Clean Match Finishes

[Fillet Club]

I've just finished reading a short article by Nick Paglino, which was posted on the WrestleZone front page. If you haven't already seen it, well it involves the percentage of clean finishes throughout 2014.

MoronBall.com reported:

WWE has a recent knack of not delivering television main events that end in decisive finishes. Just how bad was it in 2014? Out of 52 episodes in 2014, 18 Raw episodes out of 52 (34.6%) had a decisive finish to a main event; the rest of the shows either ended in a segment, or ended in some sort of non-finish. So yes, only 34.6% of Raw episodes had a legitimate main event finish. At one point around Wrestlemania, there was a stretch with one real finish to a main event over an 11-week span. Later in the year, there was also a stretch of eight straight weeks without a finish in a main event.

Now I'm legitimately surprised at the high number of dirty finishes (phrasing), now don't get me wrong I'm not of the mindset that we should never have run-in's, DQ's, cheating etc. But I do think it's possible to overdo this, Citizen Kane's constant run-ins while part of the Authority became tiresome and unbearably frustrating.

Do you see this as a good thing? A bad thing? Or something not really worth getting worked up about?

Maybe next MoronBall will give us a percentage of distraction roll-ups over the past year...

 

[MrGameTime]

nice thread hang on i will give you a a good reply after my holiday, i sent you a pm

I dont think wwe put much thought into finishes now, whatever is needed i think

 

[Navi]

I've just finished reading a short article by Nick Paglino, which was posted on the WrestleZone front page. If you haven't already seen it, well it involves the percentage of clean finishes throughout 2014.

Now I'm legitimately surprised at the high number of dirty finishes (phrasing), now don't get me wrong I'm not of the mindset that we should never have run-in's, DQ's, cheating etc. But I do think it's possible to overdo this, Citizen Kane's constant run-ins while part of the Authority became tiresome and unbearably frustrating.

Do you see this as a good thing? A bad thing? Or something not really worth getting worked up about?

Maybe next MoronBall will give us a percentage of distraction roll-ups over the past year...

In all my years of watching wrestling and it's been a lot, I've never seen as much interference and crap finishes than I've seen this last year. Kane for the most part was the biggest pain in the ass for me this year, and that's probably the reason I just can't put up with him anymore. Shit he even does it at house shows, so you can't get away from it anywhere.

It really depends on the storyline in a way, but I agree it's become a little too much at times. The icing on the cake for me was the Ambrose/Rollins feud. When Bray Wyatt interfered in their cell match for no apparent reason other than the fact it was to make him relevant, it ruined the whole feud for me.

A feud I might add that taken months to build up, and has more twists and turns than an amusement park ride. Now yea I get that this feud between Rollins and Ambrose will probably continue at some point down the line, but now I don't care anymore. They had great chemistry and momentum, and in one minute it was totally ruined for no reason.

I blame part of it on the whole Authority storyline, which at times was just ridiculous and they went a little overboard with it. Was so glad to see them finally gone, and whoohoo now they had to come back.

Cheating used to be Ric Flair delivering a low blow when the ref wasn't looking, or the Sheik being handed a doorknob by his manager, which after he used he either threw away, or stuck in his trunks. It was never so blatant like Seth Rollins coming to the ring with 2 security guards, who get involved in every match. I guess we are either supposed to think that the referees are either blind or stupid.

There is nothing wrong with a strong heel who can win without cheating, just look at Rusev. My God a heel that actually uses his abilities as a wrestler to win, not two other guys plus a 7 foot giant, the Big Show to get the job done.

 

[Mighty NorCal]

God, I wish I wouldn't have fucking read it, how immensely soul crushing.

I imagine the pain will dull over time...It has to, since this is how things are in a world with 5 hours of live TV to fill per week.

 

[The Brain]

Do you see this as a good thing? A bad thing? Or something not really worth getting worked up about?

I see it as typical. It's not something to get worked up about because it's been going on for years. I'm sure if someone bothered doing this same research for every year since 1997 you'd see similar results for every year. Probably a lower percentage of clean finishes from that beloved period of 1997-1999.

I don't understand the recent obsession with clean finishes. Wrestling has never worked that way. Of course when someone does lose clean then they're being buried. A dirty finish is done to either protect the wrestlers or advance a storyline. We should all be used to this by now.

 

[rmp0012002]

I think the WWE using dirty finishes is just a way to have someone lose but not really lose so they can be used with some credibility in a later storyline but it just kills their push and makes people care less about that wrestler. Ambrose is a good example but still has retained the fans for now but he went from a major push to almost being a JTTS as he loses every match.

