IWC Poll: Who Do You Cheer For

[Mudlup50]

I've been quite confused recently, as I took this as a yes no or both question before but it seems I'm wrong. Back when I was a kid watching wrestling before I found the IWC, I cheered faces. Undertaker was my favorite wrestler, I liked Eddie Guerrero when he won the title and so on. I always booed the bad guys because they were the bad guys.

Then I found the IWC and that stopped a lot. The faces are so boring now to me. Whether it's because I'm older or more akin to evil or whatever the reason is. Now half of my ten favorite wrestlers are heels. The bad guy just seems more interesting than the good guy who always wins.

So everyone is talking about Roman Reigns getting booed and I hear Lesnar get cheered and it made me wonder. Could the problem with the face/heel tradition be the audience? I mean, why isn't Reigns getting full support? Because the IWC either doesn't like him because he's getting a rocket push or he has like 4 moves. Could we as fans be sabotaging the company itself. Would Cena have gotten so over if he debuted now? I mean really. I know I cheer the bad guys now so when Lesnar gets cheered...well when Heyman gets cheered it makes me think those are IWC members.

It's a hard question to phrase but do you cheer for faces, heels, predominantly faces, predominantly heels or both equally? I think I lean towards heels personally and I've always attributed that to the IWC, but are we all like that? I know there are people on here who are Pro Cenation and it just makes me wonder. All of it.

I feel like we've forced WWE to stick with Cena by cheering for the bad guys. I mean in the last 5 or so years we've flipped on guys so quick it's unreal. Orton was a heel(a great one at that) and gradually he became a face. Cena gets half boos and half cheers. Batista was a huge fan favorite back in 2007 but he comes back and gets booed. Cena is the only guy we all react for, does that force WWE to push him more?

I'm rambling and doubt my point is coming across at this juncture so...

Vote on the poll and comment why you do

 

[hollowpoint]

If this was 20 years ago, the booing the bad guys and cheering the good guys would be the thing. Now, thanks to guys like Stone Cold and the Rock, cheering the bad guys has become the thing. Not until about 5 years ago or so has booing the good guys been in, but you can thank the IWC for that. John Cena has been around so long that people started to resent him; hence the "let's go Cena, Cena Sux" stuff.

WWE works on reaction. Whether negative or positive. That is the reason Cena is still relevant. The funniest thing I see every live event I go to is the same guys that boo Cena are the same guys that are in line to get his autograph or buy his t-shirts/wristbands.

I cheer for heels and faces alike. It's all about performance to me. If you can make the match believable, create a good storyline as to why the matchup exists, and be able to take me on a roller coaster during the course of the actual match that I paid (9.99) to see.

 

[Slash-LN]

Live I cheer faces and boo heels. That's how it's supposed to be. I understand wrestling has evolved from the traditional set up but I still want to do my part I guess. The only exception is if someone bores me or there's someone I really don't like that is a face. Then I don't do anything. Adam Rose I'm looking at you.

Online is different though. I would boo Bo Dallas at an event but online I totally root for him. It's not like him or the WWE are going to be sitting on this forum and judging things by what we post.

 

[laodaron]

Shit fans have decided that they are more important than the show. In this, they now cheer whomever they want to, devoid of logic.

Cheering a heel is shitting on his performance. Its saying, you aren't a good heel. You're shit at your job.

Booing a face like John Cena is equally as stupid.

Ruining the product for other people doesn't make you a better fan, it makes you a shitty person.

 

[pepentorresHHH]

Shit fans have decided that they are more important than the show. In this, they now cheer whomever they want to, devoid of logic.

Cheering a heel is shitting on his performance. Its saying, you aren't a good heel. You're shit at your job.

Booing a face like John Cena is equally as stupid.

Ruining the product for other people doesn't make you a better fan, it makes you a shitty person.

TBH I think that's a shortsighted approach. Sometimes heels are so good at what they do that you can't help but cheer them because they are so entertaining. Lets not forget. People like Edge or Randy Orton. They were such brutally good heels that people started little by little to cheer for them.

