Stephanie McMahon could be the downfall for the WWE.

[It's...Baylariat!]

Bold statement right? Well, on WZ's main site, there's a snippet concerning Stephanie McMahon wanting WWE head writer Brian Gewirtz to get in touch with some writers he knows from MTV. MTV. Really? REALLY?

Here's my mini-rant on Steph. Considering she's Vince McMahon's daughter, she's shown me that show knows very little about how to run a WRESTLING company. Now, if I was running a general entertainment business, Steph would be the first person I would call. She knows entertainment, she's got a college degree in business and knows her stuff. HOWEVER, hiring writers from Seinfeld, MTV, and other facets of entertainment isn't the right thing for the WWE and is some of the reason why the WWE has been in a decline ratings wise. These comedy skits with Golddust and Santino are NOT appealing to anyone. Even kids. I mean, tell me a kid who's entertained by Golddust. The man was built as a CREEP. Now, all of a sudden...he's Hornswoggle's best friend? Not buying it.

As far as I'm concerned, you'll see the beginning of the end of WWE when, God forbid, Vince McMahon passes on. Stephanie McMahon has no sense of being a wrestling fan and knows NOTHING about what the fans want. At least Vince McMahon knows good TV and can stir up controversy when needed. Stephanie's just worried about finding someone to write lines for wrestlers that should be coming up with their own lines anyway. It's sad.

So the question is this. Am I seeing too much into this? Or is Stephanie McMahon bad for the WWE?

 

[klunderbunker]

It's a combination of a few things to me, but there's one huge one: professional wrestling is dead, at least in WWE. I don't think it's Stephanie's fault though, as she's simply inherited a poisoned system. Allow me to explain.

It's been dead for a long time and I can blame Vince partially for it. How many stupid skits and characters such as Hornswaggle have we seen because Vince finds them funny? Fans such as Lariat, Norcal and I are old school. We love what used to be pro wrestling, in companies like the NWA. A feud goes something like this back then: Dusty wants the world title, he challenges Flair at Starrcade, the Horsemen break his foot before Starrcade, Dusty and Flair cut great promos before the show, Dusty wrestles injured as the fans are desperate for someone to take the title off of Flair and they believe that the common man Dusty Rhodes can do it, Dusty wins the title with a rollup after a 21 minute match. That was the main event for Starrcade 1985 and it was huge. That my friends, is pro wrestling.

Today, the Orton/HHH feud is so horrible that it's hard to believe. Does anyone even remember why they're fighting? The problem is that with the advent of potentially 9 hours of tv a week and somewhere between 12-14 PPVs a year, the wrestlers simply don't have the ability to come up with enough characters, angles and material. Back in the day, there was no such thing as writers or a creative team. There was a position known as a booker. His wrestlers would come up with characters or the booker would give them one and the booker would put together a card. You would have one show a week and would go from town to town having the same card because with no internet, unless you were at every show, how would you know what happened there? This was all well and good until the early 90s, when the worst business decision in the history of the business took place, and it started a domino effect that has crippled the business: Eric Bischoff got promoted.

Bischoff made great television and was great at running a business. The problem was and always will be though: wrestling isn't a normal business and can't be run as such. There's a way to run a wrestling business and if it's not run that way, then it's going to fail. Bischoff was running an entertainment company, and once the NWO hit, it stopped being about wrestling and became about drama. The WWF countered with the Attitude Era and the rest is history. The day that it stopped being about wrestling and became about entertainment and drawing as many people, wrestling fans or not, into the tent, wrestling was in trouble. The athletic aspect and story telling elements were thrown out the window or at least put on the back burner in favor of drama and comedy. The WWE has since taken this to an extreme and the problem was simple: the massive crowds and audiences in the Attitude Era weren't wrestling fans. They were drama fans. The WWE has since tried to bring back that same level of drama to attract them, instead of doing the smart thing and making new wrestling fans.

A minor issue that's hurting WWE is the amount of title belts. There is no validation whatsoever to have 9 championships. Back in the days of true professional wrestling, you MIGHT have had 4: world, tag, midcard, low midcard, but you could get by and definitely thrive on three titles. With a simple number of titles, they easily mean more. Think about it like this: say you collect baseball cards and have the rarest card in the world. Due to its rarity, it's more valuable and people will want to pay a high price for it. It another million are made, why should people want your's when they can get one of their own and not have to pay high prices for them? It's the same concept with a belt. When Edge was in two Elimination Chamber matches in one night, the illustration was perfect: Edge didn't win one world title, so he'll go win another world title. Does that just sound ridiculous to anyone else?

