Jesus Christ, there was too much wrestling this week.
13 hours of first run content – and that’s just WWE. On top of that, there’s a god damned 3-hour pay-per-view right after all of it, and then the cycle starts all over again. Trying to follow WWE television takes more commitment than religion.
It was a really interesting week though, as the WWE had a draft. A wrestling draft. Because it’s a sport.
The two main WWE shows/”brands” – RAW and SmackDown – have split apart and will have separate rosters for the first time in five years. It was a much needed change, with WWE having a really talented roster handicapped by WWE’s inability to find room for 90% of them to do anything interesting. Splitting everybody up will, in theory, help that.
I think it’s a really positive change too. Not only does the splitting of the rosters make things temporarily more interesting, and give them the opportunity to call up more guys from the bench in NXT – or call back guys from the bench of Japan, indys, etc. For me, it’s all about the World Title.
I am assuming they will split up the WWE and World Titles again, and have RAW with one top title and SmackDown with one top title. This is a necessary switch. Deciding to have one WWE World Champion for the entire WWE roster a a few years ago made sense, and was even fun. One unified World Champ makes wrestling feel legitimate – it harkens back to the days when a guy like Bruno Sammartino or Hulk Hogan was THE champion in wrestling, and gives whoever holds the title credibility as THE guy in pro wrestling. If you are the champion, you’re a part of an elite crew.
The champs since the World Title was unified – Cena, Orton, Bryan, Brock, Rollins, Reigns, Ambrose, oh and Sheamus – are all guys that current WWE and Mr. McMahon himself saw as THE star in the industry – or, in Sheamus’ case, a temporary way to make the guy he wanted as THE star in the industry an actual star.
But there are too many talented guys in wrestling these days, too many guys capable of main event-caliber wrestling that just aren’t going to have a good run at that title with that current setup. Besides that, when there were two titles, winning one of those titles typically made you a star, but winning both made you a made man. Cena, Bryan, Punk – they all went through it. The title being split went a long way in cementing Ambrose, Rollins, and Reigns as main event guys – but it makes so much sense now for there to be another split. These talented, main-event capable guys will be in top programs for top titles. It’d be nice to go back to a rosy world of 1985 where the U.S. Title meant something, or mid-90s when the Intercontinental Title meant you were going to be a World Champion soon – but it’s not that time, and even so, WWE wasn’t shitting out quality wrasslers at the rate they are now. Plus, anything that gives rigid WWE a little flexibility is probably a good thing.
The power of positivity compels me. I will report back in six months.
Besides the draft, this was also a week where Dean Ambrose vs. Seth Rollins – maybe WWE’s closest thing to a Rock/Austin or Cena/Orton type thing in this era – for the WWE Title happened two nights in a row. Both of these matches were totally questionable in actually happening but I thought both were really, really good. The first match on RAW was like a great touring house show match, as these two guys have just unreal chemistry. There were so many great exchanges here, highlighted by the fluid catapult by Rollins into the springboard knee, as well as Rollins’ Kawada kicks responded with the Tenryu punch/chop combo from Ambrose. These are basically wrestling marks wrestling WWE main event style and it’s pretty tremendous. The pace was fast, the crowd was digging it, and they both generally looked like the guys who should be in the main event, at least in this era.
I liked that the second match on SmackDown was completely different too. It was basically all Rollins, with Ambrose fighting from behind and doing a great job selling exhaustion – though with the current schedule of a WWE Champion, you can imagine it was actual exhaustion. Rollins is back just rocking it weekly too.
Beyond the title match, RAW had a couple cool things: the Rollins empty arena promo and Ambrose handheld camera promo were neat, the 12-man tag (Cena/Enzo & Cass/New Day vs. The Club/The Wyatts) was fun stuff, and the GM introductions were at least sort of compelling, highlighted by an all-time great pop for Daniel Bryan. I was also kind of fascinated by how weirdly average the Owens/Jericho vs. Cesaro/Zayn match was, including the weird Cesaro Swing flub. I’d like to blame it on Jericho, who’s had a terrible in-ring year yet one of his best promo years, but all four of these guys really seem to be just coasting lately. Everything else on this show was just time-filler bullshit.
