At the end of every column I have a thought or comment that is unrelated to the rest of the column. It’s usually something that is a smaller concern, and while it’s not worth dedicating an entire week to, it’s something that I still want to get off my chest. As it would be expected, topics for these smaller, unrelated thoughts tend to build up a lot faster than those for full-blown columns. So that I get through them before they start to get out of date, I occasionally dump a whole load of them into a single article. So what follows is a series of unrelated thoughts.
Everybody is glad that The Rock came back last year. I am, and I assume you are. But there was another wrestler who returned to WWE last year that I was probably just as excited about but for some reason, WWE has barely used the newly returned Mick Foley. Now I know that the man has had other engagements (ones he committed to before returning to the WWE) and maybe as those come to an end this concern will turn out to be all for naught. But for now I have concern. I remember last year a certain Kevin Nash returning to the WWE in January as Diesel only to disappear for eight months before finally getting a feud that was plagued by bad storytelling, poor wrestling and ended with a whimper a by the end of the year with a botched pedigree. I don’t want this to happen to Foley; so WWE, I hope you have something great in store for the guy.
Due to my Friday schedule, I usually start watching Smackdown around the sixth or seventh minute into the show. This isn’t a big deal as usually the only thing I miss is a recap of the previous week or possibly the entrance theme of the first wrestler of the night. However this week I happened to tune in early enough to see the entire show including the theme song. And I couldn’t help but notice that when the phrase “Blinded by the Light.” Is sung the graphic on the screen is a pearly white Sheamus grinning stupidly at the camera. He gets the joke.
Speaking of Sheamus, that man cannot seem to keep a good feud going. It seems that for the past several months now he has been floating from one half formed feud to another changing rivals at least once a month. And what’s more none of these feuds seem to be based on anything more substantial that somebody backstage saying “Sheamus need a feud.” Right now he’s in the middle of another “just cause” rivalry with Jinder Mahal but already it’s looking like Wade Barrett is already waiting in the wings because we all know that this feud won’t last. Hopefully with Orton currently out, Sheamus will actually get an opportunity to step up and have a real extended feud develop.
I have to say that my biggest disappointment of the year 2011 was WWE ending the partnership that was The Awesome Truth. I know that R-Truth had to sit some time out for his violation but so did Evan Bourne and look at Air Boom still going strong. Surly you didn’t have to break up your most entertaining duo over this. Why not have someone else take out R-Truth and then Miz could feud with them for a month before R-Truth returns and they can reunite their tag team. The biggest problem with all of this is that it looks like R-Truth is a face again. Yes he’s still crazy R-Truth but crazy R-Truth works so much better as a heel than a face. Every week, the crowd yells “What!” at him with all their might but to no avail. Now Truth simply welcomes it and is friends with Little Jimmy. I long for the days of a heel R-Truth.
Is Daniel Bryan a heel yet? He sure got a solid round of boos from the audience on Smackdown last week. But even though he’s starting to show heel tendencies, he still seems to mostly have the characteristics of a face. He claims he’s a fighting champion, something no heel seems to want to be. He offered a handshake of sportsmanship at the beginning of his match on Smackdown and it was Big Show who took advantage of that. I do think Bryan is on his way to becoming a full-blown heel, but he’s taking the scenic route to get there. I don’t think he’s killed the younglings quite yet. (That was a Star Wars reference)
Has anybody given a much thought to what might happen with the Rock after WrestleMania? I doubt anybody out there is expecting anything close to a full time return for the Rock, but I would like to think that his promises to “never leave us again” as well as his inclusion in the Raw theme song video might mean that he’ll still come back for a few weeks every now and then to have a little mini story. But after a WrestleMania match with John Cena what could possibly be a big enough deal for the Rock to come back? My guess is that after April 1st (or maybe the Monday after that) the next time we see Rock in the ring will be right about the time that he has a new movie to promote.
Because Mark Henry’s “Hall of Pain” character is probably the best thing of his entire career I’m glad to see that WWE looks to be doing there best to keep him relevant during his injury. They keep him around the World Title storyline so we can assume that as soon as he’s able Mark Henry’s going after the title again. But who’s he going against. If Daniel Bryan keeps the belt then he’s going to have to face another giant character as soon as he gets through the big show. I’m not sure that we need to see another “Tiny Daniel Bryan Fights a Giant” feud so soon after this one. But if Big Show wins, that means we get another Big Show vs. Mark Henry feud and I know we don’t need another one of those this soon after the last one.