This title situation creates another problem for Pay Per View: the mid card has no time to showcase their skills. Back in the real days of pro wrestling, one thing that was done very well was mid card title feuds. Magnum vs. Tully, Savage vs. Steamboat, HHH vs. Rock. All of those are epic feuds that got an epic payoff in the end and are very well remembered to this day. The reason for this was the show had a very simple structure back then: opener, low midcard, upper midcard, world title. There's no hot opener for a PPV anymore. The ECW Title, a World title/upper midcard title opens the shows now, making the fans already have to invest emotion and energy into watching the first match. There's no more random tag matches or cruiserweight matches to open the show. Let's compare last night's Bash to a classic PPV like Wrestlemania 3. The Bash: ECW Championship Scramble, WM 3: Can-Am Connection vs. Bob Orton/Don Muraco. Bash you immediately have one of three world title matches to open the show. You can't just throw something like that out there and expect the fans to jump right in. That's not how a wrestling show works. A wrestling show needs to be slowly built up to one main event. By using this formula, you leave open spots for the midcard to shine in and get noticed on PPV and tv by the audience. How many times have you seen the midcard match completely steal the show? Now think of this: when's the last time that truly happened and you didn't expect it to?

A third issue which spawns off of the dominance of the big two as well as the advent of national television is the downfall of the terrioty system. The territory system that was made strong under the NWA was a simple one, but very effective. You had a territory, such as Memphis and the surrounding area. It would have a champion, but there would also be the World Heavyweight Champion. Now once or twice a year, the WHC would come through your territory and feud with the top talent in every territory and especially their champion. A great example of this is Jerry Lawler and Ric Flair. One time Ric Flair came to Memphis where Lawler is obviously a god. Flair wrestled one match there, a fifteen minute draw with Lawler where the deal was if Flair couldn't beat him in the time limit, Lawler would become the champion. The time limit expires, Lawler wasn't beaten, and he demands the title. Flair said he never signed a contract, and Lawler slapped him. Flair talked to Jimmy Hart and wrote him a $10,000 dollar check, saying that the minute he heard Lawler was injured and out of wrestling, that amount would double. Flair never came back to Memphis wrestling, but Hart's stable and Lawler feuded for two years over that one incident.

Under the territory system, a guy like Lawler was built up to the level of a god. In today's system, he wouldn't stand a chance at getting a job. He got big in one area and developed his character until he had it down and THEN he went national. A guy like Shelton Benjamin would thrive in something like this. Say he went to the Florida Territory and stayed there for two years. Shelton is a natural talent but he's just not ready for a national spotlight. Put him in Florida (or any territory) for a year or two, season him, and make him the #1 star there, and THEN bring him back to the WWE. He has experience with being a main event guy, he has his character down, and he's ready for a big spot in WWE. With the death of the territory system though, this can't happen, as there's one minor league, FCW, and it's so crowded that no one has room or the time to shine there. Now someone like Shelton is floundering in the WWE because he never got the seasoning that he needed and he's been desperately in search of an identity for his entire WWE run.

Finally, and perhaps the worst issue of all is the fact that there is no patience with anything in wrestling now. Everything is about getting things done as fast as possible with a high turnover rate. In today's product, everything is about geting things done as fast as possible and getting people to be quick stars with no real substance. A main event "feud" is so quickly done that there's no build up, no drama, and no real story. Miz and Cena gave me some hope. It was well thought out, it was well delivered, and there was a real story to it. How many matches can you think of that are designed based on the challenger just winning a #1 contender's match? that's not a feud, that's a requirement. Instead of a true reason to want to fight, it's like the champion is fulfilling a contract. There's no time given to a proper feud, which is hurting things even mroe.

