Can Santino become dominant, while having the comedy gimmick?

[LMaruko]

Santino, in the way his gimmick is now, will never be taken as a serious wrestler, no will he be taken as anything as "dominant." He is nothing but a joke and that is his act; comedy, and hardly anything that has humor written all over it has just been given minor title/midcard shots, and then there will be this complete-opposite heel that will dominate him and take away anything that he has. Like the WWE is doing now; Ms. Santina has the Ms. Wrestlemania title, and Beth is turning against him/her and trying to vie for the title.

In all actuality, I really hope they don't repackage Santino. He is a great comedy act, and that gets ratings.

 

[Sully]

Santino has no chance of ever making it in the company, but Santina will surely make it big....

 

[Jack-Hammer]

It would be extremely difficult for me to take Santino seriously. He's funny as can be and I get a kick out of him everytime he comes out. The only way I could even remotely take him seriously is if he were to take about a year off, get roided up, lose the accent, shave his head, grow a big ass goatee, get tattoos all over himself, etc.

Basically, he'd have to look like a completely different person and have a totally different personality. A complete transformation, one so complete that I don't even know if it's possible.

Some possible good news about the comedy gimmick is that Santino has done EVERYTHING that creative has wanted him to do with no reports of him bitching or moaning about it. On one hand, that's the mark of a real professional. On the other, creative has asked him to completely lose any shred of dignity he has. Now, as to what this good news might be is that, since he's willing to do anything and everything he's told, there's a good chance that he'll be drawing a steady paycheck for years to come.

He might wind up as another Funaki when it's all said and done, but he'll be with the company. I think, with Vince, doing everything you're told without complaint is a sign of real loyalty, even though it might only be that the guy's worried about losing his job.

 

[FromTheSouth]

We fans have an incredibly short memory span, fromthesouth. Most of the casual audience would have no issue believing it. MVP went on a 20 match losing streak, losing to the likes of Funaki, yet fans were welcoming of him again once he won a couple of matches.

But he lost because he was distracted, or rolled up. It was built as a slump, and there was never a doubt that he would start winning again. MVP and Santino are two different cases.

Whenever Santino wins, I assume the guy that beat him pissed Vince off, and he is getting punished.

 

[Fuel The Fire]

im going to say never say never..remember edge and christian...there were just like santino back in the day and look at them now..so im going to say never say never

 

[Dave]

This just popped into my mind. Can Santino be turned into a good wrestler while keeping his comedy gimmick? What I mean is, can Santino ever win the IC Title alone and be taken seriously. Or will he just remain the same old really funny guy that gets jobbed to everybody?

No!

My personal thoughts on the situation is that Santino will probably be, what we in the IWC call a Comedy Jobber for life. I cannot see him losing the comedy thing in the near future. The only way I can see him being dominant whilst maintaining the comic character is an undefeated run whils in the comic gimmick. The thing is, Santino is now so over, that there is no way WWE will change his character. It wouldn't make sense really. But they way he is now, he can't really be dominant in the WWE.

 

[shafe_41]

Are you kidding? Of course he can. I think over the past few weeks you're starting to see a small transition of this. No not main event status but it'll start to build. After this whole Santina thing is over and done, I really think Santino is going to become a great face in the mid-card. I mean look at the way he was originally supposed to debut for those who know the story (and most do). Before Kurt Angle left the WWE, Santino was supposed to debut as an "Angle Protoge" of sorts. So you KNOW Santino has ring skills. We haven't gotten to see much of this sadly but you can not deny that no matter how dumb this Santina thing is... Santino is one of the most entertaining segments of Raw week-in and week-out. You can NOT pretend that you don't look forward to Santino's segments on Raw every single week. He's entertaining as all hell. It's never too late for Santino. And I know this might be kind of a bad example... but Owen Hart was the Blue Blazer...AFTER his long running "Slammy Award Winning King of Hearts" gimmick. I believe Owen would have had a solid taste of main event matches in the WWE. Granted the Blue Blazer isn't exactly along the same lines of Santina, but both in sense...rediculous. Everybody would have taken Owen seriously when his Blue Blazer thing ran its course, so I don't see why we can't do the same thing for Santino. If you get the chance to really showcase your skills in the ring and on the mic, one of which we know Santino does VERY well, then you can be taken seriously and all is forgiven. If Yankee fans can forgive A-Rod for being on the juice, we can sure as hell forgive Santino.

 

[Razor]

He could. I'm not going to say "cuz he has the ring skills" because people are dominant in the WWE without having to have Olympic style ring skills. Angle wasn't dominant because he was an Olympic gold medalist, it was because he would epically Angle Slam people over and over until they couldn't get up again.

All Santino needs is to do what he did today. He got angry at Chavo, and decked the son of a bitch. Do that for the next couple ppvs, and get it into the audiences' heads that Santino can actually do something. Drop the "I'm angry" gimmick, and you still have a wrestler that everyone knows can actually win a match. Then, he can fuck around with Beth Phoenix and Vickie Guerrero all he wants, just make sure he keeps the "I can still hurt people" thing going.

So, to answer your question succinctly, he can. But he can't keep this "I'm getting rolled up by Beth Phoenix" thing going. He has to stay competent in the ring. He can be as ******ed as he wants outside of the ring, but in the ring he has to keep the strong thing going.

 

[HartsyThaiFood]

By the sounds of it, I think they are sort of trying to kill off the Santina character. The whole 'Miss Wrestlemania' gimmick is now done and over with her (presumably). And having Santino beat Chavo I think spells sort of the dawn of a new chapter for Santino Marella. I could see last night being the night where a page was turned, so to speak. I'm interested in how they go forth from here, definitely.