On the other side John Cena has been a face since 2003! Im all for faces being on top but no one should stay the same for that long..... Which means it will get repetitive and BORING.... Hence why I boo John Cena

 

[Headman]

If I like a heel I boo him. If I don't I sit on my butt and do nothing. As Raven once put it, if you are cheering a heel he's either not doing his job or you're just being an asshole. Fans who try and hijack the show are the biggest morons of all and are the real reason wrestling sucks right now. WWE needs new fans.

 

[BestWrestlingOpinions]

I don't think it really has anything to do with the fans being really that much different, but more with the fact that the faces are just too good for people to cheer. I mean, the most shining example is John Cena. He has been doing this whole good guy thing for so long now and people just want someone more badass. Someone who will stand and hit and talk back to what he is being thrown at. He doesn't do that. He always talks about how he does everything for the kids blah blah blah and it is really cheesy and the grown ups don't want that. They want confidence.

Look at Cm Punk. Either as a heel or a face, he would talk back when he was talked down upon, he would fight back and he would do all that as if it came natural to him. That's why people liked that and consequently cheered him.

There are always exceptions of course, and that has to do a lot with backstage politics and definitely the talent and charisma each guy possesses. Back in the day, you wouldn't know a lot about backstage politics drama, whether someone is high on a guy who they shouldn't. I will give you an example:

Back in the day, you wouldn't know that they are really high on Reigns and they will try to overshadow Ambrose in order for Reigns to shine through, so you wouldn't "try to go against the officials" for that decision and boo Reigns. Now we do know that and now we do go against the officials and we do boo Reigns, sadly, because I see potential in this guy, even though he isn't ready for main events yet.

I'm not sure if Austin and Rock ushered in a new era as far as fan reactions go, but they must have played some role. I mean, Austin is that guy that you would love to cheer for, because of his manners and his anti-everything gimmick. He would be relentless for what he wants. Daniel Bryan is a different story. He might have just been pandering to the crowd a lot, but you can't really do different when you have entire arenas chanting YES. After all, Daniel is an exceptional in ring performer and you want to see that guy compete simply because of the quality of the matches he produces.

There are really a lot of reasons as to why the fans are mostly cheering the heels now, but the main one is that the heels are more aggressive when they talk and when they fight, instead of sitting there and taking it like a bitch.



EDIT: (to a guy saying that if you cheer a heel, then it is as if you are saying that he isn't doing his job well).
It's not always like that. I mean, the heel must give you a reason to boo him. He must say something bad about your home town, for yourself, making fun of someone you like etc. Back in 2009, from what I remember, Orton didn't attack the fans verbally or anything, he just uses underhanded tactics at times to win matches. Some people might actually like that and like Orton and cheer for him, simply because he took out someone they don't like. It doesn't mean that he wasn't dong his job well, because he did.
Same for Cm Punk the night he GTS'd the Rock. He didn't turn heel at that time. He gave his finished to his future opponent, yet Lawler went ahead and said "Cm Punk has turned his back on the WWE Universe". ???????? Why is the Rock the WWE Universe???

That's the thing here. There are two types of heels and two types of faces. Those who play to the crowd and should get cheers / boos if they are faces / heels, and those who are labelled as such, simply because of the tactics they use to win matches and they things they say at their promos.

Face: Cena. The good guy pandering. Gets booed.
Face: HHH (back in 2011, when he was in a tag team match with Punk). He was using dirty tactics in that match. Gets cheered.

Heel: Rusev. Lana attacks the audience. Gets booed.
Heel: Punk (during his last 6 months of his title reign). He uses Heyman to win his matches. Gets cheered.

I think you see what I'm talking about here.

 

[Savior of Silence]

In the comfort of my own home I'd say it's about 50/50. I'm a fan of the physicallity, workrate and promo skills. When I'm in the crowd I boo the heels and cheer the faces. That's the way it should be. Except John Cena. I boo the shit out of that man.

I would absolutely LOVE it if a heel would jump at me when I was there live. I'd fall over my chair and sell the shit out of it for him.

 

[The Butcher]

Fans cheering a heel practically saved the WWF, but I'm sure things would've worked out just fine if everybody just played along. It's been stated numerous times by numerous wrestlers- as long as you give some sort of reaction that's all that matters. That and your money.