With so many PPVs, there isn't time to set something like this up. In the early days of the PPV market, let's say 1988, there were two WWF PPVs that year: Wrestlemania 4, and the first Summerslam. The feud between Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage was a great one, and it was given over a year to build up until you had one huge blowoff match at Wrestlemania 5. As Jesse Ventura said at the start of that match, "This is what the term main event is all about. This is truly the MAIN EVENT." This same thing was tried again for last year's Summerslam with Batista vs. Cena. hell they even gave them the tag titles, but they gave them three weeks to build this. It was built on name value alone, not substance. Why should I care that two guys have stared at each other and had a one week tag title run? I didn't and while the match was ok, it was far from memorable. Had it been given a build of say, six months, and I mean a real build and not "this has been built for years" as the commentators would want you to believe, I would have loved a match that big. Alas, in the name of the quick buck, that won't happen.

Now, when you add up all of these things: the emphasis on entertainment, the over saturation of the title scene, the complete rushing of the product and the lack of a true developmental system, how in the world could you have a true wrestling company that is successful? In short, it's impossible. Vince McMahon and Eric Bischoff have succeeded in killing professional wrestling, and it's a very sad thing. It was a true art form and now it's a business just like everything else. The novelty isn't there anymore and neither is the emotion. All that matters is the fast buck instead of the big buck that could come with a bit of patience.

That all being said, how can Stephanie be blamed for what she's doing? In short, she can't be. the system has been corrupted and hurt for far too long to blame it on her and her simply following the path that's been made for her. There's no one person that can make a good product now, at least not in the current state of wrestling. Stephanie is a product of the system as it's what she's been brought up to think is good wrestling. Good wrestling can still exist, but not under the current system in WWE. Stephanie is merely following the example set for her by Vince. If the company falls under her watch, I certainly won't be blaming her for it, on the simple grounds that it was wounded long before she took over and was simply at its side when it finally passed away.

 

[tj177mmi]

The one thing you have to remember is that Stephanie's boss is her father. And while Stephanie may have been telling Hayes and Gewirtz, that order may have come from Vince himself. Or an order such as "find entertaining writers who can stay within the PG box." She then knows "Hey, Brian or Michael may know someone within MTV" and voila, story made, and its a trickle down effect.

Its pretty clear that while we know Vince is set in stone about this PG thing and staying this way, we don't know if Stephanie has her hands tied on this or not. She obviously has to stay within her father's box and her father's wants for TV.

I don't think it is as much as her insight failure, because from what we have heard before, she has pretty good ideas that are being killed right now because of the PG rating. Its about fresh ideas, and if someone from MTV or whatever can bring in those ideas, then Hayes and Gewirtz can transpose it into a wrestling storyline.

 

[CyrusTheVirus=ECW]

Well im not sure if she would be the downfall of the wwe. as far as looking to hire mtv writers, i think thats rediculous. but then again they hired the freddy from scooby doo so why not and hire mtv writers. who really knows this could be a good thing, maybe wwe will create better storylines and gimmicks. and like already said the pg rating isnt helping interesting ideas, and we know vince will not change this pg rating, why? because its a family product, unfortunalty this isnt the "attitude era". we dont see the gimmicks as much. i grew up during the attitude era, not every thing then was that great either but at least there was a creative team that made interesting storylines.

That said, i dont think stephanie is the downfall of the wwe, and maybe mtv people and the wwe writers can come up with some new stuff. on the HHH/Orton feud, this has in a small way drew away from the pg rating, we had HHH breaking in "ortons" house. we say almost the entire mcmahon family punted in the head, we even saw orton destroy flair. so the pg rating has been thrown out the window sorta speak. i dont see stephanie ruining the product, but as a way of imrpoving the product with better gimmicks and storylines

 

[Ambiguous Turd]

The one thing you have to remember is that Stephanie's boss is her father. And while Stephanie may have been telling Hayes and Gewirtz, that order may have come from Vince himself. Or an order such as "find entertaining writers who can stay within the PG box." She then knows "Hey, Brian or Michael may know someone within MTV" and voila, story made, and its a trickle down effect.

Its pretty clear that while we know Vince is set in stone about this PG thing and staying this way, we don't know if Stephanie has her hands tied on this or not. She obviously has to stay within her father's box and her father's wants for TV.

I don't think it is as much as her insight failure, because from what we have heard before, she has pretty good ideas that are being killed right now because of the PG rating. Its about fresh ideas, and if someone from MTV or whatever can bring in those ideas, then Hayes and Gewirtz can transpose it into a wrestling storyline.

Thank you for seeing the bigger picture.

