Well this is late, but it’s not my fault. I thought Widro might’ve closed Inside Pulse down. Apparently not, so here is the year in wrestling from one of the two best fans a columnist could hope for, Hollywood Timmy Hayes. Enjoy bitches; hope Santa treated you like a Stephanie story arc…or something…
It’s December 2005. You NEED someone to do a year-in-review retrospective of the WWE. You’re dying for someone to write it. Your prayers have been answered. The most spectacularific Year-In-Review is here!
Please know that I am a genuinely happy guy. I always try to find something positive in whatever is going on. But I realize that to actively participate in the online wrestling community; you have to be a bit bitter and complain about stuff a lot. I say, let’s cover both sides — the good and the not-so-good. Without further ado, here’s what worked and what didn’t in WWE this year. According to me, your guest columnist, Hollywood
Timmy Hayes.
The Curtain Jerkers
Cruiserweights went nowhere this year. I am a HUGE X-Division fan, so thankfully, I got to see innovative talents like Chris Sabin, Alex Shelly, Matt Bentley, Samoa Joe, AJ Styles, and Christopher Daniels turn into stars.
Yes, TNA is making stars in an area that the WWE has no idea how to book. I think most of us wrestling fans who talk about wrestling a lot on the internet finally realized that TNA and the X-Division is the only place for high-flying, innovate wrestling. It’s dead in the WWE and I wish they’d stop wasting time with it. Not a core competency for the WWE at this point, so I say, just lose the division entirely.
Lots of people got fired. That’s a shame. But Viscera had an affair with Lillian and still wrestles on Raw. Who liked the skits with the overweight lover Viscera? Anyone? Oh, your FF button liked Viscera.
The 2005 Award for “The Hurricane and Rosie vs. La Resistance on RAW! Yes,
Really, We’re Putting This Match on Again This Week!” goes to the downsized women’s division for having the same women‚s match every week. Did you see that match with Victoria, Christy, Trish, Mickie, Torrie, Candace, and
Ashley? About a hundred times.
Seriously, WWE wasted a lot of TV time with women’s matches with the same participants and then a lot of time with the diva search part 2. Hello FF! I can’t imagine all of the tits and ass made a difference in the ratings or PPV buys though. The internet already has a ton of porn for free. So get the crappy actresses/wrestlers off of my sportz entertainment show.
But keep Melina. Not only is she really hot and has a great entrance (she’ll have to feud with Stacy eventually, right?), but she’s involved in the stories and the matches. She’s a good manager, and she’s eye candy. That’s how to use the women in this day and age.
I’m putting the tag teams in this section too. Road Warrior Animal came back. And elevated Heidenreich by making him part of LOD2005. MNM got a nice push. Murdock and Cade got a few minutes in the sun. You see, we all bitched about the lack of tag teams in WWE, and then the WWE tried to do
more with tag teams. So we all shut up for awhile. But the emphasis on tag teams didn’t work so well. And now we all bitch about tag teams again. And rightfully so.
Da Mid Card
Eugene was annoying. His thing with Angle for the medals was mildly entertaining, but mostly because of Angle. And Christy’s short skirt. I am so glad the Eugene character is done. Having a retarded wrestler is just a recipe for disaster. They had a chance, they could have made him mentally challenged outside of the ring, but a true wrestling force in the ring, but they went for comedy instead. It failed and the WWE wasted a lot of TV
time.
The Boogeyman. He’s weird, bashes clocks, and eats worms. A slight improvement over Eugene to be sure, but get him off my TV too.
Shelton Benjamin was IC champ for a while with no real feuds. Someone that talented and they couldn’t do anything else with him?
Hassan had a nice run, but was eventually written off of the shows due to pressure from advertisers and television executives. That was a shame he was really solid on the mic and his character grew on me over time.
Booker T went nowhere in the mid-card. I think we said that last year too.
Orlando Jordan had a long run with the US Title. I didn’t like him, but they booked him well and he almost convinced me he could be a credible guy in the ring. But then they buried him by having Benoit destroy him in a series of matches. And basically killed the character.
Rookie of the year: Ken Kennedy. He has the extra something that a star needs. Charisma. Kennedy and Monty Brown are the stars of the future, I say.
The fans especially the fans who talk about wrestling on the internet really got behind Christian because he was funny on the mic and wrestled good matches. He left for TNA. I applaud that.
By the way, having “brands” for wrestling promotions is still stupid. “Brands” is a business term. No room for it in the make-believe world of sportz entertainment.
Like most wrestling fans who are active on the internet, I too was bummed that the experiment with having Benoit in the main event picture ended this year.
Carlito got a big push, had the IC title for awhile, managed to stick around the upper-mid card with no apparent finisher, which bugs a lot of people.
