Great article on current champions

[Senhor Perfect]

Welcome back one and all to a column that knows first hand how easy it is to get distracted when you are trying to get something you want to do done, my name is Wayne and you are now entering my world. Now I ask you loyal readers is it just me or does every now and again a wrestling show happens from which, beginning to end, brings to the forefront an issue that has been bugging you for a long time? Well that happened to me this week on Raw as for the entire show the WWE proved without a shadow of a doubt that they no longer care about their Championships.

It all started when in the second match of the night Kofi Kingston challenged Antonio Cesaro for the United States Championship. The first thing that crossed my mind was what did Kofi do to deserve a title shot? I mean Kofi’s good and all that and has been a worthy champion in the past but what had he done recently to deserve the shot? For the majority of 2013 Kofi has seemed little more than a jobber, in fact before the match with Cesaro he had not won a match on Raw this calender year. Just stop and let that sink in for a minute. Kofi Kingston, a man who in his entire career averages 3 wins out of every 5 matches, has not won a match on the biggest weekly show that WWE has to offer in the last 3 and a half months and this, in WWE logic, makes him worthy of a title shot.

Granted it was pointed out to me by a former LOP writer that I had missed the fact that Kofi had beaten Cesaro on last weeks Smackdown (the first Smackdown I have missed in a long time) thus earning the match in Kayfabe terms but in return I posed the question, what in Kayfabe terms had Kofi done recently to have a match with a champion in the first place, be it for a title or not. The simple fact of the matter is that with the record that Kofi has had of late has no right even sniffing around a title at the moment let alone competing for it. Yes his record this year before the Raw match may have been 10 wins out of 24 matches but 9 of those wins came from either Superstars or Saturday Morning Slam and the 10th was of course the match on Smackdown which gave him the right to have the title match in the first place. What this means is that a guy who on the couple of shows that the majority of WWE actually watch has had a losing streak of 13 matches all year (the 14th loss being on Superstars) is suddenly the number 1 contender out of nowhere. I don’t care what you say but even in Kayfabe that doesn’t make sense.

Oh and did I forget to mention that Kofi beat Cesaro and is the new US Champion, it just baffles my head even more.

However I should have saw it coming for only a week before something similar had happened to one of the big titles, the World Heavyweight Championship. Now before you all jump down my throat about how much Ziggler deserves the title and things like that let me please explain that I am fine with him being the champ but it is the pattern he took to get to the title that has me all worked up. What has Ziggler done to warrant him having the belt around his waist, yes he bumps better than anyone since Mick Foley and he won a ladder match which gave him the right to carry a briefcase around which guaranteed him a title shot but seriously what has he done otherwise?

What would you say Dolph’s win/loss record was like since he won the briefcase? We all know he clearly hasn’t won all his matches but seriously it couldn’t be to bad could it, say maybe a ½ to ¾. Well to be quite honest if this was your answer than you would be way off. In fact since winning the Money in the Bank briefcase and cashing it in last week Ziggler had won only 25 times in 73 televised matches thus meaning he only managed to win 1 match in every 3. You would think though that even with this irrational booking that WWE would correct it getting close to the day he cashed in his contract but even his 2013 stats paint the same picture with 10 wins from 27 matches. In no other sport in the world would a competitor who only wins one third of their matches be able to be World Champion which makes Ziggler’s holding of the title nothing but a joke.

How can you take either Kofi Kingston or Dolph Ziggler serious as a champion if you don’t believe they can win the match that they are competing in? We have now come accustomed to these guys losing that each time they step between the rope we expect them too lose. The idea of being champion is that you are the best of the best, that you can beat anyone that is thrown in your way. The best champions of all time have got this fact in common be it Bruno Sammartino, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Steve Austin, The Rock or John Cena. Every time they stepped into the ring you expected them to win, be it clean like a good face hero or by pulling some of the dirtiest tricks in the book to steal the victory. However Dolph Ziggler can’t even win a one on one match just one week after winning the title against a man who has a nice hefty record of being a jobber himself.

