Wrestling with Eventuality
It's fake. I know it, you know it, or at least I hope you know it.
Professional wrestling is more about performance than it is about athleticism. It's no secret, especially since Vince McMahon told the world about its scripted nature in order to avoid paying taxes in states where athletic events could be taxed.
With the events of the last two weeks, wrestling has had a spotlight cast upon it that it probably didn't want or need. The murder-suicide involving Chris Benoit has overshadowed any storyline or feud in any wrestling federation. The current investigations into steriod use (which I believe has absolutely nothing to do with the murder-suicide) has painted a large target on professional wrestling as a whole. Professional wrestling has survived its share of deaths. It has survived corporate takeovers, network changes, and previous steriod investigations.
But will it survive the current attacks on it?
Here's the problem: The WWE is stagnant right now. They are trying to run three brands when they are currently incapable of running one show properly. They have very few "major" stars, with no one on the roster even approaching the popularity of a Stone Cold Steve Austin or The Rock. HHH is on the shelf and couldn't (and shouldn't) be compared to those two. Bobby Lashley is boring. Umaga is boring. CM Punk, who was supposed to be a "wrestling god", looks like he's going in slow motion. Don't believe me? Watch an AJ Styles match, or a Samoa Joe match, and compare them to what CM Punk does. He's going at half speed!
And John Cena is an unbelievable champion, and not in a good way. He seems to be bullet, fire, and missile proof. And Great Khali proof. Nothing seems to be going right in WWE land.
TNA seems to be having an altogether different problem. They have a great amount of talent, but they are not making the money they need to grow and survive. TNA is capable of putting together great shows and turning people into stars. One only needs to look at the growth in popularity of Eric Young and Chris Harris in recent months. A major problem with TNA is their reliance on ex-WWE stars. I can't fault them for using and pushing Kurt Angle and Christian Cage; both men are high profile workers who can come into a ring and work with anyone and make it look good. But look at how many workers are in TNA who were released from WWE who have no reason to be in TNA: VKM, Team 3D, Christy Hemme, Gail Kim, Jackie Moore, Jackie Gayda, Basham and Damaja. Why not promote the guys who have been there longer and who have actually done good work in the ring?
ROH...with all the hype I've been hearing for five years, I expected a lot from their first PPV. I wasn't expecting Commodore 64 graphics, K-Mart lighting, and video quality that looks like it came from an old VHS camcorder. The wrestling wasn't bad, but it wasn't really good, either. Every match reminded me of a RvD match: tons of highspots, but nothing that would really make me think they're great wrestlers. It probably didn't help ROH when TNA refused to lend them talent for the show (why should they help their competition?) and the talent they did have consisted of one guy I've heard of (American Dragon Bryan Danielson) and a bunch of nobodies.
The other problem is this: MMA, more specifically, the Ultimate Fighting Championships. Ultimate fighting has become exponentially popular in the last five years and has attracted fans who became bored with boxing (where are all the boxers?) and who became tired of the soap-opera antics in wrestling. When watching a wrestling match, it is always in the back of my mind that the two guys in the ring know who is going to win and how it is going to happen. This is not the case with fighting. Anyone who watched the recent Shamrock-Baroni or Ortiz-Evans fights will know that they not only got the match they paid for, but the two guys beat the living snot out of one another with no script, no predetermined plans, and no interference from outside influences. Yes, there are boring MMA fights where the fighters look like they're auditioning for So You Think You Can Dance (albeit without the insane screaming woman) or they're crawling all over each other looking like some abstract gay porn, but those fights not the majority. MMA is here to stay, and it offers a great alternative to watching "fake" fighting.
And yes, there have been boring wrestling matches.
As for Chris Benoit, while others have been crucifying him on the internet, and that's their right, I'm not going to. I can't explain his actions, and I sure as hell won't try to defend the man. All I can say is that in all the years I watched him wrestle, I never once saw him wrestle a boring match. He was a consummate professional in the ring and could probably wrestle a bag of potatoes and make it interesting to watch. I don't know of any other wrestler, or any athlete in any sport, who could deliver night after night the kind of performance Benoit did. The actions of his last two days will likely cloud, and probably erase, all of the great things he did.
