Round 8: Blue Cardinal -vs- Dave

[D-Man]

Does a company allowing their World Champions to have long title reigns help the prestige of the title?

This is a eighth round match in the Debater's League. Blue Cardinal is the home debater and gets to choose which side of the debate they will be on and who debates first, but they have 24 hours to make their choice.

This thread is for DEBATERS ONLY and will end on Friday at 2pm EST.

Anyone that posts in this thread besides the debaters, league admins, and judges will be infracted!

Good luck.​

 

[Rhonda Rousey's Sports Bra]

I say yes it does help add prestige to the belts and Dave can go first.

 

[Dave]

Championships are tools.. Nothing more!

That mantra is something that I think you should know and let swirl around your head a little bit. More so than that, Championship reign are what we make them. Reigns are entirely subjective and as such, how can we claim that a reign has added prestige? When you look at it really closely, you will struggle to find criteria that makes a successful reign all the more legitimate. People are fickle and will base a successful reign on many different criteria. That criteria differs from person to person. So again, we are at a loss when we think about how prestige is gained. In fact, to go further than that, Championships are exactly as we make them.

How do we possibly classify prestige?

Is prestige how long a Championship is held for? If so, we can all claim that Santino Marella was an prestigious Intercontinental Champion, right? Of course not! His reign were comedy bullshit that almost every single member of the IWC hated. Did he add prestige to the Championship by dating Beth Phoenix or being the comedic jobber that he undoubtedly is? No way!

Let me put this into perspective for you. Santino Marella has held the Intercontinental Championship almost 5 times as long as Kurt Angle. Now, Kurt Angle is a World Champion wrestler. He is simply the only Olympic gold-medallist to ever compete in the WWE and yet the figure that has been amassed by Santino Marella dwarves his tenure. Was Kurt’s reign wasted on him because he only held it for a short period of time? Absolutely not!

The fact of the matter is that it does not come down to how long you hold a Championship. Rather, it comes down to how prestigious the Champion is. Holding the Championship for a limitless time does nothing but saturate the division that it dwells in. It takes away prestige from that division and not only makes the competitors in that division look weak, it makes the Champion look boring.

Again, if we look at the World Heavyweight Championship this time, tenure means absolute nothing. Chris Benoit and CM Punk have held the World Heavyweight Championship for around the same time. Punk has 6 more days with 2 more reigns. Is Punk’s Championship reigns more prestigious than Chris Benoit finally capturing the biggest accomplishment of his life? Absolutely not!

The length of any reign is entirely useless! Rather, it is more to do with what Champion is holding that Championship and how the reign is executed. Goldberg won the World Heavyweight Championship at 108 victories into his massive winning streak and then you could call his streak and the Championship that went along with it prestigious. However, he only held the Championship for 84 days.Are you seriously trying to tell me that King Booker’s reign of 124 days is more prestigious than that moment in wrestling history?

I fucking think not.

 

[Rhonda Rousey's Sports Bra]

So the question at hand is about prestige and length of the title reigns, I say yay, Dave says nay. Well I'm right.

This is really simple here actually, let's just give a for instance. Let's say we have John Cena as the champion today, he gets put in a match with Randy Orton and loses the title. They trade it back and forth every month or so for about 3 PPVs and we'll say Orton walks away with the title, then Orton goes on to feud with Sheamus and they trade the title. Sheamus walks away with the title and then feuds with Edge and ect. ect. What this creates is parody in the WWE. Meaning everyone is on the same level. So if all these guys are on the same level as the champion then what prestige is there? What it means to be the champion is to be the best in the company. Short reigns create this. A short reign shows that no one is the best and that hurts the prestige.

On the flip side we can look at a long reign. A fighting champion is what's desired and that's what longer reigns create. If AJ Styles holds the TNA strap for 8 monthes and is defending it at every PPV it shows he's the best in the company and it really puts the next guy over that beats him. This is what happened back in the Hulkamania Era, Hulk would have long reigns and when someone beat him for the belt it was a huge deal, this was back when the champion was the clear cut best in the company and the belt was the highest honor.

So yes, a longer championship reign helps the prestige of the title.

 

[Dave]

So the question at hand is about prestige and length of the title reigns, I say yay, Dave says nay. Well I'm right.

This is really simple here actually, let's just give a for instance. Let's say we have John Cena as the champion today, he gets put in a match with Randy Orton and loses the title. They trade it back and forth every month or so for about 3 PPVs and we'll say Orton walks away with the title, then Orton goes on to feud with Sheamus and they trade the title. Sheamus walks away with the title and then feuds with Edge and ect. ect. What this creates is parody in the WWE. Meaning everyone is on the same level. So if all these guys are on the same level as the champion then what prestige is there? What it means to be the champion is to be the best in the company. Short reigns create this. A short reign shows that no one is the best and that hurts the prestige.

On the flip side we can look at a long reign. A fighting champion is what's desired and that's what longer reigns create. If AJ Styles holds the TNA strap for 8 monthes and is defending it at every PPV it shows he's the best in the company and it really puts the next guy over that beats him. This is what happened back in the Hulkamania Era, Hulk would have long reigns and when someone beat him for the belt it was a huge deal, this was back when the champion was the clear cut best in the company and the belt was the highest honor.

