WWE General Discussion Thread

[Kushikimi]

Solomon Crowe for some reason spells "Raven like guy" to me and Raven is probably my favorite wrestler of all time. I hope they don't make him a surfer guy a la Tyler Reks or something stupid....

 

[Postman Dave]

Watched bits and pieces of this weeks Smackdown & Raw, some general thoughts:

- With Cena out & Punk busy elsewhere, I like the fact that so many mid and under card guys are getting a chance to shine now. Obviously Daniel Bryan is benefiting from being booked as the top face, but you've also got the Uso's. They're booking as Shield-killers has gone nicely under the radar, but they've got two 6 man tag victories over them now, came close to taking the belts at MitB and continuously cause Shield problems. I know the PTP are starting to get pushed stronger, but surely the long term booking points to the Uso's dethroning Rollins & Reigns?

- Speaking of the Shield, whilst I fear their titles are becoming an after thought, being HHH's muscle has really rejuvenated their act. And no matter how many times we see Bryan vs. The Shield in some form this year, I never seem to get sick of it.

- Nice nod of continuity from HHH on Smackdown this week. When he talked about "first 10 guys, next week 20" rebelling, obviously this goes back two years to when he first took charge. It's a nice trait that whilst he's being a dickbag, he knows he still has to walk a very fine line.

- I just cannot get into Del Rio at all. He's solid, that's it. Nothing is extraordinary, his booking is safe and straight forward, and he's literally always in the WHC picture. As a character I just can't get interested in anything he does. I only bring this up as a lot of people aren't particularly thrilled about ADR/RVD 2, and cite RVD as the reason. For me it's the complete opposite.

- I know continuously hammering on about this is boring, but they really do need to sort out the titles in WWE. Curtis Axel isn't treated strongly enough to be a credible champion, and Ambrose's US title reign seems like an afterthought to everything else he does. Neither title adds anything to the product nowadays.

 

[Postman Dave]

WWE.com did an article on how much superstars can bench (do they even lift?). The results in order of best to worst.

Big E Langston - 575lbs
Ryback - 550lbs
Titus O'Neal - 545lbs
Kane - 525lbs
Big Show - 500lbs
John Cena - 465lbs
Jack Swagger - 457lbs
Roman Reigns - 445lbs
Antonio Cesaro - 405lbs

Of note is that despite Cesaro's amazing feats of strength, he's got one of the lower bench presses, although he concerns himself more with functional strength than anything. Mark Henry of course is the obvious omission as he isn't about at the moment.

Oh, and Big Show noted that he can do 16 reps of his biggest press.

 

[Postman Dave]

Some stat website listed some of their favourite WWE stats for 2013. Some are boring points based stuff, but here's the interesting ones (also posted because I love a good pie chart):

15:24 – John Cena’s average match length. In 23 singles matches in 2013, Cena led all of WWE in match length by almost two minutes, beating CM Punk’s 2nd place time of 13:27. It’s no surprise that the two biggest stars in the Fed dominated this category – if they’re advertised the WWE makes a conscious effort to get fans their money’s worth. With Cena you always get at least ten minutes worth of hot babyface comeback fire sandwiched around those 5 sweet moves, as only three of Cena’s matches failed to hit that mark. He might be booked as the WWE Superman, but at least he puts some time in before taking flight.

11 – Matches between Dolph Ziggler and Alberto Del Rio on WWE Television in 2013. Del Rio and Ziggler take the top spot in most matches against an opponent over the last year. They ranked 2nd and 3rd in overall televised singles matches, so you weren’t seeing things if you thought they squared up every single week. Only 3 of those 11 matches took place in their official “feud zone†– my term for when there’s some sort of discernible stoyline to follow in a program. They faced each other 4 times before the epic cash in on the night after Mania, and even with Ziggler fading from the WHC scene they still matched up three times after their last bout with a title on the line. They are two of WWE’s weekly workhorses, an example of great ring work and chemistry mixed together, but also an example of WWE’s penchant for putting together programs without much story to make it compelling. Outside of their double-turn match at Payback and of course the cash-in, most fans would be hard pressed to even remember the other nine. Not a good sign for two hopeful main event talents.

6 – Times Randy Orton main evented a PPV in 2013. Orton wrestled last in half of the years PPVs – but don’t sleep on everyone’s favorite underdog Daniel Bryan, who’s close behind with 5. Not bad for a guy Triple H and Vince hate so much. Some of these cats made this prestigious list by competing in July’s Money in the Bank, but it went on last so it counts. Check out the full pie-tastic breakdown below:

226 Days – Number of days Dean Ambrose held the US Title in 2013. Improbably, Dean Ambrose weaseled his way to the longest title reign of any championship belt in 2013. Well, not improbably if you noticed his last title defense was all the way back on October 28th, against Big E. Langston. I’m surprised WWE hasn’t focused more on his ducking competition and winning almost every title match via DQ loss – it fits the character arc so well. Probably because the lack of luster makes it as worthy of a prize as the Jelly of the Month club – focusing on it might actually hurt Ambrose’s standing. The guy is jawing with CM Punk on Raw every week, the US championship is not a great talking point in his favor. Here’s a list of the longest reigning champs for each belt in 2013:

