WRESTLEMANIA 33 POST SHOW THREAD

[Playa Shunna Ver 3.0]

I want to point out how awesome The Kingslayer's Jamie Lannister tights were.  

[Jiji]

3 minutes ago, CreativeControl said:

It's like I'm back in 2006, and everyone's whinging about turning Cena heel because the crowd boos him and he's rammed down our throats, oblivious to the fact they will never turn him heel because he's the face of the company. Seriously, the sooner you accept Reigns and shit like this and move on the better everything will be for you. Or, y'know...

I already said they're not turning him. I'm not losing sleep on wwe booking. After the Bryan fiasco, I pretty much gave up on caring and try to enjoy the little things. The only guy I'm still a little invested in is Wyatt and that probably has something to do with latent masochistic tendencies or whatever. 

[Kyuubi]

8 hours ago, J.T. said:

In wrasslin' physics, it has always baffled me why no one has ever tried to leapfrog over the spear so that Goldberg crashes shoulder first into the turnbuckle.

I always wanted someone to do an aircatch kip up when someone does a spear. Looks cool and makes Roman/Goldberg/Edge/Nikki Bella/Kaitlyn/ Moose/Christian look like a dumbass.

 

[RIPPA]

14 minutes ago, Gonzo said:

Kane has double-digit losses, too. He's 8-10.

Yup - I don't know why I skipped that.

I also wonder what Big Show match the list I looked at is missing

[Jiji]

Didn't DDP or somebody in WCW do the leap frog to avoid the spear? I could've sworn I've seen it before. 

[Just Dave]

17 minutes ago, Oyaji said:

Look, Roman is fine and all but from a connection with the fans, they've invested 3 years on the guy with nearly all of the big marquee moments for younger guys going to him, and he's still not way out in front of the pack in terms of merchandise and getting mercilessly booed across the country and world with no heel turn in sight. You can quote merch numbers but do you really believe that if they had given the opportunities, time and effort to somebody who didn't come off as completely manufactured and has the personality of a wet dish cloth that you'd be seeing more separation in those merch numbers? He is good in the ring but not good enough to deserve the spot he has. He is a brutal babyface promo, though clearly shows potential as a heel on the mic. I am of the opinion that they would've already turned him if they were going to, so his being a better heel promo doesn't really matter. Maybe one day they realize he's more Randy Orton or Lex Luger than John Cena and decide to cut their losses. Maybe not. But without a heel turn I just don't see him becoming a real success.

The sad thing is that Roman offscreen is witty, gregarious, funny, and disarming. Really fun to be around. If they'd let him go be that guy, I think people would warm to him. But Vince's idea of what makes a babyface is so far off-base its staggering.

[Overly Critical Man]

From what I can gather, a lot of these people that are butt hurt they won't turn Roman heel are mad because it prevents them from cheering for him. 

No wonder they call these guys smart marks. 

[pipGofern]

I was at Mania yesterday and thought overall it was a great experience!

My only previous Mania was 28 in Miami and I gotta say the pop for the Hardys was at least equal to the one Rock got when he pinned Cena. Place went absolutely insane. Even little kids. At 28 the "Yes!" chant was the "cool" chant and last night it was definitely "Delete!" - it'd come and go all night.

Our parking pass said lot opens at 5:30 so we were surprised when we saw online on the way in that the show started at 5. I wanted to see the CW match but I'm sorta glad we didn't get there until a bit after 6 because even then sitting there for 6+ hours was just too much.

You can't really go by crowd reaction for the last few matches because people were drunk, tired, and just burnt out by then. Plus that bug shit in the Bray match utterly confused everybody. Every time it happened people either laughed or just sat in silent confusion.

Oh I was one of the legendary posters who asked "Who's Pitbull?" first time he appeared on Raw but I have to say he was a big hit live...people were dancing in the aisles and the crowd seemed to really enjoy his performance. 

Overall I thought it was a good, definitely not great show in terms of matches but I'm glad I can say I saw the Hardys return and Taker's swan song. 

[JohnnyJ]

They will discard Roman when he starts effecting the bottom line. Until a generational talent emerges, it does not seem to really matter who they have on top. The companies finances are stable and everything kind of remains the same.