So yes, a longer championship reign helps the prestige of the title.

See, all of this would be completely correct if it wasn’t so completely wrong.

Championship are completely independent of everyone until they are won. Even then they are tools to help that person to get over.

Let me put it to you like this. Before TLC last year, we had only heard of Sheamus as the person who won a battle royal to make the main event at a PPV. Sure, he had “retired” a lame Jamie Noble but that isn’t really anything to hang your hat on. At this point, he was not the most prestigious person in the WWE. There was so many more prestigious people ahead of him in the queue to be WWE Champion. Yet, he won the match and was given the opportunity.

When it rolled around to TLC last year, he won the Championship on, what many say, was a mistake. He won the Championship when John Cena basically fell through the table below the turnbuckle. Does this mean that Sheamus was a more credible Champion that John Cena? Did this win make the belt all the more prestigious? No! It didn’t. At the end of the day, the Championship had changed hands by way of a mistake and the people knew it. Did they count Sheamus as being a prestigious Champion because of it? I certainly, didn’t.

What I am getting at here is that the events that unfold when a Champion is in possession of a Championship is far more important than how long he holds it for.

Do you remember when Edge performed with La Familia with Curt Hawkins and Zack Ryder? The World Heavyweight Championship changed hand because of the sly tricks of Edge. Not only did he use decoys to win the Championship… He also hit the Undertaker with a chair twice before stealing his cover on Batista. The fact of the matter is that this win will always plague his tenure as Champion. He was seen as The Ultimate Opportunist and thus he never defended or won the Championship fairly. He was Champion on and off for the next year or so. However, his antics always caught up with him and he was never seen a prestigious Champion by any means.

When you compare that to the relative short reign of Goldberg and the World Heavyweight Championship, how can you possibly say that the length of the reigns meant anything? Edge cheated his way to almost every single win he achieved and has held the World Heavyweight Championship longer than Goldberg has. Edge stands at 295 days as World Heavyweight Champion and Goldberg has 174. Did this mean that Edge was more prestigious Champion? Absolutely not!

At the end of the day, length of any reigns means nothing. Rather, it is what you did with that reign that the fans will remember. People will always remember how dominant Goldberg was in WCW. People might not remember how lucky Edge got consistently and that is the telling factor.

 

[Rhonda Rousey's Sports Bra]

Without a lenthy reign the champion can't defend his championship. Fairly simple really. You can have John Cena win the championship at the Elimination Chamber and have him lose it that night, not having a lenthy reign brings that reign way down. You need time to build the prestige, other factors go into this, but without time a reign is shit. Your Goldberg-Edge comparison is a bit off since both of those reigns had time to build the championship. It doesn't matter who wins the belt if they don't defend it multiple times to show that the champion is the best in the company. Without time you can't have that. Also Edge's reigns added into what it takes to be a champion, you don't have to be the most dominate wrestler if you're smart enough. Edge showed how he could bend the rules and get away with things to keep his belt, which was the most important thing to him. It showed how much he coveted the championship.

 

[Cena's Little Helper]

Clarity of debate: Dave
He opening argument was nicely organized.

Punctuality: Draw
Neither was 24 hours late with a reply.

Informative: Draw
Both participants presented a decent amount of information.

Persuasion: Blue Cardinal
I didn't buy the whole belts as props to get someone over argument, Dave. On the other, the hot potato example Blue Cardinal presented in his opening argument perfectly conveyed to me why short reigns devalue world titles.

Final Score
Dave: 2
Blue Cardinal: 3

 

[Phoenix]

Clarity of debate: Dave
Superb opening here and a great stance with the opposing side.

Punctuality: Draw
What Tdigs said, both kept it in good timing.

Informative: Draw
Good amount of info here from both.

Persuasion: Draw
This isn't a point against either of you, but rather you're both right together and this point is awarded to both of you because I don't disagree with either of you, but great points were raised and convincing both ways.

Final Score
Blue Cardinal: 2
Dave: 3

 

[Miko]

Clarity: Dave's opening and continuing posts were definately clearer

Point - Dave

Punctuality: Both on time? Share the cookies

Point - Split

Informative: Dave brought the information, but Blue dealt with it well if you catch my drift

Point - Split

Persuasion: I typed out a really long post for this, then I realised that all it was was me more or less repeating what you said to explain why long title reigns and big moments and champions can be necessary for a belts prestige. Almost did a GameRage and debated myself.

Point - Split

My Scores;

Blue Cardinal - 2
Dave - 3

 

[D-Man]

Except for the fact that Dave's posts were clear as crystal, I cannot give the edge to anyone else in this debate. Good arguments on both sides.

Final Score:
Dave: 3
Blue Cardinal: 2

 

[D-Man]

After a complete judge's tally, Dave is the victor with 11 points to Blue Cardinal's 9.

Congratulations and great debating from the both of you!