I used to think it was Stephanie's fault, as well. Until I realized with the leadup to Wrestlemania and how Vince was acting, that she was nothing more than a patsy. She has the title of EVP of Creative, but make no mistake about it. The true head of the Creative team is Vincent K. McMahon. If he wants to involve himself to the degree he does in this once facet of the company, then he is going to have the finger pointed at him that much more when things go wrong.

So as far as lack of storylines, lack of interesting characters, boring commentary style, lame comedy, etc. Vince takes the blame for it all, in my book. And it's his own damn fault for being too stubborn and narrow-minded to think that everyone else and their ideas are inferior to his.

Paul Heyman hit the nail on the head. Vince doesn't want a Creative team. He wants a bunch of "Yes Men" to kiss his ass each and every week. And to further my point, this commentary that was posted on Wrestlezone is definitely worth a listen to from a former Creative team member discussing what it's like to be on the Creative team.

http://www.wrestlezone.com/news/art...wwe-writer-discusses-creative-struggles-79727

 

[Nev]

I was thinking the same thing.

I'm not sure if Steph has that entertainment mindset Vince has.

Vince knows when something is on fire - he lights gasoline on it.

He knows if society changes - he takes advantage

Vince says whatever he wants because he knows what he wants. Vince loves any publicity the WWE can get.

I'm just not sure if Steph can do this, even Shane.

This causes a growing concern. It was only 8 years ago Steph was the TV ****, is she really a marketing genius like her father?

Only time will tell.

Though, the one thing you can't stand about Vince is that he is so convinced that 'he knows what the fans want more than they do.'

But when the WWE receives record breaking success(I.E. Attitude Era), it all doesn't matter.

 

[jmt225]

From all the information I've gathered from listening to wrestlers and former employees in radio/shoot interviews and shit like that, the general consensus is that Stephanie McMahon is a very smart, sweet woman that gets shitted on because she's married to such a selfish, shitty person.

Even Paul Heyman himself has praised Stephanie, and they HATED each other at one point. But it seems as time goes by, Stephanie more and more gets the business; from both a business stand point, and a creative one as well. Of course I can't pass this as 100% fact since I'm not back there myself witnessing it all first hand... but I'll gladly take the perspectives of guys like RVD, Foley, Angle, the Dudleys, ect. highly praising Steph for the way she conducts herself, how hard she works, and since to them that she's becoming better and better creatively.

So, no... I don't think she's currently hurting WWE, or will in the future. If it's anyone, it will be her husband, but that's another topic. The fact is... I've heard plenty of former and current workers from WWE state that Stephanie is by far their favorite McMahon, and compliments like that make me think she's doing great things for WWE and will continue to do so. I use to hate Stephanie as much as anyone, but when you listens to what former employees of hers have to say about her... your respect for her has to go up, otherwise at that point it's just nothing but blind hatred.

 

[It's...Baylariat!]

I see a lot of viewpoints, and KB's post is a telling tale on what is wrong with pro wrestling in general, but the thing is...there's few people who could have an impact on what Vince says. One of them is Stephanie McMahon. Now, the bottom line is she's a great businesswoman. As I said in my first post, Steph knows how to sell her product and make it seem like the greatest attraction in the world. The problem is that Stephanie doesn't buck the system and suggest more of a wrestling based show, she embraces sports 'entertainment' and is willing to hire 'writers' from comedy shows. Vince is well capable of booking wrestling shows. He's done it for years and years. So is some of the guys on his staff. Dusty Rhodes, Michael Hayes, and other former talent can book. On the other hand, former MTV writers like Brian Gewirtz and Tom Cherones from Seinfeld aren't going to cut it on a wrestling show.

I feel that Stephanie is more business oriented than wrestling oriented. She'll promote the hell out of her product, but the product she promotes is subpar. Hopefully, if Vince is the one who's pulling the strings, Stephanie will stand up and say, 'Dad, maybe we can do something different. See how it works. If it doesn't work any better, we'll continue the path we're on right now.' It's not hard. All he can do is say yes or no. It's not a 'Yes man'. It's his daughter. The one person who has no worries of being fired.

 

[tLight]

I dont think its Stephanie McMahon thats ruining the WWE. I think its the combination of her and her husband.

 

[The Mark of Zur-En-Arrh]

Today, the Orton/HHH feud is so horrible that it's hard to believe. Does anyone even remember why they're fighting?

