Yes indeed, this fortnight’s column marks a entire year since my first ever wrestling column was posted at Obsessed With Wrestling. In celebration of this fact, I’ve posted a full archive of my pre-InsidePulse work on my profile. Go and have a look and let me know what you think.
Well, it looks like I’ve f*cked up on my draft picks so far, as neither guy was included in my previous column. Having John Cena on Raw was just one of those truly bizarre moment and I think it shows that the brand extension actually works. After all, Cena has never wrestled on Raw in his entire WWE career so having him jump shows is a big deal – of course, the fact that he is also WWE Heavyweight Champion makes it an ever BIGGER deal, but it was pretty huge to start with.
I’m really interested in how this thing is going to play out now that both Champions are on one show. Will Cena have to vacate the belt? Will he be traded back for more workers, in the same way that Triple H was last year? Will he be allowed to keep the belt, but he and Batista have to create and Undisputed Title between them? Will Batista trade shows as well? It could be any of these, or none of them, but the fact reamins that I’m looking forward to each new development. In fact, I’ve decided that I’m going to stop myself from looking at either the Raw or SmackDown! spoilers for the rest of the Draft month as I want to feel the old buzz that I used to get when something totally unexpected happened during a wrestling show.
What else is there to discuss from Raw? Shelton Benjamin continues to impress me like nobody else on the roster; Christian is really hitting his stride in the promo department; who the Hell is that new ring announcer and where’s Lillian Garcia? How weird was it seeing Ballz Mahoney, Axl Rotten and the Sandman on a WWE TV program?
Good stuff.
Also, I’d like to hold my hand and admit that it looks like I was in the wrong regarding Chris Masters. You may remember that my first impressions of him were that he was too green, too dangerous, loaded down with a shitty gimmick and that he wouldn’t last long using the Full Nelson as a finisher in this day and age. I must say that he match with Stevie Richards last week and with Val Venis this week have started to make a believer out of me. His ringwork was more than passable, his heel promos have been garnering some decent heel heat and as for the Masterlock – well, don’t be surprised if the first person to break it doesn’t get a pop that tears the roof off the arena. Don’t get me wrong, I still think he’s too green for the main event, but I wouldn’t be turning off my TV in disgust if the man hooked himself an Intercontinental or US Title reign in the not too distant future.
I had a number of e-mails this week regarding the draft picks from my last column. In particular, I’d like to thank Scott J, James Marsh, George Neocleous and Peter von Erik for their thought provoking comments. I’ve decided not to put them on here this week, as it’s kind of a moot point, since the draft has already started, but thanks for your input, guys. There are just a few things from your respective e-mails that I’d like to point out, if I may…
Scott suggested that, with SmackDown! moving to Friday nights on UPN, then the WWE needs to overload it with superstars, which could possibly turn Raw into the company’s B-Show. I would say that that is the least likely outcome imaginable – not that they wouldn’t draft some big names to SmackDown!, but rather that they’d do anything to reduce Raw’s popularity. Monday night is wrestling night, after all. If all those fans who zoned out after the Attitude Era wrestling-boom ended ever want to get back into the sport, then they will almost certainly start by checking out Raw on a Monday night. I personally see Raw being the well marketed, demographic targetting, soap-opera copying mega-ratings show, whilst SmackDown! becomes the wrasslin’ program where top-flight in-ring competitors like Benoit, Angle, Michaels, the Cruiserweights and, yes, Triple H regularly put on ****+ matches for the fans.
James slagged off Danny Basham, which I’m totally cool with – each to their own and all that – but seems to think that Danny’s finisher is a full nelson when, in fact, it is the Brain Damage, a sit-out, double-handed choke-bomb. It’s seriously sweet, too, check it out on Velocity sometime.