Professional wrestling is more about performance than it is about athleticism. It's no secret, especially since Vince McMahon told the world about its scripted nature in order to avoid paying taxes in states where athletic events could be taxed.
With the events of the last two weeks, wrestling has had a spotlight cast upon it that it probably didn't want or need. The murder-suicide involving Chris Benoit has overshadowed any storyline or feud in any wrestling federation. The current investigations into steriod use (which I believe has absolutely nothing to do with the murder-suicide) has painted a large target on professional wrestling as a whole. Professional wrestling has survived its share of deaths. It has survived corporate takeovers, network changes, and previous steriod investigations.
But will it survive the current attacks on it?
Here's the problem: The WWE is stagnant right now. They are trying to run three brands when they are currently incapable of running one show properly. They have very few "major" stars, with no one on the roster even approaching the popularity of a Stone Cold Steve Austin or The Rock. HHH is on the shelf and couldn't (and shouldn't) be compared to those two. Bobby Lashley is boring. Umaga is boring. CM Punk, who was supposed to be a "wrestling god", looks like he's going in slow motion. Don't believe me? Watch an AJ Styles match, or a Samoa Joe match, and compare them to what CM Punk does. He's going at half speed!
And John Cena is an unbelievable champion, and not in a good way. He seems to be bullet, fire, and missile proof. And Great Khali proof. Nothing seems to be going right in WWE land.
TNA seems to be having an altogether different problem. They have a great amount of talent, but they are not making the money they need to grow and survive. TNA is capable of putting together great shows and turning people into stars. One only needs to look at the growth in popularity of Eric Young and Chris Harris in recent months. A major problem with TNA is their reliance on ex-WWE stars. I can't fault them for using and pushing Kurt Angle and Christian Cage; both men are high profile workers who can come into a ring and work with anyone and make it look good. But look at how many workers are in TNA who were released from WWE who have no reason to be in TNA: VKM, Team 3D, Christy Hemme, Gail Kim, Jackie Moore, Jackie Gayda, Basham and Damaja. Why not promote the guys who have been there longer and who have actually done good work in the ring?
ROH...with all the hype I've been hearing for five years, I expected a lot from their first PPV. I wasn't expecting Commodore 64 graphics, K-Mart lighting, and video quality that looks like it came from an old VHS camcorder. The wrestling wasn't bad, but it wasn't really good, either. Every match reminded me of a RvD match: tons of highspots, but nothing that would really make me think they're great wrestlers. It probably didn't help ROH when TNA refused to lend them talent for the show (why should they help their competition?) and the talent they did have consisted of one guy I've heard of (American Dragon Bryan Danielson) and a bunch of nobodies.
The other problem is this: MMA, more specifically, the Ultimate Fighting Championships. Ultimate fighting has become exponentially popular in the last five years and has attracted fans who became bored with boxing (where are all the boxers?) and who became tired of the soap-opera antics in wrestling. When watching a wrestling match, it is always in the back of my mind that the two guys in the ring know who is going to win and how it is going to happen. This is not the case with fighting. Anyone who watched the recent Shamrock-Baroni or Ortiz-Evans fights will know that they not only got the match they paid for, but the two guys beat the living snot out of one another with no script, no predetermined plans, and no interference from outside influences. Yes, there are boring MMA fights where the fighters look like they're auditioning for So You Think You Can Dance (albeit without the insane screaming woman) or they're crawling all over each other looking like some abstract gay porn, but those fights not the majority. MMA is here to stay, and it offers a great alternative to watching "fake" fighting.
And yes, there have been boring wrestling matches.
As for Chris Benoit, while others have been crucifying him on the internet, and that's their right, I'm not going to. I can't explain his actions, and I sure as hell won't try to defend the man. All I can say is that in all the years I watched him wrestle, I never once saw him wrestle a boring match. He was a consummate professional in the ring and could probably wrestle a bag of potatoes and make it interesting to watch. I don't know of any other wrestler, or any athlete in any sport, who could deliver night after night the kind of performance Benoit did. The actions of his last two days will likely cloud, and probably erase, all of the great things he did.
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