[Sublime]

I'm not mad they won't turn Roman heel I'm mad they won't stop the push either way. Dude is at NXT Bo Dallas pre-Bo-lieving levels of don't care for me now. I was ready to get behind him two years ago against Lesnar but everything that has happened since then......ugh. I don't want Roman to turn heel I want him to go away for a while, the only turn that helps my enjoyment of him these days is off.

[Overly Critical Man]

It's okay, I feel the same about Samoa Joe and Kevin Owens. Or maybe I'm just secretly into fat shaming. 

[Zac_Fu]

9 hours ago, Casey said:

 

I saw it too. After he took that hat off and did the eyeroll, the magic of the Undertaker was gone, and the character fled in that fleeting moment. A world weary, exhausted, and  Undertaker entered the the ring. A broken, battered, and exhausted Mark Calloway left it. And shit on the match as you will, I wept post matcheck. Just as much as seeing what one man did to himself over the years for our entertainment, a paycheck, and his own ego/love of the game, as I did for watching one of the last vestiges of better times disappear into the floor in a cloud of stage fog.

[The Man Known as Dan]

56 minutes ago, CreativeControl said:

It's like I'm back in 2006, and everyone's whinging about turning Cena heel because the crowd boos him and he's rammed down our throats, oblivious to the fact they will never turn him heel because he's the face of the company. Seriously, the sooner you accept Reigns and shit like this and move on the better everything will be for you. Or, y'know...

As an alternative to accepting is outright rejecting, and tuning out of WWE for a while.

[Greggulator]

Roman/Taker wasn't a good match by any means but it still got an incredible reaction from an emotional standpoint.

Taker took what was on paper the dumbest character ever created and made it into something historic. He is a masterful storyteller -- the eyes and the sit-ups and his timing are so great. He got to tell one final story.

In-ring action was slow but the overall story was amazing. People cried. What more could you want?

[odessasteps]

Sounds like plauing mass effect and watching the uudd mania stuff was a better use of my time than twitter-watching mania.

Best thing i saw last night was the snickers commecial with bayley.

[Greggulator]

Also, WM's audience is a lot different than a regular audience. The show is build so differently.

They really did need to cut something out. It was too long.

But I applaud them for giving something different with every match.

1) Cruiserweight start.

2) Battle Royale used to try and get some mainstream publicity via Gronk. (And as lame as that sounds, the point of WM is to expose people to the product.)

3) Good Shane/AJ match to start. Lapsed fans who know who Shane is get to meet AJ.

4) Great car wreck ladder match with The Harry's being both a nostalgia and smart-mark favorite.

5) Jericho/KO fight that was the best story of the WM fiscal cycle and also serves to into KO to an unfamiliar audience.

6) Woman's match that featured Charlotte doing insane spots. I would prefer to see a Bayley/Sasha end segment but Charlotte -- Ric Flair's daughter -- needs to get rub to impress new viewers.

7) Bray/Orton was an experiment. Kudos for trying something that can use the WWE's production in a match but it didn't work. But they tried something really different.

8) Cena/Nikki for the Total Divas fans.

9) Fun woman's sprint to get a hometown victory pop from someone with an awesome entrance.

10) Attempt to have a HHH/Rollins epic that went on too long in front of a tired audience. This would have been a good match if they trimmed like 30% off and built to the Steph spot earlier. But it was just soooo long.

11) Brock/Goldberg brawl. Just bombs.

12) Taker saying goodbye.

They really did mix it up. Still too long but there were only like two matches that really dragged for me, and one of them (Bray) they at least tried something creative that didn't work.

[Wyld Samurai]

9 minutes ago, Greggulator said:

Also, WM's audience is a lot different than a regular audience. The show is build so differently.

Last nights crowd clearly throws this argument out the window. They were hot for Austin Aries. Cheered the ever loving he'll out of Miz over Cena, and had the entire audience if 70-75k going "DELETE! DELETE!" when The Hardyz showed up. 

[Craig H]

From an entertainment standpoint, this show delivered far more than last year's show. Last year's show was just awful from start to finish. This year, it wasn't so much the in ring action that made for good viewing, but seeing storylines play out and good moments happen that allowed me to enjoy the show, even if the SDL title match was horrible and Undertaker/Reigns was whatever it was.

Like, was HHH vs Rollins a classic? No. Spotty selling from Seth, HHH kept working the wrong knee at points, but honestly, who cares. WM has become more about delivering a huge and entertaining stage show than anything else in recent years. So seeing them finally figure out a way to put Steph through a table was great and seeing Seth defeat HHH was almost as good.