How can you not remember why they're fighting? We get at least one video package every fuckin' week about what's transpired with Orton since he punted Vince. What's terrible about this fued is that the matches are mostly shit. Last week, they had their 4 or 5th Last Man Standing Match together. 3 Stages of Hell was also pretty pointless as well. A single fall is ok, but Falls Count Anywhere and Stretcher Match are near enough the same thing. The other two 3SoH both ended with cage matches did they not? Why not this one? Answer:- stupidity. 6 days after having a No Dq match they have a 2/3 Falls match where two of the falls are basically No DQ matches. Cleveeeeeerrrrrrrrr.

The day that it stopped being about wrestling and became about entertainment and drawing as many people, wrestling fans or not, into the tent, wrestling was in trouble. The athletic aspect and story telling elements were thrown out the window or at least put on the back burner in favor of drama and comedy. The WWE has since taken this to an extreme and the problem was simple: the massive crowds and audiences in the Attitude Era weren't wrestling fans.

I'd just like to point out that i didn't watch wrestling frequently 'til 1999 and for me it has always been about the wrestling. I couldn't give a flying fuck about comedy skits or long winded promos. I used to hate it when Raw always opened with the McMahons talking for 25 minutes, and i hate it now when the main event is a talk segment or backstage attack that goes on for 20 minutes, regardless of how great it may have been. Start the show with wrestling, end the show with wrestling. That is why we're watching after all. I doubt people record Raw on Tivo and then fast forward through the wrestling for the Santina skits.

It's the same concept with a belt. When Edge was in two Elimination Chamber matches in one night, the illustration was perfect: Edge didn't win one world title, so he'll go win another world title. Does that just sound ridiculous to anyone else?

That's not quite how it happened now is it? He LOST one world title and couldn't have his contractual rematch, so he went and won the other one, to insure he was in the Main Event for Wrestlemania. Now you could say 'why couldn't he just wait until SD! and have his rematch then?' Well yes he could have done that, but think about it. Which would you rather do? Let HHH rest for 6 days and then face him one on one in an even match, or be a surprise entrant in another chamber where A) no one will be prepared for you, and B) you could possibly be the last guy in as opposed to the first, and have a cake walk title match? It's an easy choice for me.

This title situation creates another problem for Pay Per View: the mid card has no time to showcase their skills.

I'd say that this has improved slightly in the last 3 months. The IC, US and Tag titles have all been defended in the last 3 months on PPV as opposed to NEVER. Kofi, Regal, Matt, MVP, the Colons, Legacy, Dolph Ziggler, Khali, Finlay, Tommy Dreamer, Swagger, Christian, Mark Henry, John Morrison and Shelton are all mid-card guys who've had a PPV match since May, and the Miz was in the 2nd to last match of the night this past Sunday, which is the slot where everyone will be watching, (used to be the Undertaker's PPV slot, but now it's Cena's apparently) and yes the match was shit, but that's not the point. It's nowhere near as good as it was in the era KB's a fan of, nor the Attitude Era, but at least it's getting better somewhat.

Finally, and perhaps the worst issue of all is the fact that there is no patience with anything in wrestling now. Everything is about getting things done as fast as possible with a high turnover rate. In today's product, everything is about geting things done as fast as possible and getting people to be quick stars with no real substance. A main event "feud" is so quickly done that there's no build up, no drama, and no real story.

2 words:- Chris Jericho. Not only does he have great matches and can cut a classic promo without really trying, he actually ASKS for guys to fued with. Thank you Chris, you're the only one right now who's giving us anything worth caring about in WWE. Otherwise yeah, i agree with you KB.

Miz and Cena gave me some hope. It was well thought out, it was well delivered, and there was a real story to it. How many matches can you think of that are designed based on the challenger just winning a #1 contender's match? that's not a feud, that's a requirement. Instead of a true reason to want to fight, it's like the champion is fulfilling a contract. There's no time given to a proper feud, which is hurting things even mroe.