I really liked SmackDown. Obviously the Draft itself was newsworthy, but I actually really liked the wrestling too. Nothing was blowaway great, but it was all story-driven and served a purpose: Luke Gallows basically squashed John Cena before taking the fall, Bray Wyatt basically destroyed Xavier Woods before Woods got a quick flurry then got frightened into the finish, Darren Young got his big win over the Miz with the Crossface chickenwing to a HUGE pop. Everything was simple, fun, and felt like it mattered. That’s something I hope the brand split offers more of, though hope as a WWE fan can be a very silly thing. There WAS Kane laying out Owens and Zayn, which I really felt was their way of saying, “Don’t get too excited about this.” There’s really no use in discussing the picks themselves yet – lots of possible directions but every time I think about it I just go into a fantasy booking rabbit hole and you don’t need that. Would’ve preferred the old style of guys reacting to the picks in the back and/or Shane/Bryan and Steph/Mick making picks from a War Room. The NXT call-ups were cool though.
I watched the Network Draft coverage shows, mostly FF’ing the Simulcast that wasn’t promos. This really was a fascinating deal. I liked that they really built the Draft up as a big deal, and you got promos from most guys who got drafted, but the most incredible thing of this entire week of WWE and maybe the entire year was watching Renee Young and friends losing all cognitive abilities covering this thing for four straight hours. You’ve got Renee, Booker T, Corey Graves and Lita out there for just an insane amount of time given the task of bantering about World Wrestling Entertainment, and blatantly stalling for time during the actual show as they waited for draft picks. Just next level mental breakdown shit.
There were a few good promos, highlighted by the bizzare Sin Cara promo flub. That one got all the love, but Charlotte trying to ad lib with Booker T was almost as awkward. Finn, Alpha and Nia Jax’ Performance Center interviews, Chris Jericho being interviewed on the panel,Owens interacting with Enzo & Cass and Enzo popping Booker, Cesaro’s hissy fit, Backlund’s rant, and last few seconds of the show with Heath Slater were all worth watching.
NXT and the Cruiserweight Classic were both good – the Draft brought the news, but these shows brought the quality professional wrestling. Rhyno vs. Samoa Joe I thought was legit good, just a great hoss battle. Both guys looked a little tired and slow but basically worked the match around them being a little tired and slow. The Authors of Pain vs. American Alpha was a fun match – Author’s aren’t all there yet but have a great presence, and all the Alpha suplexes and Jordan’s crazy dive were awesome. Bayley vs. Nia Jax was good too – probably the weakest match of the series, but it’s been a great freaking series. Nia is still kind of limited but the entire Bayley brand works perfectly for her.
Cruiserweight Classic was another fun one. Round 1 has a lot of solid matches, nothing standout great yet but it’s so cool to see all these random guys from all over the world. I don’t know if I want to see another Da Mack match, but I’m glad I saw one. Lince Dorado vs. Mustafa Ali was my favorite match of the tournament so far, a perfect showcase by two talented guys. Lince did some amazing, amazing flying that was some of the coolest, crispest stuff on WWE television in a while. Ali meanwhile was not only a tremendous base but brought out a couple sweet-ass high-risk maneuvers himself. TJ Perkins looked great in his match, as smooth as advertised. He’s really always been good, back to Puma. Tozawa/Kenneth Johnson I liked too – Tozawa is a guy who if there’s any interest should’ve been signed yesterday. Mauro and Bryan hyping the shit out of him on commentary was great fun, and match had an awesome finish. I adore the intros of the CWC too – “Here we go with some more high-flying cruiserweight action!” Such corny but awesome stuff.
The C-shows were super average this week, just killing time before the Draft. For Main Event – Ziggler/Titus/Usos vs. Sheamus/Rio/Shining Stars was a moderately fun WWE multi-man tag, while Kalisto/Viktor was okay for the like 2 minutes it lasted. Apollo Crews & Golden Truth vs. Baron Corbin & The Dudleys wasn’t much, though it did have Corbin acting like he didn’t want anything to do with the Dudleys. And I can’t remember a thing about Henry/Swagger vs. Breezango.
Superstars has Alicia Fox vs. Summer Rae and The Usos vs. The Dudleyz, both fine matches in their own right that felt totally empty.
WWE TV Match of the Week: Both Seth Rollins vs. Dean Ambrose for the WWE Title matches from RAW and SmackDown were just top shelf stuff.
WWE TV MVP of the Week: LINCE DORADO. A lot of guys had fine weeks, but Lince Dorado is the guy I want to see again.
