Payback '14

[Victator]

Not every week, it would wear off very fast. 

Bryan had a long term connection to part of the audience. 

[Joe Fixit]

Ryback could have won the WHC from Big Show, instead of Del Rio.

[ebbie]

When you look at how damaged most of the roster is now thanks to being jobbed out, wins and losses do matter.

Don't forget the seemingly never ending months of Mr. and Mrs. HHH telling everyone on the roster how worthless they are.. ON TV. Man, I can't think of a single collection of moments that hurt an entire roster more. It's one thing with the face tells everyone he is wasting his time (*cough* Punk), but for the people who are in charge on air to tell everyone watching they think their talent is shit...

It's still real to this guy!

It's not about real or fake. It's about conditioning your audience to react how you want them to. You know, basic pro wrestling stuff. If you tell someone watching what they are watching is shit enough times, eventually they start to agree with ya. Esp when you have characters that get enough of a reaction to have influence on the audience.

But it's only terrible when commentators shit on things. I guess.

[Fat Spanish Waiter]

Not every week, it would wear off very fast.

Bryan had a long term connection to part of the audience.

Second dude off from NXT. Lost a ton of key matches at key times to others. Bryan is the shining example of a guy who doesn't need to win and doesn't suffer when he loses.

[Niners Fan in CT]

It should have been Brock/Rock but because Cena needed the win back from Rock they had to roll with that instead. It screwed over Ryback who would have gone over Punk most likely if it wasn't for Punk having to drop the strap to Rock who in turn had to drop it to Cena.

 

John Cena.

[Spontaneous]

Wrestlemania 29 was just poorly planned. Everything leading up to it feels like that made it up as they went along, which they probably did. In a better written world we probably would have seen Ryback defeat Punk for the title, Cena beat Rock, perhaps Y2J vs Taker and something purposeful done with the US, IC and tag titles. Ryback's worst loss in my opinion were his repeated defeats at the hands of The Shield, another group that benefitted from winning and nothing els their first seven months.

"A millionaire that should be a billionaire"

[Brian Fowler]

Weren't all the reports that Rock specifically asked to work with Punk?

[Bourdain]

This is awesome. You can't put the toothpaste back in the tube but you can put it in a different bottle, which is exactly how this whole authority angle has been played. We know wrestling is fake, the wrestlers know we know it's fake, so they play to what we believe is real, the backstage bullshit that we see absolutely zero of.

 

And so we think that OUR voice managed to get Punk his 400 day title run or OUR voice managed to get Bryan a title win at Wrestlemania. What better way for the Authority to gain heat than to wink along, "yes we know that you all know this is fake so this is what we REALLY think of our roster, Bryan is a B+ player but the Yes Movement made us break promises and change plans last minute"......

[Big Fresh]

Weren't all the reports that Rock specifically asked to work with Punk?

I've never heard this, but I hope it's true.

[Cristobal]

Punk beating Ryback led to A) elevation of The Shield, B) Rock's best matches, with Punk, and C) Punk/Cena from that Raw, which was a better match than Ryback will probably ever have in his life.

[Greggulator]

This is awesome. You can't put the toothpaste back in the tube but you can put it in a different bottle, which is exactly how this whole authority angle has been played. We know wrestling is fake, the wrestlers know we know it's fake, so they play to what we believe is real, the backstage bullshit that we see absolutely zero of.

 

And so we think that OUR voice managed to get Punk his 400 day title run or OUR voice managed to get Bryan a title win at Wrestlemania. What better way for the Authority to gain heat than to wink along, "yes we know that you all know this is fake so this is what we REALLY think of our roster, Bryan is a B+ player but the Yes Movement made us break promises and change plans last minute"......

 

It's an absolutely ingenious branding and marketing and a way to build audience loyalty.

[bink_winkleman]

I'm still convinced that "our voice" put the belt on Bryan, for the most part. Especially after the Jericho interview. If you listen to it, you can tell Bryan's sincere - he's a horrible actor, after all. And Vince was shitting on him in board meetings, for fuck's sake. It was all very organic and not part of a clear plan. Everything doesn't have to be work/shoot, there's so much gray with how so much stuff goes down.