Official WWE/ECW/WCW/TNA talk, or whatever v2

[Blaster86]

Originally Posted by trackercowe

Guess that means Roman will finally lose at Mania, and probably take some time off.

He ####ing has too. This is a situation where the predictable booking is important. This is Cody's moment.

[SuperMatt18]

Bron Breakker was very impressive tonight. Man he's explosive.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by trackercowe

Weekly events for AEW are entirely predictable, since nearly every match has at least one job guy who never wins.

Again, I think you're just bitching about wrestling. Complaining that Jeff Hardy is jobbing to Swerve is like complaining that Gable is jobbing to Gunther.

[SuperMatt18]

I think the matches are always predictable but one thing AEW used to be great at was having predictable outcome matches that made both guys look good afterwards.

I think AEW has gotten worse at that though, and WWE has gotten better at it (the Gable-Gunther series being a great example)

For AEW I think part of that is having more and more WWE and NJPW veterans and less emphasis on their younger talent.

[Ozy_Flame]

I don't know about that. The recent Samoa Joe/Hook match made them both look fantastic, and the Continental Classic elevated everyone in that tournament, even Daniel Garcia who, although lost most his matches, has gotten invaluable TV time and is recently main eventing Collision.

They've made bone-headed booking at times, but making people look bad after matches hasn't been one of them. No worse than WWE.

[trackercowe]

Originally Posted by rubecube

Again, I think you're just bitching about wrestling. Complaining that Jeff Hardy is jobbing to Swerve is like complaining that Gable is jobbing to Gunther.

The difference here is Gable.wins many of his matches, while Hardy never does. Hardy only wins occasional tag matches against other job guys. Has Jeff won a single high profile match in his entire AEW tenure? That's what makes him a jobber. Gable won a fatal four way, beat Kaiser, and Vinci, and actually beat Gunther by count out. So I wouldn't consider his matches as predictable.

Edit: obviously much of this comes down to booking feuds. AEW doesn't always do that. They just randomly hot shot matches. For example, here was yesterday's Collision card. Of the seven matches, how many had any booking prior to the show? I believe just the one. Of course we all know who is going to win each match. When so much of the talent it sparotically appears on shows, they don't stand much of a chance. There's Willie Mack against Kingston, whose only appearance on AEW was losing a squash match to Wardlow. Why is getting a title shot? It's just random nonsensical booking. It's undeniable in my view. Other than the catch match it's a bunch of thrown together contests which mostly feature jobbers being fed for no reason.

Also I know the New Japan talent aren't jobbers, but do they ever win singles matches while.in AEW? The only one I can recall was their champion going over Jungle Boy at Forbidden Door months ago. Why bring these guys over only for them to lose? I know they lose since they're not on the AEW roster, I just feel it's an odd choice to have all these "dream matches" have expected outcomes.

Escape The Cage elimination match: FTR & Daniel Garcia vs. House of Black
Bryan Danielson vs. Yuji Nagata
Jon Moxley and Claudio Castagnoli vs. Lee Moriarty and Shane Taylor
AEW Continental Crown Championship Eliminator: Eddie Kingston vs. Willie Mack
Serena Deeb in action
AEW International Championship: Orange Cassidy vs. Komander
Mariah May vs. Lady Frost

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by trackercowe

Has Jeff won a single high profile match in his entire AEW tenure

Jeff beat Darby Allin last year. He's had exactly 6 singles matches in AEW.

I can understand the gripe regarding AEW just cobbling together matches without any rhyme, reason, or build. Hopefully the rankings help with that a bit.

That said, your gripes about the stars being fed jobbers is just bizarre. IMO, If anything, one of AEWs biggest problems since it got off the ground has been giving away PPV matches for free on TV.

If you want your stars to appear on TV, without giving away PPV-worthy matches for free, you basically have 3 options:

1. Book them against lower card guys.
2. Book them against upper card guys and have a bunch of dumb DQ finishes, etc.
3. Book them in multi-man tag matches.

AEW tends to do the first one, whereas WWE often does the latter two. I prefer option one because it at least gives the lower card guys some exposure, and I find the WWE formula very repetitive.

[trackercowe]

The difference is in the booking. Let's compare the midcard belts, held by Gunther and Cassidy.

Gunther has had recent feuds with Miz, Reed, Gable, Drew, Sheamus, Ricochet, Ciampa and a few others. Many of those were heavy underdogs, and Gunther going over was likely. Yet they built to these matches, with wins and actually looked like credible opponents for the belt.

Meanwhile take Cassidy's recent opponents: Komander, Preston Vance, Dante Martin, Rocky Romero, Angelico. They are all booked as job guys who basically did nothing other than lose to get title shots. These guys rarely win matches (in AEW) and just walk into thrown together matches without any storyline behind them. Wins in RoH and outside of AEW shouldn't matter. Your average viewer doesn't follow matches in AAA, Lucha Libre, and NJPW. Then again most of AEW's hardcore fanbase might disagree with me?