Then you have other feel good moments like Naomi winning the title back and Bayley winning in a match that probably was rushed just a little bit. Goldberg vs Brock was one of the most fun 2 to 3 minute matches I've ever seen with each guy hitting the other with their strongest shit until Goldberg wilted. KO delivered on his promise and destroyed Jericho even if the match wasn't all that stellar. Then you have the Raw tag titles match with the Hardy Boys returning in an incredible moment. Miz got to have his moment with everyone going nuts for him and I was all smiles when the proposal actually happened.

Look, everyone is entitled to bitch and moan or praise this show however they want. For me, it's abundantly clear that WrestleMania isn't about putting on a show on par with Wrestle Kingdom. Could it do that? Sure! And maybe it should, but at this stage it's more about the awe and splendor of what WrestleMania is. It's the biggest wrestling entertainment show of the year, not the biggest wrestling show of the year. Looking at it with that mindset helped me enjoy it more than most on here it seems. If I want the biggest wrestling show of the year with tons of amazing matches, then I know where to look. I just know that looking to WrestleMania for that is a mistake.

[ingrsco]

RE: Orton's win....

My wife(who is a casual fan at best) and I were talking about Meltzer saying that if Cena cuts back his time or were to leave tomorrow they have no one to be the "face" of the company as they still are adjusting the crowd to accepting Roman. When the eventual Bray loss at Mania happened she says " they probably trust Orton to be the guy between Cena and Reigns." which I think explains it. However, I still don't see the need to take the belt off AJ. And if for some reason AJ gets the belt back from Orton than we are exactly where we started in January. 

[Nice Guy Eddie]

1 hour ago, Oyaji said:

And the plan for the eventual Brock/Roman match is... 

  Hide contents

For them to headline next year in New Orleans. Another year of this shit.

 

Dear God, please have mercy on our souls.

[Greggulator]

6 minutes ago, Wyld Samurai said:

Last nights crowd clearly throws this argument out the window. They were hot for Austin Aries. Cheered the ever loving he'll out of Miz over Cena, and had the entire audience if 70-75k going "DELETE! DELETE!" when The Hardyz showed up. 

75% of the on-camera crowd, who are people willing to spend a few hundred bucks to see WrestleMania. 

[joseph2112]

1 hour ago, Overly Critical Man said:

From what I can gather, a lot of these people that are butt hurt they won't turn Roman heel are mad because it prevents them from cheering for him. 

 

And I think, unless someone can show me a specific, long term example, that this is not true. In fact, I'm pretty sure that nobody has gotten more Internet cred over the past year then Miz, and I don't particularly remember him getting many face pops recently. The WWE wants your 10 bucks and they will safely and comfortably make their money. They are not (and don't particularly have to) try to start the next wrestling boom. Romans the man and that's that, who cares if people boo.

[Nice Guy Eddie]

2 hours ago, JohnnyJ said:

Mojo won the battle royale so espn can plug that gronk was on the show.

Cena proposed so that I can come home to my wife telling she learned all about the engagement from mentions on E! News. 

I hate how desperate WWE is for that mainstream acceptance. 

It's professional wrestling. It will never be 100% accepted. To outsiders, we're all backwoods hillbillies that believe rasslin' is real. 

WWE is that guy who has a girlfriend anyone else would be happy with. She loves him despite all his faults and puts up with all his shit because she knows he's a good guy deep down. However, WWE keeps going after girls that are way out his league despite them never showing any interest and just look at him like he's some pathetic sap.

[Charlie M.]

1 hour ago, Oyaji said:

Didn't DDP or somebody in WCW do the leap frog to avoid the spear? I could've sworn I've seen it before. 

Yeah, DDP did it. Orton and RVD (and probably some others) leapfrogged Edge's spear.

[jaedmc]

I fucking love Roman Reigns. He's not Cena or Cena 2.0. He's the new Batista. And I fucking loved Batista when he was leading the Blue brand back in the day. And with people wanting him to turn heel I can see it'll be just like Batista, where no one will appreciate him until he walks to the ring like this: 

Because as soon as that happens, and he starts dressing in tight jeans, and talking about fat girls at ringside, people will be like "Oh man Roman Reigns, he's really put it together, what a great wrestler he's become." 

And I'll sit back and shake my head in disgust, because you never loved him like I did. You don't deserve this.