I too was very disappointed with how their 2 matches have turned out. Everything the Miz has been built up with since coming to Raw has now been shat on because he's had his ass handed to him twice in 2 days by Cena. The young fans won't give him the time of day now. What WWE don't seem to realise is that guys can fued without actually fighting each other. Look at HBK/Y2J, that went on roughly from May until October, which is about 5 months give or take, and they only had 3 matches in that time frame and everyone loved it. Miz has been taunting Cena since the draft, so roughly thats 2 or 3 months with only 1 PPV match and Miz was flourishing as a result. HHH and Orton fight near enough every week and it's shit. Big Show and Cena wrestled EVERY PPV since Backlash and that was shit as well.
Rather than let the talent talk their way through a fued for a while, we instead get 'humiliate the GM' skits instead. Everyone likes to see the boss get beaten up or have shit pured on them. No Vince, people like to watch their favourites beat the fuck out of anyone. Austin could have decapitated Mother Teresa and fans would have cheered. Taker could plow Mahatma Ghandi down on his bike and the crowd would have eaten it up. Watching Santina in a dress throw mud on Vickie Guerrero isn't going to get you squat except a cheap laugh because you embarrassed your employee.

None of that is reflected solely on Steph. She knows how to get the best out of the company using the tools at her disposal and following Vince's business plan. The problem is, Vince's business plan is a crock of shit. What makes matters worse is that most of the talent seem to think they've made it to Wonderland and they don't need to try because the paychecks will roll in, and t-shirts will sell, and that's that. Don't forget people, the Queen will still cut your head off if you don't amount to anything. People who were actually over and appreciated by the fans have been cut in the last month alone, so what makes you impenetrible?

The only thing that makes me think that Steph is making things worse, is the report that she wants to be rid of people like Gerry Brisco. A guy who's given his life not just to wrestling, but to WWE specifically since he left the ring. Not smart Steph, not at all.

 

[NSL]

We love what used to be pro wrestling, in companies like the NWA. A feud goes something like this back then: Dusty wants the world title, he challenges Flair at Starrcade, the Horsemen break his foot before Starrcade, Dusty and Flair cut great promos before the show, Dusty wrestles injured as the fans are desperate for someone to take the title off of Flair and they believe that the common man Dusty Rhodes can do it, Dusty wins the title with a rollup after a 21 minute match. That was the main event for Starrcade 1985 and it was huge. That my friends, is pro wrestling.

This is the biggest point you made in that post, and the whole thing was great. I love "pro wrestling". I enjoy being a fan. I liked the fact that Miz had a chance Sunday, and was pissed that he got squashed. I hate the RKO/HHH feud going on for so goddamn long anymore, although it's not as bad as Show v Cena.

As far as Stephanie...I can't blame her. Like KB said, it was fucked when she got here, don't blame her. She seems to be a smart woman, with complete control over what's going on. If it keeps HHH in the spotlight for a few years too long, whatever. As long as wrestling still gives me the chance to cheer for the good guys, boo the bad guys, and hate Vince for hating the faces.

 

[48.7 is Approximately 49 Times Better Than You]

It's been dead for a long time and I can blame Vince partially for it. How many stupid skits and characters such as Hornswaggle have we seen because Vince finds them funny? Fans such as Lariat, Norcal and I are old school. We love what used to be pro wrestling, in companies like the NWA.

The majority of casual fans, the largest audience of wrestling, enjoys the comedy skits and characters. Hornswoggle and Goldust are hugely over with the fans, Doink was a popular character, and Santino gets great pops. You and a small percentage of fans may prefer a more serious product, but the majority is who Vince caters to. If he did what the NWA did, the WWE would likely be in the same place the NWA is now.

A feud goes something like this back then: Dusty wants the world title, he challenges Flair at Starrcade, the Horsemen break his foot before Starrcade, Dusty and Flair cut great promos before the show, Dusty wrestles injured as the fans are desperate for someone to take the title off of Flair and they believe that the common man Dusty Rhodes can do it, Dusty wins the title with a rollup after a 21 minute match. That was the main event for Starrcade 1985 and it was huge. That my friends, is pro wrestling.

I agree. That is great and I personally love to see things like that, but fans today are more into flashy stories, big gimmicks, etc. Wrestling has evolved to fit the fans. A storyline like that is simply not what works today. That isn't something to blame Vince McMahon for. The fans created the change.

Today, the Orton/HHH feud is so horrible that it's hard to believe. Does anyone even remember why they're fighting?

Doesn't everyone on here sing about wanting long feuds that have time to develop fully and have a big payoff? That's what we have here. This all started with Randy Orton wanting revenge for being turned on by Triple H, and wanting to take everything from him. It's become personal and they just want to hurt each other. It could have been a good feud, but Orton and Hunter have absolutely zero chemistry together.

