October 9, 2002
Well, it's been awhile, but I'm back, writing another wrestling article. Let's recap the 20 most important things to happen since last time I wrote, in no particular order:
1 - They flushed WCW and NWO down the toilet.
2 - They got the "F" out.
3 - Had two world championships for awhile, unified them and now we have two world titles again.
4 - Forgot to push some former world champions.
5 - buried the tag teams further into the septic pile.
6 - brought Ric Flair back, and made him an on-screen "boss" character.
7 - Pushed Rob Van Dam.
8 - changed Ric Flair from "boss" to "talent".
9 - refused to elevate new talent.
10 - gave a world title to a Rookie.
11 - brought in Eric Bischoff to do the job Flair was doing just fine.
12 - Had Shawn Michaels beat Triple H, yet still get over.
13 - Removed Stephanie McMahon from TV--only to bring her back to do the job her father was doing just fine.
14 - Let a comic book reading sitcom writer come up with storylines for Raw while former ECW owner wrote SmackDown!
15 - Had rock concerts on Raw, and moved the commentary team away from ringside... to make "Raw" look like "Nitro".
16 - Let Triple H appear in every other segment on Raw on multiple episodes.
17 - Had the rookie from #10 beat a babyface Hulk Hogan.
18 - Let "Stone Cold" Steve Austin slip through their fingers.
19 - Had one man win a TLC match for the tag team belts against: 3 makeshift tag teams made up of better wrestlers than the winner.
20 - it hasn't happened yet, but they're gonna shitcan the Intercontinental Title.
Yep, that's the WWE right now in a nutshell. I'm on my 6th beer right now and I'm on vacation for the week from my day job. So I'd say now's a good a time as any to write up a new wrestling rant. On to the here and now of wrestling:
Two World Champs in one company, that's what WWE has right now. Why? Because Triple H wanted a belt. Why? Because he's on Raw and Brock Lesnar is on Smackdown. Why? Because he jumped from Smackdown to Raw, and Triple H jumped to Raw from Smackdown. Why? Because he wanted to be the top dog. Why? Penis envy, maybe? Why? He's scared of Brock's tattoos.
Let's get real now, the real reason that HHH wanted to have a belt is because he's having sexual relations with the head of the creative control committee. That's right, although they split up for TV, Paul Levesque and Stephanie McMahon are still bumpin' uglies. Not married, but they are in carnal knowledge of each other. 'Nuff said.
"I am the Game... I have sex with the Boss' daughter. I can get you fired, gimme a title belt. No, not the Intercontinental title, that's not over enough, I want a world title. No, I don't wanna fight Brock Lesnar, he's a legit tough guy. I know he's the world champ, I just don't wanna fight him. Put me on Raw and give Raw a world title. I know, why don't we use the old WCW belt. Good idea, huh? That's because I'M THAT DAMN GOOD!" *spits water*
Well, I doubt he used that many big words. But I really think it was Triple H's idea he gets his own world title, and now, like the hardcore and european titles, they're gonna do away with the I-C belt. I think that's partly why they put it around the waist of Kane. Because Chris Jericho's also a heel and if the heels aren't getting over, why would a heel vs. heel match? And clearly after their previous encounters, I guess HHH feels he's proven himself to be better than RVD.
One Dave Scherer on the most excellent 1wrestling.com website calls what I described "the Triple H effect", it's why Raw's ratings are down, it's why turnover of wrestling fans is gonna be increased, it's why a lot of possible possibilities aren't going to happen any time soon.
I can understand the "brand extension", you know, turning Raw and SmackDown into more than two shows, but two different entities. Two shows, two touring groups, "let's make the talent exclusive to each group to reduce travel for the talent and run them as different promotions". Makes sense so far.
On paper it all makes sense, they're gonna strip things down to two championships on Raw, the World title and the Tag Team titles, and SmackDown will have the same thing. The Women's title will remain able to bounce from show to show because after all, it's only a special attraction, i.e. not what people come to see the shows for.
They've pushed Brock Lesnar to the moon and back, and for good reason. He's an incredible physical specimen. 6 foot, 5 inches tall, 295 pounds, former all-American collegiate wrestler. The man is able to pull off moves like that spinning power bomb and the F-5 like they're nothing. In the indies he was known for doing a SHOOTING STAR PRESS for god's sake. We've not seen that in WWE for good reason... they don't want such a skilled individual (especially when they're a "big guy" like Lesnar) to pull something so risky, just in case they botch it and break their necks. Just keep in mind the kind of moves the Rock did when he was in the mid card. He was pulling off the occasional hurricanrana and other moves which require high flexibility, which all went away when he made it to the big time. Same with Triple H, who did a top-rope somersault senton (like Booker T also used to do), until he got over enough that he didn't need to anymore. Even though he didn't do any major high-risk moves, Steve Austin was a skilled technical wrestler with a number of great mat holds to his disposal at one time.
