The booking of The Miz couldn't be much worse in my opinion. There seems to be a lot of arguments here focusing on how The Miz's character is built to behave this way. I have a question and a concern with this.
My question is: How ya figure? He isn't Edge. Edge is Edge. The Miz has never built himself on winning matches by the hair on his chiny-chin-chin. The Miz's character is a guy who came in to the WWE and was treated like crap, and so he developed an enormous chip on his shoulder. He has to prove himself at every moment because the treatment he received from the veterans robbed him of his sense of self-worth. It's honestly a pretty good gimmick, all things considered. What does any of that, though, have to do with bumping for Jerry "The King" Lawler?
Now, I have a concern. If The Miz indeed is a crappy wrestler who can't cleanly win matches against top-level talent (or even low-level color commentators), why is he champion? I'm told that cowardly heels have been champion before. This is true. Edge, Hollywood Hogan, etc. They've also been main-eventers without necessarily holding the title: DiBiase, Chris Jericho, etc.
Here's the thing: each of these men, though cowardly, had a means by which to win their matches. Edge had a plan, meaning he could out-strategize his opponent if he couldn't win straight-up. Hollywood Hogan was the leader of a gang, meaning that though he couldn't win one-on-one he always had the support of countless others, and his opponents could never really gather the same steadfast support. Essentially, he out-politicked his opponent. Dibiase had money, and so he could simply out-spend his opponent to buy whatever was needed to win the match. Jericho had legitimate wrestling talent, so though he was cowardly, he could just out-wrestle his opponents (that's one of the things that made the Jericho vs. Goldberg feud so interesting in my opinion, because it was obvious that Goldberg couldn't wrestle).
Each of these men possessed power, even though that power did not involve valor. What is The Miz's source of power exactly? He can't wrestle, so that's out. He has no money to speak of. He somewhat out-politicks his opponents, but I don't think anyone wants to compare Alex Riley and Michael Cole to the nWo. He somewhat out-strategizes his opponents, but I don't think anyone wants to compare anything he's done in the past two months to Edge cashing in the MITB briefcase at New Year's Revolution '06 or using the Edgeheads as stunt doubles against The Undertaker at Armageddon '07. Those were legitimate schemes, not just sort-of crafty wrestling.
So what does he have? If I were booking The Miz, I would book him according to his character. He would take on all challengers and guarantee victory in every match (chip on shoulder). He would become more dominant in every match, and the commentators would inform us that this is because of how intensively he trains (need to prove himself). I would sort of keep Alex Riley, because it does make sense for The Miz to have a protege (he eventually needs to become the very veteran bully he was once tortured by) and I would vaguely keep his heat with Lawler, but only because The Miz would be anti-veteran and would downplay the accomplishments of everyone who came before him (because of his bad experiences with veterans). I certainly wouldn't have him wrestle Lawler, because that's just bad business, and I wouldn't have him wrestle any other legends, either, because that's Orton's old gimmick. I would have him eventually drop the title by exhausting him. His need to prove himself causes him to train ever more intensively, and to take on ever more challenges, until his body finally fails him and he can no longer continue, at which point he's beaten by whoever ya want to be your next champion. Actually, Miz/Undertaker, Title vs. Title at Mania seems like a pretty good idea. (Taker is the most veteran member of WWE's active roster, interestingly enough.)