 

[Franchize1990]

Personally, when I'm at a live event, I'll cheer for the face characters that I like, boo the heel characters that I like, and will remain silent for the characters that I don't particularly care for. We've seen it often, guys will cheer louder and louder for a heel to the point where he eventually has to turn into a face only for the people that were cheering for him to turn around and say "I liked them better as a heel", "his/her face persona sucks", and eventually this leads to "what was [insert company here] thinking when they did this? They're so dumb." With the exception of Cena, most companies will change a guy/gal based on what we, the fans, give them in terms of feedback. I believe in the philosophy that giving a character a proper reaction based on their face/heel alignment lets that person that he/she is doing a good job and we want to continue seeing you as the good/bad person that you're portraying. Having said that, fans paid their hard earned money to go watch the show so, they're free to say what they want but, playing devil's advocate to those type of people, imagine the level of "heat" people like Heyman, Barrett, and Wyatt would have if everyone that cheered these people played along with the show.

 

[WarroBODFan]

I think the line between what is a face and what is a heel has never been more blurred than now. I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing to cheer for a heel, even if we're not really supposed to. I'm going to my first Raw and Smackdown live shows in November when they come back to the UK, and I'm just planning to cheer for who I like, and boo who I dislike, or have no reaction for the ones I don't care about. If I appreciate the work that a heel is doing, I may cheer them. Though saying that, I think Seth Rollins is absolutely fantastic, but if he's facing Ambrose then I'll be booing him. But if a heel that I like is facing Cena, then I'd likely cheer for the heel because I'm an asshole. All kidding aside, I feel like there is nothing wrong with cheering for who you want. Fans cheering for Bray Wyatt play into his "eater of worlds/whole world in his hands" shtick, for example.

 

[laodaron]

The actual professional wrestlers have pretty much all said that getting cheered as a heel is a disappointment to them. It tells them that they are failures.

 

[Mustang Sally]

I voted for both "heels & faces equally" because it depends on the performer and what he's bringing to the table....whether he's a good guy or bad guy is almost incidental to the question because most wrestlers take turns at portraying both sides during their careers.

Getting up on my soapbox and orating, however, I'd like to make a statement that might sound odd standing by itself: If it weren't for Stone Cold Steve Austin back in the Attitude Era, we wouldn't be booing John Cena today.

More than anyone who came before him, Austin personified the term 'tweener. He showed us that a performer could act like a bad guy, yet be cheered as a good guy. Except for his occasional forays in saving good people from bad ones (his rescue of Stephanie McMahon from the clutches of Undertaker comes to mind) there was nothing good about Austin. He was a bragging, beer-swilling bully......yet, we followed him religiously and cheered his every move. But in real life, if you're a decent person, would a guy like Stone Cold be a friend of yours? ......No. Probably, he'd be someone you avoid because you'd never know when he might turn on you.

On the other hand, John Cena is one of the best overall entertainers I've ever seen.....in pro wrestling or outside it. He can wrestle, tell a story in a match, tell a story on the mic, and inspire a crowd like no one I've ever seen.....and he does it playing strictly himself.....his ring persona is his own, which means his ability to get people on his side is based on factors more pure than someone who has to portray a character to achieve it.

So what does a portion of the crowd in a wrestling arena do? We boo him. We hate him. We're "bored" by him. While Cena surely understands the crowd mentality better than we do and uses the boos to his advantage rather than being offended by them, I'd wager he was as surprised as anyone in the WWE braintrust when the boos started emerging a couple of years ago.

"They boo John Cena and cheer Steve Austin? What the hell?" the suits in Stamford must have said.

But the root of the problem is contained in that very statement. Austin taught us to love the anti-hero, the guy we'd stay away from in real life. As a result of this, we no longer have to appreciate the virtues of the guy who's so good that his teeth gleam when he smiles. In some ways, pro wrestling reflects what's going on in society; which isn't an accident.....wrestling management keeps their fingers on the pulse of the public, as does any good producer of entertainment.

So, illogically or not, many folks hate John Cena.

I blame Stone Cold Steve Austin.

 

[WBL]

I just cheer for my favorites. I like Bray Wyatt, I cheer for him, he's a heel. I like Dean Ambrose, I cheer for him, he's a face.