This makes everything extremely predictable as well, where the outcomes are obvious. The same generally applies to WWE, but way more often in AEW. One thing AEW needs is more "dusty finish" matches. WWE has too many of them, but AEW has none. Rarely do matches end up with disqualifications, no contest, count outs (do these even exist in AEW).

Things definitely aren't perfect in WWE, as I agree they have a formula, and everything is overly rehearsed and scripted. Yet maybe that's something AEW needs more of? There needs to be a middle ground, which AEW never seems to have.

[rubecube]

We're in agreement on the random booking. I don't want to see more DQs and whatnot though. That just waters everything down.

[Inferno]

https://twitter.com/user/status/1751944600447525214

[rubecube]

Rumours out there that CM Punk suffered a torn triceps again. Might be time to call it quits. His body just doesn't seem to be able to hold up anymore.

[SuperMatt18]

I do wonder if he tries one more rehab, return next year to win the Rumble and main event one night of WM...then retire and be a commentator (which he would actually be great at and WWE could use right now).

[trackercowe]

They should elevate him to commentator now, for the next six months while he heals up. Then give him one more run as a heel, and hope his health holds up. Have Gunther go over Rollins in the meantime.

They can't take Punk off television right upon his return, especially with the recent TKO merger. I'm certain they will find a way to keep him on television.

[rubecube]

I actually thought that was Punk's best promo since he's been back in WWE.

[SuperMatt18]

Also one thought on the Royal Runble..:they need to have a big stage for the rumble when it's in these stadiums.

It kills the crowd because it's impossible to see who's coming out and the names with the floor level stage.

Big stage and big countdown clock

[trackercowe]

Rumors of Malakai Black and Buddy Matthews heading back to WWE once their contracts expire. No surprise there as it's been hinted at for months (same as Andrade). I really wanted to see what direction Triple H had Aleister going before he was let go. It makes a ton of sense with their significant others still being employed by the competition.

It'll be interesting to see if Rusev and Swerve will also be targeted once their contracts are up, as they were also Triple H guys that were fired during Vince's tyranny. Triple H has brought nearly everyone back during his era, other than those still on contract with AEW.

Also the speculation of why Shane McMahon left WWE is interesting. That he knew what misdeeds did Dad was involved with and tried to force Vince to stop his ways. Meanwhile Vince tried to get Shane "involved". Shane obviously refused, and eventually it came to a head and Shane quit. It sounds like something out of a soap opera, but if true it (again) makes Vince look really bad, and good on Shane for taking a stand.

I wonder if Shane or Steph will ever be involved with WWE again, or will TKO/Endeavor seek to distance themselves from the McMahon's all together?

[Buff]

Originally Posted by trackercowe

Rumors of Malakai Black and Buddy Matthews heading back to WWE once their contracts expire. No surprise there as it's been hinted at for months (same as Andrade). I really wanted to see what direction Triple H had Aleister going before he was let go. It makes a ton of sense with their significant others still being employed by the competition.

It'll be interesting to see if Rusev and Swerve will also be targeted once their contracts are up, as they were also Triple H guys that were fired during Vince's tyranny. Triple H has brought nearly everyone back during his era, other than those still on contract with AEW.

Also the speculation of why Shane McMahon left WWE is interesting. That he knew what misdeeds did Dad was involved with and tried to force Vince to stop his ways. Meanwhile Vince tried to get Shane "involved". Shane obviously refused, and eventually it came to a head and Shane quit. It sounds like something out of a soap opera, but if true it (again) makes Vince look really bad, and good on Shane for taking a stand.

I wonder if Shane or Steph will ever be involved with WWE again, or will TKO/Endeavor seek to distance themselves from the McMahon's all together?

Makes sense to distance them from the McMahon name. I have wondered if they'll take it one more step and also move on from Triple H.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by trackercowe

Rumors of Malakai Black and Buddy Matthews heading back to WWE once their contracts expire. No surprise there as it's been hinted at for months (same as Andrade). I really wanted to see what direction Triple H had Aleister going before he was let go. It makes a ton of sense with their significant others still being employed by the competition.

No big loss for AEW, IMO. They did absolutely nothing to evolve or get themselves over.

[Blaster86]

Originally Posted by rubecube

No big loss for AEW, IMO. They did absolutely nothing to evolve or get themselves over.

They came in with name and ability. AEW did nothing to use them. This was more a symptom of the fact AEW had too many ####ing bodies than not knowing how to use them.

[trackercowe]

Meanwhile Gunther and Kingston put on an absolute banger on Raw tonight. It's a shame they had to cut away to commercials twice in the match. For my money Gunther is the best wrestler in the world right now.