Announcing Matches

[cwcanno]

I have had the fortunate pleasure of having the time to watch some old matches of the WCW and WWE the past couple of days and I have noticed a major difference between wrestling of old and the current state of the announcing in WWE.

There is not at much excitement as there used to be coming from the announce team. I am not trying to bury Michael Cole (there are plenty of other forums here that do it very well). He is actually a good announcer(if you leave him out of the storyline). I am just stating, I think the product needs to be looked at from an announcing point of view.

The announcers are out there to help further along the Face or Heel gimmick of performers, but if you watch some of the older matches, it didn't matter what the performers were (heel or face) the announce team called the matches with such excitement and enthusiasm. And didn't try to blatantly bury talent.

I feel that this is something that is missing today. Excitement and enthusiasm within the announce team. Any thoughts????

 

[MrAsmith97]

I had this similar thought when i was watching an old WWF pay per view hearing Gorilla made me miss it, i wouldnt say its so much an excitement but id say it just the way it came across during the announcing back then that made you intrigued

 

[JJkrin_27]

I personally don't think King and Cole do a bad job, in fact I like them. But on the other hand Booker T...I can't stand, he's horrible

 

[Syborgg]

The problem isn't the people on the announce table. It's the people talking to them over the headsets. In the last few years there was a call from WWE Creative to change the way matches were called. Gone are the days where the announcers have near heart attacks while calling matches. I'm not saying I agree with it, but it seems it's the way Vince wants it. Go back and watch an older match that Cole has done, he has done a decent job of calling matches before, maybe not as good as Gorilla or J.R. But definately better than his current stuff.

 

[FlairFan2003]

Gorrilla was a jk as an announcer, altho he was a step above David Crockett! Gorrilla was only moderately watchable when paired with Heenan, he was a solid straight man for Heenan's over the top comedy routine. Tony Schiavone never duplicated that charisma.

The best announcing teams are those with an entertaining heel who will side with the villains (like Heenan, or Lawler back in the day) paired with a polished, but impartial play by play guy. He's the one that elevates a match for their viewer, his excitement and enthusiasm as the impartial, unbiased voice lends credibility to the idea this match is really special.

For whatever reason WWE has toned that down in recent years. Where it hurts is on Raw & Smackdown, free weekly shows that should be getting guys over (making us want to spend money on house shows & PPVs). Without the entertainment value of the announcing the matches, and by extension the wrestlers, do not seem as special. When you and your matches are not special me and my money wont pay to see you perform.

 

[thebarber]

Michael Cole is a rubbish announcer. Jesse Ventura, Jim Ross, even Vince himself were all great announcers.
Vince has been yelling in the ears of his commentators for many many years, its not just the current crop who cop it.
A solid straight play by play man with a color guy to bounce off is the perfect formula. Not three guys trying to one up each other.

 

[Azane]

The announce teams spends too much time trying to push their personal feuds (Lawler vs Cole)

I liked it so much better when the announcers fought over their opinions, not each other. Cole being a heel and pushing the Miz ahead, helps the Miz, Cole taking shots at DBry (Before his heel streak) helped push Daniel Bryan. Cole taking jabs at King personally makes ratings go down.

I don't know if it's just the way JR took the little jabs from King compared to how King takes Cole's, but I never got the sense the old announcers hated eachother, whilst today, they physically get involved often, and it takes too much focus off the matches. Michael Cole can narrate a 2 hours RAW using twitter, his ego and a laptop full of anonymous e-mails, I'd rather have 90% of a match being called and 10% set aside to pushing the main story, instead of the ratio we see now, where 10% of a match is called, 50% is used to push the main event, and 40% are spent pushing a Lawler vs Cole rematch.

 

[mrfantastic111]

There has NEVER been so much focus on an announcers table ever in the history of WWE. In the past year they have had several shows every few months which involve opening or long promo sessions between feuding announcers, one last year which lead to a match at WM27! At the end of the day, the casual viewer, much like most of us don't watch WWE or buy PPVs to see the story of Cole or Lawler. The job of the announcers are to tell the stories of the competitors in the ring and help emphasis the importance of the storylines, as well as highlight the roles of heels and faces. This is why RAW's team fails:

Lawler: Lawler was great during the attitude era because he was the voice we heard at home on our televisions that represented heels. He was a subtle heel commentator and reminded us of why we hated the heels and liked the faces by subtly portraying his colour character. He could also be funny and so he added entertainment value for all audiences. However, nowadays he often contradicts, and I don't think that he is very good at portraying a face. He doesn't seem interested anymore in his character, which is almost always overpowered by Cole.

Cole: Where do I start... Well, Cole wasn't too bad at first because it was new and funny, but now he's taken it way too far. Cole tends to make his own stories seem far more important then the stories at hand which he is meant to be telling. He also tends to heavily put down faces, instead of subtly asserting the fact that he doesn't like them because they're the good guys. This isn't good because he's also the main play-by-play guy, which isn't good when your play-by-play guy is dissing half of your roster. Putting down wrestlers over commentary is a custom that comes with almost any announce team, however, Cole tries too hard to direct his arguments to legitimate reasoning as to way he doesn't like faces, which somewhat puts doubt in the mind of the audience as to whether they should doubt or discontinue their support of faces. Commentators are meant to help assert and build new stars, but Cole tends to cut them down before they have a chance to get over.

Also, Cole's arguing is often taken too far, and his rambling often causes me to mute the television. There's a difference in being a heel, and just being annoying. People will watch a heel because they're stilling entertaining, however, people will simply change the channel if something/someone annoying pops up on their television screen.

 

[Bad Booking]

I know a few years ago I read up on how Jim Ross was talking about how announcers would be featured less. The announcers would talk less, and let the story in the ring play out more.

This I didn't think was that bad of an idea.

Now let's go to 2011. We have FEUDING announcers, who talk up time that could have been devoted to mid-carders. The only reason why it lasted as long as it did was because it got surprisingly strong ratings in every segment.

Cole was always a guy whose main strength as an announcer is to pitch a proverbial fast-ball, and let his comrade (i.e: Tazz, JBL, even Booker T) hit that sucker right out the park. Now it's like Cole is trying to be become the 'Perfect Switch-Hitter' of doing both, which is absolutely atrocious. Apparently it was so bad, HE (on his own and by himself) won Gooker of the Year by Wrestlecrap.

The current announcing situation is so bad, it makes me long for 2003 JR and King. Keep in mind that year was probably the worst time for that duo.

 

[RyanAn]

I think a lot of it has to do with them having to listen to what the back has to say through their headsets. Having the freedom to call it like you see it and rif is great! Bobby Heenan and Gorilla seemed like they actually have a blast out there. You can notice it on some of C-shows like Superstars and NXT that William Regal goofs a lot while Josh Matthews plays it straight. Regal sang a whole Smiths song, lol!

 

[jrichardson25]

.. And didn't try to blatantly bury talent.

That right there is the MAIN reason why talent have failed to get over and why the announcing has gone to hell... The announce team is too busy bitching at each other and the heel announcer berating everyone that has caused this. The days of good announcing are dead. If Cole would lighten up a little bit (I'm aware he's being fed lines) and played the PBP position and left the color to Lawler, RAW would be much better... BUT he needs to have SOME personality... just calling the matches doesn't make for good tv either... It really is a catch 22...

 

[Kevolution]

Could be worse could sound like the samn video games, that's the most boring thing i've ever heard...