Chris Masters got a big push. The internet fans hate him. But for a big musclehead, he’s actually not that bad. He’s kind of growing on me. I think it’s because he’s really trying.
Flair kind of turned a few times during the Batista/HHH feud, but eventually sided with HHH. Even so, the fans eventually turned him into a good guy again. Then he had some matches with HHH, which were bloody hardcore matches. I give Flair a lot of credit for staying in wrestling as long as he has and staying as popular as he has. But it bugs me to see him basically as a hardcore‚ wrestler. Every once in awhile I throw in an interview from when he was with the Four Horsemen in the mid/late 80s. He’s
still the best, no matter how much he tarnishes his legacy‚ by sticking around as long as he has.
The Upper Mid-Card, if there is such a thing
ECW One Night Stand. Very cool. Plus, Heyman, Bischoff, McMahon in the same ring on RAW. Someone said it was six years too late, but we all loved it anyway. Nothing else needs to be said on this topic, because it was great.
First, early in the year, Lita got injured doing what internet wrestling fans called “being sloppy”. Seconds, no pun intended.
There were two reaaaaaaallly long story lines that kind of bled together, mostly because of Lita. Kane/Snitsky/Matt Hardy and then Matt Hardy/Edge/Lita. The Kane/Lita/Hardy thing was annoying. They got married.
Other than Randy Savage and Elizabeth getting married, I don’t think anything good has really ever come from an on-screen, sportz entertainment marriage. Uncle Elmer, notwithstanding, of course.
That said, good job by Matt Hardy in making internet fans ˆand eventually all fans care about him and his character. Unfortunately, “creative” botched how to use him and his feud with Edge once Hardy came back to the WWE. That was a shame, because all on his own, Matt Hardy made people care
about him. For awhile. And now, he loses a lot and no one really cares about him again.
Edge won a lot of matches this year, but still doesn’t seem to be a real main event draw.
Please, get rid of the “General Managers”. It’s done. Over.
Eddie Guerrero and Rey Rey had a really long feud that took forever to get resolved and then they threw in the stupid family storylines. Do you watch House on FOX? Did you see the episode where someone is really sick and they can’t explain what is going on, and there’s some controversy with the hospital administration/politics, and House is a jerk to people but figures out the mysterious illness near the end of the episode? You saw that one? Did you see that Eddie Guerrero and Rey Mysterio PPV match? You know, that
PPV match? Seriously, how many times did they wrestle this year?
The Undertaker beat some big stiffs (Heidenreich and Luther Reigns), Muhammed Hassan, and Randy Orton. Put him in the ring with Hogan and then I can just boo the crap out of both of them. I still can’t stand Hogan or the
Undertaker.
The Main Event
But Hogan did participate in a great angle. Hogan and Shawn Michaels won a tag match vs. Hassan and Davari. And then Michaels created a feud with Hogan that was fantastic work by Michaels. To surprise of no one, Hogan won. Even still, Angle and Shawn Michaels had a terrific series of matches
that demonstrated why we all still watch wrestling. I’ve never been much of a Shawn Michael fan. Until this past year, that is. Whatever crap he’s done in the past behind the scenes is forgiven in my book. Between the
Hogan stuff and the Angle matches, Shawn Michaels was the MVP.
Chris Jericho and then Kurt Angle lost a lot of PPV matches to John Cena. Yes, the feuds went on too long, but both men had a lot to do with making Cena into a credible champion. It was kind of the formula they used to use with Hogan back in the 80s. Bad guy faces Hogan, gets 3 shots at Hogan, Hogan eventually prevails in the blow-off match. I have to say, it worked. Again, good jobs by both Jericho and Angle.
HHH started the year as world champ, but his role this year was to create a new star. HHH lost a lot of main event matches to Batista, thus really cementing Batista as a main event player and as a big-time champ. Nice jobs HHH, they were really good for business in the long-run. (Note to Jeff Jarrett this is how you and Monty Brown should have been this year.)
And once Batista went to Smackdown, JBL did good jobs too. And supposedly Batista is really injured, but he’s fighting through it. Which is good for the WWE, because they have invested a lot in Batista, if you look at who
Batista beat in 2005.
The problem now though, is where do you with Batista and Cena? Who are the challengers. HHH for Cena? Does anyone want HHH back in the title picture again?
Summing It All Up
Was it a banner year for the WWE? Basically, no. The main event stuff kept us all hooked, but there was a lot that didn’t go right elsewhere on the card. The action in Pure American Wrestling (PAW) the eFed on Inside Pulse, so go check it out is a heck of a lot better than what “WWE
Creative” is doing.
Sportz entertainment is what it is. As long as the McMahon family is in charge, we all know what we’re going to get. It’s still better than most other things on TV though, so I think we’ll all keep watching.
Next week, entwined in this column of happiness, ABarker gets his turn.