198 Days – AJ Lee (Diva’s)
155 Days – Curtis Axel (IC)
148 days – The Shield (Tag-Team)
133 days – John Cena (WWE)
133 days – Alberto Del Rio (WHC)

28 – Submission wins for Alberto Del Rio. I wrote this post back in July trying to figure out who the best submission specialist in WWE was, and the landscape has changed so much since then. Jericho’s off playing Metal God, Swagger is a Real American and Bryan introduced the Running Knee, and thank god the Miz hasn’t used the figure-four since September. So that leaves Del Rio as our only consistent tap-artist in the WWE. It’s amazing that these effective finishing maneuvers have been reduced to just token in-match drama rather than the destructive forces that can destroy careers. Here’s to hoping Bryan brings back the Yes Lock with a vengeance real soon. Start on Triple H please.

Kayfabermetrics

Del Rio tapping bitches out all day long. I wonder how many of those were against Ziggler. Also, check out Cena being WWE's Iron Man this year.

 

[Wang Chung]

WWE has come to terms on the release of the following Superstars and Diva as of today, June 12, 2014:

Drew McIntyre
Jinder Mahal
Aksana
Curt Hawkins
Theodore Long
Camacho
Brodus Clay
Evan Bourne
Yoshi Tatsu
Marc Harris (referee)

WWE wishes them the best in all their future endeavors

A lot of names here and none are very shocking either.



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[Fuji Vice]

There's no actual Main Event thread (probably shouldn't be either) so I'll just post in here that if you haven't checked out Del Rio/Sheamus from this week's episode, you're totally missing out on a great match. If I still rated them I'd say it was about ***3/4ish and certainly one of the better television matches that I've seen in recent memory that didn't feature a Wyatt or Shield member.

 

[Hidden Blaze]

There's no actual Main Event thread (probably shouldn't be either) so I'll just post in here that if you haven't checked out Del Rio/Sheamus from this week's episode, you're totally missing out on a great match. If I still rated them I'd say it was about ***3/4ish and certainly one of the better television matches that I've seen in recent memory that didn't feature a Wyatt or Shield member.

I might have to check that out when I get home. Hopefully it's as good as you make it out to be.

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[Drew]

Anyone else think roman and Rusev were not only wasted on Smackdown but also is too soon?

If they keep building Rusev they could have had a big angle with Rusev and Roman several months from now.


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[Postman Dave]

Anyone else think roman and Rusev were not only wasted on Smackdown but also is too soon?

If they keep building Rusev they could have had a big angle with Rusev and Roman several months from now.


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I do agree, but it certainly raised some eyebrows and Smackdown doesn't do that a lot nowadays.

Roman vs. Rusev on PPV could be huge if built properly, but I see Rusev as Cena-bait before the year is out.

 

[Drew]

Oh yeah I fully expect Cena to beat him in a feud.

And as much as I support Cena over hating on him like most...I wouldn't like that at all.


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[Wang Chung]

I think if they did the feud right with Cena Rusev could still look like a monster.

 

[Castiel]

Saw a clip of Kofi losing to Rollins from Main Event and nothing of him, E, and Woods from RAW. Did they do anything this week? Is the angle still going or have they randomly dropped it? They were together on the stage last night but I didn't see any of them near the ring for Kofi's match tonight. Maybe I'm jumping the gun but this stable has my interest and I hope it hasn't been dumped already.

 

[Lover Boy]

Saw a clip of Kofi losing to Rollins from Main Event and nothing of him, E, and Woods from RAW. Did they do anything this week? Is the angle still going or have they randomly dropped it? They were together on the stage last night but I didn't see any of them near the ring for Kofi's match tonight. Maybe I'm jumping the gun but this stable has my interest and I hope it hasn't been dumped already.

They were wearing matching ring gear on the stage on Raw.

I just think WWE would rather focus on more important angles in the lead up to Summerslam, the Stable is still going to happen.

 

[Fuji Vice]

Except it'll feel completely inane at this point because Kofi was clearly wrestling as a face yesterday on Main Event. Normally I don't have a problem with slow burn booking, but if you're going to start a new angle with a few guys, you can't just abandon it after a fucking WEEK. Sure they won't get maximum television time every week with the build to SummerSlam, but a couple of quick backstage "hey, we're still here" segments wouldn't hurt. Hopefully they come up with something for them after Sunday, but as it stands right now the initial buzz is already near death.

 

[Postman Dave]

I don't buy the "not enough time" point for a minute. They have 7 hours per week between Raw, Main Event, Superstars & Smackdown, plus social media, network shows and youtube to help too.

Not enough time my ass, maybe if they used that time more productively rather than running rematches of the previous show all the time then it wouldn't be a problem.