George made a few suggestions of his own for the draft, but the one that really tickled me was moving Heidenreich to Raw. I know that Heidenreich isn’t exactly beloved at the moment, but I’m starting to dig his crazy, poem-reading, creepy babyface routine and I can see some funny stuff in his future, if he were allowed to run with it on Raw. George mentioned a showdown between Heidenreich and Viscera, but I could also see some good stuff going on with Heidenreich and Eugene, or Snitsky or possibly Hassan. Even a Heidenreich-Masters feud could be entertaining when Heidenreich proves that he is the only one capable of breaking the Masterlock.
Peter agreed with me on Jericho vs. Cena and, judging by their interaction on Monday night, I think I was actually on the ball for once with that. However, he suggested that JBL should stay on SmackDown! in a US Title role, as someone to both elevate new stars and gun for Cena once the pops start dying out. I can see the logic there, certainly, but I think JBL will flourish wherever he might go.
Thanks for all your e-mails – as I said, it’s only time and space predictions that prevents me from posting them this time, coupled with the inherent uselessness of the exercise, now that the first two names have already been anounced.
Keep on e-mailing me people and let me know what you think of my work.
As I said at the top of the page, this column marks my first full year as an IWC columnist and, since I never got around to doing a 2004 recap at Christmas, I thought I look at what’s happened in the wild and wacky world of pro-wrestling, since my debut column back on 9th June 2004.
At the time, the WWE title scene looked like this…
Raw Title Holders
World Heavyweight Title: Chris Benoit
Intercontinental Title: Randy Orton
Tag Team Titles: La Resitance
Women’s Title: Victoria
SmackDown! Title Holders
WWE Heavyweight Title: Eddie Guerrero
US Title: John Cena
Tag Team Titles: Charlie Haas and Rico
Cruiserweight Title: Chavo Classic
How times have change, eh?
Over the last twelve months a hell of a lot has been going on in the world of professional wrestling, mostly for the good. I know it’s customary to slag off those things that are bad in the sport, but I think that certain areas of the business have improved considerably and that 2004-05 was a far better year for wrestling than it might look on paper.
JBL winning the WWE Title was a major shock (in fact, one of my friends said it best with a poignant text message that simply read ‘FUCK JBL. FUCK HIM UP HIS STUPID ARSE’) but, with the benefit of hindsight, he was a fine Champion, whose extended title run gave some much needed legitimacy to the belt and meant that when Cena finally beat Layfield at WrestleMania, it actually meant something. After all, Cena had managed to accomplish something that more experienced and talented grapplers like The Undertaker, Kurt Angle, the Big Show and Eddie Guerrero had failed to do. In many ways, it was reminiscent of when the Ultimate Warrior squashed the Honky Tonk Man at SummerSlam ’88, as it ended a lengthy title reign that only got that long in the first place through subterfuge and trickery.
On the Raw side of things, it was a little more complicated, as Benoit lost the strap to Orton, who lost it to Triple H who had it vacated following a controversial Triple Threat match in November between himself, Benoit and Edge. The belt was then up for grabs in an Elimination Chamber at the first ever New Year’s Revolution PPV in Puerto Rico, which Triple H also won (bringing his stock of World Titles up to 10). There was hope for the future, however, as the newly turned Batista saved our souls by defeating Trips for the title in the main event of WrestleMania 21. Hallelujah!
Cena’s chase of the title on SmackDown! and Batista deftly orchestrated face turn on Raw were just one pair of highlights in a year that was stocked to the gills with them. If you like your soap-opera style romance angles, then you need look no further than the Kane-Lita-Matt Hardy triangle, that got even more bizarre when the baby-killing Gene Snitsky and the philandering Edge became involved in the proceedings. Do you want a tale of broken trust, self-loathing and real injuries, then head over to SD! and watch Kidman give Chavo Guerrero a concussion, then bloody up his tag team partner, Paul London, and Shooting Star Press him on a stretcher. Or maybe that whole ‘wrestling’ thing is your bag (weirdo) – the various upper midcarders on Raw have put on mind-blowing bouts of in-ring action as Benoit, Edge, Jericho and, most notably, Shelton Benjamin have upped the stakes of heavyweight wrestling with nearly every match.