On the other side of the coin now is Triple H. Two major injuries in the past year, a torn biceps and a torn quadroceps. He's slowing down big time, not capable of really working a high-impact style. He's bulked up big time compared to how he used to look. Which has caused him to slow down considerably. He got over big awhile ago when he came back from his quadroceps injury. He's according to WWE commentary, in the best shape of his life, I personally beg to differ. But anyway, I used to consider Triple H a favorite character of mine. But not anymore. Since it's my website, and my article. How about I give a little biography of the WWE Raw World Champion, who'll soon be defending his title against the current Intercontinental champ and one-half the World Tag-Team champs.
Think of this, Triple H, Paul Levesque... using the ring name "Jean-Paul Levesque", playing the character of a French-American aristocrat in WCW in 1994 was fresh out of Killer Kowalski's wrestling school. He was 6'4" and about 245 or so, running around and using some wicked moves. His big finish then was an "Inverted Indian Deathlock" something no-one had ever done before, and for good reason, it was a legitamitley painful and damaging hold, as is the regular Indian Deathlock. After he got over a little, WCW's booking team came up with a new finisher for him, a double-underhook facebuster, hooking the arms like a double-arm suplex, then driving the guy face first by dropping to his knees. WCW never gave it a name. When the character was brought over to WWF, they changed his name to Hunter Hearst-Helmsley... the last names of the Hearst family and the Helmsley family, two very well known rich families in the US. He dropped the poor French accent in favor of a relatively clean generic-yet-snobbish accent. They got him over by beating then-rookie sensation Rocky Maivia when well known heel Mr. Perfect interfered in the match.
Some time after the angle with Perfect ended, we slowly started to see him evolve more. Dropping the snooty well-to-do gimmick, they paired him up with a very successful WWF superstar, former World Champion Shawn Michales. A both were former Intercontinental Champions and Michales, a very popular regardless of wether he's playing babyface or heel. Dubbed "D-generation X" they played somewhat goofball characters and found themselves often accompanied to the ring by former Hunter Hearst-Helmsley valet, Chyna. The trio had some incredible angles and innovated the modern "cool heel characters".
Shawn Michales left active wrestling duty not too long after due to repeated injury, DX was expanded to also feature the sucessful heel tag team, "The New Age Outlaws", "Bad Ass" Billy Gunn and "Road Dogg" Jessee James, later Sean Waltman, the former 1-2-3 Kid, then commonly known as Syxx in WCW returned to the WWF, he found himself joining the faction, now referred to as the "DX Army". More entertaining angles followed, yet none were as entertaining as when Michales and Hunter Hearst-Helmsley, now occaisionally referred to as "Triple H". DX dispersed and the individual wrestlers found themselves in their own angles. Triple H found himself as part of Vince McMahon's stable of heels, known as "the Corporation". Which suprisingly brings us, for the most part leads us up to today. It was through The Corporation, which merged with the Undertaker's Ministry of Darkness stable that they put together an angle which introduced both Shane and Stephanie McMahon to WWE television viewers. I believe from here, you can pick up the story.
Backstage Politics... That's what's wong with wrestling. People say that's why WCW fell apart. Unfortunately it's everywhere. I blaim backstage politics with why Steve Austin walked out (which was for real, not a storyline, go to thesmokinggun.com and see the police report.) Dave Scherer, whom I mentioned earlier, has a theory that it's also partly why we don't have Scott Steiner in WWE right now.
In the day and age of gauranteed contracts and such. I don't understand it. There's no "winner's purse" like in boxing. They're not fighting over anything for real. They're actors performing physical feats, making like they're beating each other up. Why do they need to make such a big deal. Maybe it makes them look good on TV when they get their way backstage. But does it really matter, if they're not going to make any more or less money?
Only to their egos. If you don't understand that... think of it this way, you're paid to entertain. Yet how could you entertain when you're not letting anyone else up to your level. As if you had no competition and the company has to make ompetition for you. You're a superstar, you know it, the fans know it. The fans are gonna get mighty bored if you're the only superstar. And on top of things, you don't really need to be world heavyweight champion all the time to prove you're superstardom.
All I really have to say, is that wrestling could be alot more entertaining from a fan's standpoint if a few people took a step back and thought about how their actions effect the company as a whole.
Thanks for reading. Maybe if we're lucky, at No Mercy 2002 will drop the belt to Kane, someone I feel could actually benefit from winning world heavyweight gold.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed. But in all honesty, I'm not holding my breath.