In fact it seems like in the WWE only jobbers are allowed to hold a title as just this week on Raw we had not only the United States Championship change hands but the Divas, Intercontinental and World Heavyweight Champions all lost non-title matches. Honestly who writes this shit. How are we supposed to believe that these guys deserve to be champion if every single one of them loses to someone on the regular roster on the same day, it is just slap in he face of every fan for believing in the titles as the measuring stick

Since winning the Intercontinental Championship from Kofi Kingston at the end of 2012 Wade Barrett has only managed to win half of his matches (17 from 34) which includes a 1 day title change thanks to The Miz and a head scratching job he had to perform to Bo Dallas. We are supposed to believe that these guys are the best there is, well prove it.

At the moment there are only two titles in the WWE that I can see as being anything better than a joke. The Tag Team Championship has been held by Team Hell No since September of last year and while they have not had the best of luck while separated in singles action, have been pretty much unstoppable the whole time when teaming, be it by their great teamwork or by pure luck when the in-fighting got too much for them too control. This is not to say though that they have not had their challengers as at times it looked like the Prime Time Players and The Rhodes Scholars could be the team to beat them for the title as the worthy number 1 contenders that they were. Now with a new number one contenders on the horizon the Tag Division continues to shine.

The other title which seems to be on the right track is that of the WWE Championship as quite honestly it has been held by the best of the best the last few years. With current champion John Cena, the man he beat for the title The Rock or our year long champion CM Punk before him you always felt like they could overcome whatever was thrown in their way. They were simply the best there was at the time and their opponents were always of a similar or slightly lower quality. These guys could not be mistaken for jobbers whatsoever thus making the title as credible as it could be.

It is quite an easy concept to follow, if your champions and challengers look strong than they will make the title they are fighting for mean something. If the title means something than more people will tune in to watch the champion and challenger fight over said title. More people watching the product means more money to line the wallets of the owners. Come on WWE it is not rocket science, but then again to the guys who do the booking it probably is.

While it is nice that the WWE is acknowledging their wrestlers how are part of JOB Squad 2013 it is time stop making their titles a joke and give the belts to those who actually know how to win before we end up with Michael McGillicutty, Yoshi Tatsu or shudder to think, JTG, as our next WWE Champion.


Thanx for reading,

Wayne Little
Read more at http://www.lordsofpain.net/columns/waynesworld/Wayne_s_World_So_You_re_A_Jobber_Well_Here_Is_A_Nice_Shiny_Belt_For_You.html#bwyRFzslIu0aZkI7.99

Makes a lot of sense.

 

[Swift]

Great read. I agree with it.

 

[Stopspot]

I think this sadly is the result of having too many "TV writers" and not enough wrestling writers. The TV writers are so used to writing dramas that they either forget the importance of titles in a universe like the WWE or don't care. If we had a mix of wrestling writers/bookers and TV writers the wrestlin guys could remind the TV guys and the TV guys could help turn the wrestling angles into TV material (I guess).

 

[Lockard 23]

Yeah, that was something that stood out to me on Raw, the way all the champions jobbed except for the tag team champions. The Dolph Ziggler loss to Swagger really stood out because I figured once Ziggler cashed in MITB, he would have be booked as a credible heel world champion. Not that he would win every match cleanly or never cheat but that he would at least WIN. He's capable of cheating himself, not to mention he has a bodyguard and a conniving girlfriend in his corner as well. But he already goes back to jobbing just one week after winning the title, this time to the most boring guy on the roster. Why are they pushing Swagger? I know JR has been in love with him for awhile, does he really still have so much pull that he's convincing WWE that Swagger can/will be a big star?

I'm already starting to think (even with just one Raw to judge from thus far) that Ziggler is gonna be turned into a paper champion just like Mysterio in 2006.