 

[Mighty NorCal]

I don't understand the recent obsession with clean finishes. Wrestling has never worked that way. Of course when someone does lose clean then they're being buried. A dirty finish is done to either protect the wrestlers or advance a storyline. We should all be used to this by now.

They aren't talking about dirty vs clean finishes, its talking about finishes at all, vs no-contest, interference, double count out etc etc.

Dirty finishes would be wonderful. You mean.....heels cheating to win? Take MY fucking money, PLEASE.

 

[OYDK]

In all my years of watching wrestling and it's been a lot, I've never seen as much interference and crap finishes than I've seen this last year. Kane for the most part was the biggest pain in the ass for me this year, and that's probably the reason I just can't put up with him anymore. Shit he even does it at house shows, so you can't get away from it anywhere.

I was just about to write my post when I noticed this so I'll tie it into my response. In my opinion, this past era has had the least amount of "garbage" finishes in the past 20 years. Remember the Monday Night Wars when almost every. single. match in BOTH WWE and WCW included a run-in, DQ, distraction, ore count-out finish? It didn't get much better with the Ruthless Aggression Era honestly, but I think lately we've only been getting the real screwy finishes for matches that add to a certain storyline.

I agree with your Kane comment though. That was probably the most frustrating stretch of the year for me, and didn't really do anything except try and make Kane somewhat relevant in The Authority storyline.

All in all, I'm okay with the amount of screwy finishes this year. I think the part of the OP's post where they mention that they were surprised by this amount, kind of shows that it was relatively done in a smooth way and not in a way that pissed off the fanbase. People remember the HIAC finish and a few others, but those kind of finishes for BIG matches were few and far between.

To answer your question though, I don't think it's anything to get worked up about. If you hadn't found those numbers, nobody would have even noticed the amount of screwy finishes that happened this year, and also they've been commonplace in wrestling for a long while now.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

Meh, to be honest, it doesn't really bother me all that much. It just comes across as another of the endless complaints and criticisms the dirt sheet writers have.

For instance, I read a report by Benjamin Tucker at PWTorch.com the other day talking about WWE "blowing through" main event matches, yet Tucker would also complain even more if there weren't enough quality matches on Raw. In fact, he does complain when he doesn't feel there aren't enough quality matches on Raw...in fact, there's pretty much nothing he doesn't complain about and only seems to enjoy Raw when it's one of these big ol' epic shows that can only really happen a handful of times a year.

If a match ends clean, there are criticisms from writers often about how this makes the loser look weak. If a match ends dirty with interference or DQ, here come some writers complaining of how it's a lousy ending that detracts from a good match. If a certain match happens on TV, some writers say that WWE shouldn't be giving such a match away for free on television and around and around we go.

Sometimes, a lack of clean finishes does bug me but, more often than not, as long as I'm treated to quality matches, I'm pretty happy. It doesn't bother me if heels cheat their asses off to win, it doesn't bother me if they want to save the more decisive endings for a pay per view, it doesn't bother me to have a babyface that actually acts like he's something of a decent human being instead of trying to be some ultra edgy anti-hero.

 

[Mustang Sally]

Well, it's what professional wrestling was built on and I tend to doubt there's been more of it in the modern era than not.

In the old days, wrestling was two guys going one-on-one....without the gang mentality that's so prominent today. How do we compare a Bruno Sammartino vs. Buddy Rogers match in '63 to what we see now? Back then, neither had an entourage of people ready to jump in and interfere. Sure, there might be an "unclean" ending, but that consisted of a count-out or disqualification; the latter being something we really don't see much of these days, compared to old times. Hell, they were disqualifying people like crazy back then.

One of the brightest stars today is Seth Rollins, but look what the Rollins package comes with: Joey Mercury and Jamie Noble. This virtually guarantees interference in every damn match Seth is in, yet as tiresome as this is quickly becoming, it's not going to end until management either sees fit to let Seth go on his own....or the fans get so sick of it that management is forced to get the message.

From a storyline view, it doesn't even make sense. Mercury & Noble were assigned to Rollins by the Authority. Who was paying them when the Authority ceased to exist? Who's buying their suits?

Whatever the answer, unclean finishes have always been a part of this "sport" and truly do have their purpose; to keep a guy's standing high even after facing a top performer.....he can win or lose without being pinned or submitted and start again next week with his rep still intact.

But it's not all for nothing; when we saw John Cena cleanly pin Seth Rollins last week during a time we figured Rollins was never going to have a decisive defeat pinned on him, we realize that while a storyline-driven form of entertainment is always going to take shortcuts to keep things viable, there will still be enough clean finishes to keep the pecking order clear.