What modern wrestling needs is...

[Tromatagon]

You people need to watch when NWA had judges on the network. It sucked. Frankenhooker was a judge though.

 

I own Frankenhooker on DVD. I bought it because of the box quote from Bill Murray.

 

Anyways...

 

What modern wrestling needs is...an enema.

Way to steal my joke from the first page you fucking hack

[greenbat]

How about this.

 

So the backstage skits are here to stay. They look hokey and scripted and no one really likes them but they aren't going anywhere, so how about we just change how we get there.

 

Right now we have a system where there's a set and everyone gets into place. What if, as a concept for the promotion (I doubt WWE could pull this off after training us to just get used to the "set") the owner or GM or whatever introduces us and says something along the lines of:

 

"This country was founded on freedom of speech, and more importantly, freedom of the press. I introduce you to Jimmy Whatever and Carla Somebody, a cameraman and reporter who will be on site at all times to capture whats really going on."

 

So imagine if last week after Dean Ambrose destroyed the case, we get an impromptu, JIP shot of HHH calming down Seth, explaining that the contract can be reprinted, then the reporter confronts HHH, he goes into politician mode, telling Ambrose to watch his back, etc.

 

Eh? Kind of like sideline reporters. So if there's a tag match and a partner gets injured halfway through, instead of a guy rolling around we get an actual reporter asking the refs and trainers whats going on, or when Ambrose had to leave the MITB match she was giving updates from the back before Ambrose throws the cameraman down and runs out.

 

Maybe it'd get old but just a thought.

[Tromatagon]

Can they be third string celebs like Mario Lopez? Not him though because he beat the shit out of Val Venis that one time on Sunday Night Heat and I'll never forgive him

[Parties]

On the “sideline reporter” tip: a few years ago, Orton won some match on RAW, and they had one of the backstage interviewers (Striker?) come down to the ring and immediately interview Orton, who cut a really good, unique promo while catching his breath after the match. Same deal with that Main Event match Kofi won against Cesaro where he cut the promo immediately afterwards, talking about how his son had just been born a few days/weeks earlier, and that this was the start of big things for him. Every time they do it, it's great. Partially because of the novelty, so who knows if it would get old. But judging from MMA and Crockett TV, seems like a lot of guys understandably cut great post-match promos when their adrenaline is high.

 

Having squashes is a good thing, but from a kayfabe perspective it wouldn't make sense for a company to keep bringing back a constant loser week after week. If a minor leaguer was called up to the Yankees and ended up with a .160 batting average, they wouldn't keep him around just because he makes everyone else look good in comparison. It's a delicate balance in that your jobbers should either be a rotating cast of indie guys, or a Kobashi story where someone is super talented and massively over, but it takes them several months to get their first win, leading to a nuclear reaction when they start beating opponents. Ideally some of each. Amusing to imagine message boards of the 1980s filled with screeds against bookers who fail to recognize the main event potential of Rocky King and Pez Whatley.

 

While I agree that pro wres judges have worked exactly once (Wrestlewar '89), I was just this morning thinking about how great time limit draws and the notion of “TV time remaining” would be in modern WWE. Not only is it fun, but it seems like an obvious aid to their booking, where you'd have good reason to rematch all these pairings they run into the ground, and less predictable TV than having every show coincidentally end by 11:05, with just enough time for other spontaneous segments. And you can liven up the midcard with short “Beat the Champ” time limit title defenses. Plus it's a justifiable reason to get the Network: “We're completely out of time, but you can see the conclusion of this main event/closing segment melee live right now on the Network!” Or the next night on Main Event. Granted, USA might initially hate them doing this, but I think you'd raise ratings and turn up the heat by adding the notion that this stuff doesn't stop and start in perfectly clocked, scripted increments.

 

Re: the idea that it's “no longer a wrestling show, but a show about running a wrestling promotion”, the same could be said for Memphis and other territories in their prime, where promoters, announcers, and governing bodies played regular roles, and the matchmaking/booking was heavily incorporated into storylines. The difference is that they did it very well, played it completely straight, and usually knew when enough was enough of Eddie Marlin, Jerry Jarrett, Verne, Watts, Fritz, etc. Rarely did the promoter book themselves as smarter/tougher than any of the talent, which is obviously the case in WWE and TNA. I think it was even acknowledged that Baba and Inoki were bookers/owners during their primes, or at least such common knowledge that they were viewed by fans the way one views player-coaches.

[J.H.]

What wrestling needs is actual managers again with genuine stables.

Wrestling needs mid-card blood feuds where it is one man against that stable, going through heart ache and betrayal time and again until he finally gets that one pivotal win that has substance.

What wrestling needs is a modern take on Jimmy Valiant v. The Paul Jones Army!

 

James

[notoriusvig]

I think what the WWE needs is a good dosage of realism.  There should be a reason why everything is happening.  There should be a reason guys come out and wrestle.  What is it today?  When I was young, two guys were competing for a shot to become the champion.  They were fighting because it was supposed to be a sporting event between two athletes.  Now, why are they fighting?  Right now, it's just a bunch of guys, in leotards, pretending to be mad at each other, with no real veil of realism at all.  Sure, it's always been guys pretending to have tension but at least the WWE gave everyone the impression that there were real fights/athletic competitions going on.  Do kids these days wonder why these guys do this or do they still believe it's a competition?  I just want that veil back.

[thee Reverend Axl Future]

 

And stop with the idea that the way to get over is to play chant games with the crowd.  Ignore the fucking crowd and focus on how much you want to hurt that one guy.

 

Hello, Kevin Steen, I am looking at you. He's more indy than indy with that shite. 

 

 

Why would they wanna do that? Hulk Hogan, Dusty Rhodes, and the Rock got over way more because of their promos and their charisma and their rapport with the crowd than they ever did because of anything they did from bell to bell. Mick Foley constantly reminds us that he got bigger pops and made more money by whipping out Mr. Socko than he ever did from any of his hardcore masochism.

What modern wrestling truly needs is an all-powerful wizard to wave their magic fucking wand and teleport us all into an alternate universe where rasslin' is not rather obviously a dying artform. Let's face it, unless there's some massive unforeseeable shift in the way history is going, pro wrestling as we know it won't even exist a hundred years from now.

 

 

I cannot disagree with your argument more: for one thing, there is a huge difference between antics during a worker's entrance, promos and highspots, and beating up the audience trying to get a reaction (instead of emotion) from them instead of telling a story in the ring.

 

Wrestling is always evolving and adapting. I could foresee the collapse of the WWE, and then minor territories re-emerging. Whether they can survive for another century is a different debate but I think it's possible.

 

-RAF

[El_Brillante]

A show to start with two guys in the ring wrestling. 

[Cole Miner]

De-emphasize fans. The obvious plants in the audience for reaction shots. Workers begging for chants. All the signs. It is like watching a play where the actors sporadically stop and talk to the audience and try and include them in the show; actually there was a play that did that it was called Strange Interlude. Marx Brothers parodied it Animal Crackers. The Sin Cara lighting was bad but it did have one benefit. The crowd was no longer lit. Mic the audience and turn down the sound when appropriate. Like when they start chanting for wrestlers that retired. Put on a show for the audience not with the audience. Makes it a lot better to watch at home. It sounds ridiculous at first when someone says a show sucked because the fans sucked. It makes sense though since it is a reflection of how much they made the crowd a part of the show. That is a flaw in the presentation. It doesn't make going to a show more appealing. Who wants to go to a show and having to worry about fighting with some fool that keeps blocking your kid's view by raising a sign over and over?