I honestly think part of the lack of care for the midcard titles (excluding the WHC, which is very much a midcard title itself these days) might stem from a lack of creativity having to do with them thinking that if they ever come up with a pretty good angle over a championship, they would rather just save it for one of the world titles instead of wasting it on one of the midcard titles.

 

[RoyalRaven]

I've been saying this over and over, why do the IC and US champions job so much :/ literally they are CHAMPIONS! They're supposed to kick ass, not job to the likes of Randy Orton for no reason at all, it honestly just makes no sense to me whatsoever.

 

[Leo C]

A nice article, indeed the champions job waaay too much these days.

 

[Super Saiyan Goku]

ok?

 

[CM Punk]

ok?

Nice input there Gohan.

I agree on Dolph losing to Swagger. Who booked that shit?

 

[Super Saiyan Goku]

Nice input there Gohan.

I agree on Dolph losing to Swagger. Who booked that shit?

Swagger wining was great! Figger is a page champion!

 

[Dolph'sZiggler]

This guy acts like none of us know DZ was a jobber before. Yea no shit pal. We're aware.

 

[Snowman1]

In my opinion, the titleholders aren't as big a problem as the belts themselves. What do they symbolize? No, being the US Champion doesn't make you "the champion of the United States", it makes you the best of the second-tier wrestlers. It's the Triple-A Baseball Championship. If it really seemed like winning the Intercontinental Championship would do anything to propel you up to play with the big boys the belt would have meaning. Right now it's just floating around random jobbers all the time.

Granted, there's other things you can do with it. Cody Rhodes talking about "bringing back the prestige of the IC Championship" really helped make him a star back in 2011. Bo Dallas eliminating the IC Championship from the Royal Rumble would have been a big deal had they not decided to just pay that off on NXT and write Bo off TV. (great booking WWE), and all the anti-american heels with the US belt helps them out to an extent.

I joke about the mid-card belts being a negative right now, but they are treated as such. Ever since Cesaro and Barrett won those belts most weeks on Raw they're jobbing to Cena, or Sheamus, or Orton, or Ryback, or Del Rio. When I was a casual I just thought winning a mid-card belt just halted your progression and kept you out of the Main Event, now I think they're crutches for Creative to have one less feud to write for a PPV (although looking at Sheamus/Henry so far they don't even need crutches). Either way: As a Cesaro fan, why wouldn't you be happy he dropped the US Title? (Says a lot about it, now doesn't it?)

Look at the way they bring in main-eventers now. Cena debuts, goes right after Kurt Angle. ADR debuts, attacks Rey then goes right after the World Title. Sheamus debuts (WWECW doesn't count), he goes right after the WWE Title. Ryback squashes jobbers, BAM main event. Orton debuted in Evolution. All the main eventers are brought in and immediately associated with main-eventers, the only ones to actually work their way up the card is CM Punk and Cena to an extent, and those are the only two who are catching on right now.

That's seemingly one of the biggest problems with the mid-card right now is that nobody's ever getting out of it, they're just bumping their head against the glass ceiling. Speaking of bumping; Ziggler. Ziggler's an odd case, he's over as hell despite his jobbing and it feels like he has much more momentum than he has any right to have (granted being around you Ziggler nuthuggers all the time probably has something to do with that). Seems like the only guy Ziggler can beat is Kofi, and that's why Kofi feels like Yoshi Tatsu right now.

To be more positive: Wins and losses don't mean as much as momentum much of the time with wrestlers, and it's the same with championships. When Rhodes had the IC Belt and Santino had the US belt, which was more prestigious? And with Smackdown no longer being a separate entity what point does the World Title still have being there? And yet it still feels like a world title belt.

 

[Farooq]

While I do agree champions should be at high regard, I don't think the IC champion nor the US champion should be considered the best of the best. I think if a high card wrestler challenges them, the higher card should go over most of the time. Of course this doesn't mean you should job them out every single week, they should still have a higher wins then losses. Other then that, I agree with this article.

 

[Leo C]

And also, when the midcard champions job, why make them job on a random match against Randy Orton that leads to nothing?