The problem is that with the advent of potentially 9 hours of tv a week and somewhere between 12-14 PPVs a year, the wrestlers simply don't have the ability to come up with enough characters, angles and material.

The more shows there are, the thicker Vince's wallet. Overexposure hurts in the sense that the writers cannot keep up. Fans these days have attention spans of a goldfish and if you don't constantly remind them of what's going on and shake things up, they'll become bored with the product.

Back in the day, there was no such thing as writers or a creative team. There was a position known as a booker. His wrestlers would come up with characters or the booker would give them one and the booker would put together a card. You would have one show a week and would go from town to town having the same card because with no internet, unless you were at every show, how would you know what happened there? This was all well and good until the early 90s, when the worst business decision in the history of the business took place, and it started a domino effect that has crippled the business: Eric Bischoff got promoted.

That style of booking could never work today, regardless if Eric Bischoff is promoted or not. You couldn't do the same thing week in and out, because everyone has the results of every single show just a few clicks of the mouse away. Or, if you keep the shows private and off television, you make no money. You can hardly fault Eric Biscoff for the internet and nation television.

Bischoff made great television and was great at running a business. The problem was and always will be though: wrestling isn't a normal business and can't be run as such. There's a way to run a wrestling business and if it's not run that way, then it's going to fail. Bischoff was running an entertainment company, and once the NWO hit, it stopped being about wrestling and became about drama.

Because that was what the fans wanted to see. He simply made the smart business decision.

The WWF countered with the Attitude Era and the rest is history. The day that it stopped being about wrestling and became about entertainment and drawing as many people, wrestling fans or not, into the tent, wrestling was in trouble. The athletic aspect and story telling elements were thrown out the window or at least put on the back burner in favor of drama and comedy.

It's always been about wrestling in one facet or another. This isn't a giant soap opera. Things are settled in the ring and the title is, and has always been, the focus of the show. I don't know how you can say that story telling was thrown out the window when you also say drama was the focus. If by drama you mean "shock factor" and surprise, then I see what you're saying. But storylines, which have always been vital, are still focused on.

The WWE has since taken this to an extreme and the problem was simple: the massive crowds and audiences in the Attitude Era weren't wrestling fans. They were drama fans. The WWE has since tried to bring back that same level of drama to attract them, instead of doing the smart thing and making new wrestling fans.

No one is interested in fake wrestling. Wrestling has such a bad reputation, it'd be impossible to create "wrestling" fans. Everyone, and I mean everyone, who doesn't watch knows it to be "fake and boring". I don't see how you'd make new fans by focusing on the wrestling aspect.

A minor issue that's hurting WWE is the amount of title belts. There is no validation whatsoever to have 9 championships. Back in the days of true professional wrestling, you MIGHT have had 4: world, tag, midcard, low midcard, but you could get by and definitely thrive on three titles. With a simple number of titles, they easily mean more. Think about it like this: say you collect baseball cards and have the rarest card in the world. Due to its rarity, it's more valuable and people will want to pay a high price for it. It another million are made, why should people want your's when they can get one of their own and not have to pay high prices for them? It's the same concept with a belt. When Edge was in two Elimination Chamber matches in one night, the illustration was perfect: Edge didn't win one world title, so he'll go win another world title. Does that just sound ridiculous to anyone else?

Back in the day, you had one show. Now, you have RAW, SmackDown, and ECW, each operating as separate entities, with their own superstars, managers, and title belts. If you had only four titles, the number of superstars allowed to shine is cut down by 5/9. Whether we like it or not, this is still a business. To make the most money possible, they have four shows. Four titles could not effectively work with four shows.

This title situation creates another problem for Pay Per View: the mid card has no time to showcase their skills. Back in the real days of pro wrestling, one thing that was done very well was mid card title feuds. Magnum vs. Tully, Savage vs. Steamboat, HHH vs. Rock. All of those are epic feuds that got an epic payoff in the end and are very well remembered to this day.

After the brand split, they had RAW and SmackDown Pay-Per-Views every other month. All titles were able to be showcased as well as a couple of other matches, but a lot of the time, it wasn't entertaining. I don't want to sit through a throw-away grudge match between too lower-mid-card guys.