Granted, if you’re a fan of tag teams, cruiserweights or women’s wrestling then you’re onto a bit of a loser. I covered my thoughts on tag teams a few weeks ago so by all means check it out. The cruiserweights continue to go along without any real direction or significant air time, which is a crying shame as they have one of the most talented workers in the world as their champion at the moment and a few guys in the division who regularly put their X-Division counterparts to shame. As for the Women’s division, well, the less said the better, I think. Having started the year with one of the strongest female leagues in a long time, they are now reduced to Lita, Victoria and Trish, with a whole bunch of ropey old tarts dragging down the good name of female wrestling.
Which brings me on to arrivals and departures section of any Year in Review type of column. This year saw a hell of a lot of WWE Superstars fly the nest and several more be brought up to the big leagues. In a nutshell (and ignoring failed Diva Search and Tough Enough entrants), this is who came and went over the last twelve months.
Left WWE
Rue DeBona (SD!)
Paul Bearer (SD!)
Rikishi (SD!)
Sakoda (SD!)
Sable (SD!)
Jamie Noble (SD!)
Billy Gunn (SD!)
A-Train (SD!)
Jazz (Raw)
Test (Raw)
Gail Kim (Raw)
Rodney Mack (Raw)
Chavo Classic (SD!)
Johnny Stamboli (SD!)
Rico (SD!)
Nidia (Raw)
Chuck Palumbo (SD!)
Lamont (SD!)
Shaniqua (SD!)
Rhyno (Raw)
Matt Hardy (Raw)
Molly Holly (Raw)
Luther Reigns (SD!)
Joined WWE
Heidenreich (SD!)
Gene Snitsky (Raw)
Viscera (SD! + Raw)
Carlito (SD!)
Christy Hemme (Raw)
Daniel Puder (SD!)
Jesus (SD!)
Simon Dean (Raw)
Muhammad Hassan (Raw)
Khosrow Daivari (Raw)
Chris Masters (Raw)
Marty Jannetty (???)
Sharmell Sullivan (SD!)
MNM (Mercury, Nitro and Melina) (SD!)
The Heart Throbs (Romeo and Anontio) (Raw)
Matt Morgan (SD!)
No doubt there are some I’ve missed – after all, it’s been a hectic year – but those were the major players.
As far as old school nostalgia goes, we’ve had it in bucketloads, from JBL hiring Viscera and Gangrel to destroy their old Ministry leader Undertaker to Kurt Angle bringing Marty Jannetty and Sherri Martell out of the woodwork during his WrestleMania feud with HBK, we’ve seen plenty of old faces back on the little screen. Hell, we even got to see Jake “The Snake” Roberts back in a WWE ring, one of the guys I never would have suspected seeing on a Primetime TV programme.
PPVs have varied in their quality, from the awesome (WrestleMania 21) to the downright abysmal (Great American Bash), from the quirky (Taboo Tuesday) to the frustrating (New Year’s Revolution). On the whole, Raw has fared better than SmackDown! for these shows, but then they had some stellar workers on their roster to keep the pace going nicely.
Another improvement for 2004-05 has been the return of the lengthy feud. Forget things like the 2 month Triple H-Steiner feud or the even shorter Brock-Eddie segment…this year saw feuds going on for months and months at a time. I’ve already touched on Lita (and, let’s face it, who hasn’t) and her involvement with Kane, Edge and Matt Hardy, but she also had a long-running story with Trish Stratus; Edge and Chris Benoit have been at each other’s throats for ages; Booker T and Cena had a good long feud, as did Cena and Carlito (with the introduction of Jesus to the mix). Of course, the cream of the crop has to be Batista’s excellent defection from Evolution and the joy that brought to millions and millions of WWE fans and Triple H haters.
All in all, it’s been a good twelve months to be a fan of the WWE and I hope they continue to push this healthy run well into the future. The Draft Lottery is s good start, as is the ECW PPV and the potential rekindling of old feuds and an influx of experienced workers who, nonetheless, are new faces to most WWE fans. The last year was a good one – let’s hope that 2005-2006 will be even better.
Until the next time…farewell.
