevin Owens back in ROH, and damn - the man was just a motivated charisma engine. If they'd gone all-in on him and made it work, it would have made it much more difficult to give up watching.

[BomberPat]

Even in NJPW, Nakamura was pretty well known for only turning it on when it counted.

The problem is that so much of his charisma is utterly organic, and just flows naturally from him. I honestly think he's one of the most charismatic performers I've ever seen live. That can't survive the micromanagement of WWE - he can't be effortlessly cool when he has to hit the exact right movement at the exact right part of his entrance theme, and make sure to hit his mark, and be well aligned with hard cam, and all the rest of it, rather than just allowing his natural sense of timing and spontaneity to govern his movements. 

There was backstage footage of his NXT debut where Triple H flat out told him that there would be no point him telling him how to do his entrance, because he knows what he's doing. They soon gave up on that idea.

 

There's also a bit of typical WWE failure to understand when less is more. Nakamura being played to the ring by a live violinist was one of the legitimately coolest things they've ever done. Even to a non-wrestling fan, that is a cool series of visuals. So the next time they give him a big entrance, they give him more violinists, and it was dogshit, because it lacked the connection that made the first time work.

[Supremo]

1 hour ago, The Cutting Edge said:

I did say they booked him badly which again they did, I think it was known he was leaving when his contract came up so other than Shield reunion wasn't worth the effort to them, hence too little too late on both parts

If I remember correctly from his podcast appearances, Mox spoke about coming back for that last run super motivated. He had no plans of leaving until after they’d squandered him and he’d ended up sniffing handkerchiefs and taking the piss out of his mate’s cancer diagnosis.

[TomJones233]

2 hours ago, WyattSheepMask said:

Funny you should bring up Jinder as WWE Champion, as for some morbid reason I decided to rewatch this the other day after listening to the first part of Wrestle Me covering WM33.

In the space of 49 days, a mere 7 weeks, Jinder Mahal went from being beaten in the Pre-Show Battle Royale by Mojo Rawley, complete with getting smacked about by 'annoying fuck and NFL player' and future 'annoying-fuck, NFL player and Wrestlemania host' Rob Gronkowski, to beating (then) 13 time World Champion Randy Orton to lift the WWE Championship in front of a Chicago crowd who ironically cheered Jinder throughout the match in a "yeah, go on Jinder, I mean, you're not going to win, but yeah, go on" sort of way.

The whole match is completely arse-backwards, with Orton jumping Jinder before the bell and the ref asking Jinder, a crumpled heap in the corner, whether or not he wants to start the match. Oh yes, the valiant heel, that classic piece of wrestling booking. They then proceed to have a 15 minute punch-kick match, complete with plenty of armlocks and headlocks, because that's all that Jinder had at that point, he'd probably had a 15 minute match only a handful of times in either of his WWE stints at that point, as well as Randy sending the Singh Brothers into a different orbit because they're both about 10 Stone soaking wet.

The pinfall happens, and his title celebration plays out to a mixture of cretins actually cheering the dam thing, and everyone else stampeding to the exits. The highlight of the whole thing though - switch to the Hindi Commentary on the network to hear the two lads chanting "India! Number One! India! Number One!". He held onto that belt for nearly 6 months, racking up 2 more PPV wins over Randy, one which had the same distraction finish, the other an 'utter shite even by it's own low standards' Punjabi Prison Match, and 2 over Shinsuke Nakamura, again with the same distraction finish in both matches and a touch of racism talking about Nakamura's eyes, before mercifully dropping the belt to AJ Styles on RAW on the UK tour in November*. One PPV rematch with Styles, meaning that Jinder Mahal had 6 World Title matches on PPV in 2017, then it was back down the card where he belonged, picking up the US Title for 8 days along the way, before making up the numbers with sporadic appearances on Main Event, as well as the occastional RAW or Smackdown.

And you can't lay the blame at Jinder's feet either. He didn't ask to be put in that spot, he didn't politic his way into it, he was put into a position that he was never meant to be in purely because WWE were negotiating a new deals in India. He was thrown into a spot that he was never prepared for, and I'm fairly certain he's said in interviews that there were times where he would just in his car for hours at a time, scared to leave and enter the arena such was the pressure on him, which is actually quite upsetting when you think about it. I don't have anything against Jinder, there are plenty of people far worse than him and he has his place on the show same as others, but that place is nowhere near the top. 

* So no, that match with Brock didn't really happen

Jinder as WWE champ is a fever dream, A shit version of JBL