The reason for this was the show had a very simple structure back then: opener, low midcard, upper midcard, world title. There's no hot opener for a PPV anymore. The ECW Title, a World title/upper midcard title opens the shows now, making the fans already have to invest emotion and energy into watching the first match. There's no more random tag matches or cruiserweight matches to open the show. Let's compare last night's Bash to a classic PPV like Wrestlemania 3. The Bash: ECW Championship Scramble, WM 3: Can-Am Connection vs. Bob Orton/Don Muraco. Bash you immediately have one of three world title matches to open the show. You can't just throw something like that out there and expect the fans to jump right in. That's not how a wrestling show works. A wrestling show needs to be slowly built up to one main event.

I don't agree here. I don't want to see a show with a lackluster card filled with random tag-matches. I want to see a loaded card that I know, from start to finish, is going to be filled with big matches. Are you more like to buy WrestleMania consisting of an Intercontinental, World, Tag-Team, and Women's championship bout with a high profile grudge match and some throw-away matches, or a WrestleMania with a jam-packed, fully loaded card? I'll take the latter.

By using this formula, you leave open spots for the midcard to shine in and get noticed on PPV and tv by the audience. How many times have you seen the midcard match completely steal the show? Now think of this: when's the last time that truly happened and you didn't expect it to?

Jericho and Rey stole the show at The Bash. The last time I didn't expect it? It doesn't happen very often, so I couldn't tell you.

A third issue which spawns off of the dominance of the big two as well as the advent of national television is the downfall of the terrioty system. The territory system that was made strong under the NWA was a simple one, but very effective. You had a territory, such as Memphis and the surrounding area. It would have a champion, but there would also be the World Heavyweight Champion. Now once or twice a year, the WHC would come through your territory and feud with the top talent in every territory and especially their champion. A great example of this is Jerry Lawler and Ric Flair. One time Ric Flair came to Memphis where Lawler is obviously a god. Flair wrestled one match there, a fifteen minute draw with Lawler where the deal was if Flair couldn't beat him in the time limit, Lawler would become the champion. The time limit expires, Lawler wasn't beaten, and he demands the title. Flair said he never signed a contract, and Lawler slapped him. Flair talked to Jimmy Hart and wrote him a $10,000 dollar check, saying that the minute he heard Lawler was injured and out of wrestling, that amount would double. Flair never came back to Memphis wrestling, but Hart's stable and Lawler feuded for two years over that one incident.

Territories do not work in today's society.

Under the territory system, a guy like Lawler was built up to the level of a god. In today's system, he wouldn't stand a chance at getting a job. He got big in one area and developed his character until he had it down and THEN he went national. A guy like Shelton Benjamin would thrive in something like this. Say he went to the Florida Territory and stayed there for two years. Shelton is a natural talent but he's just not ready for a national spotlight. Put him in Florida (or any territory) for a year or two, season him, and make him the #1 star there, and THEN bring him back to the WWE. He has experience with being a main event guy, he has his character down, and he's ready for a big spot in WWE. With the death of the territory system though, this can't happen, as there's one minor league, FCW, and it's so crowded that no one has room or the time to shine there. Now someone like Shelton is floundering in the WWE because he never got the seasoning that he needed and he's been desperately in search of an identity for his entire WWE run.

Essentially, you want more developmental camps. I suppose that could be a good idea, but I doubt very much it'd make a profit or if there is enough talent to spread.

Finally, and perhaps the worst issue of all is the fact that there is no patience with anything in wrestling now. Everything is about getting things done as fast as possible with a high turnover rate. In today's product, everything is about geting things done as fast as possible and getting people to be quick stars with no real substance. A main event "feud" is so quickly done that there's no build up, no drama, and no real story. Miz and Cena gave me some hope. It was well thought out, it was well delivered, and there was a real story to it. How many matches can you think of that are designed based on the challenger just winning a #1 contender's match? that's not a feud, that's a requirement. Instead of a true reason to want to fight, it's like the champion is fulfilling a contract. There's no time given to a proper feud, which is hurting things even mroe.

I agree fully.

With so many PPVs, there isn't time to set something like this up. In the early days of the PPV market, let's say 1988, there were two WWF PPVs that year: Wrestlemania 4, and the first Summerslam. The feud between Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage was a great one, and it was given over a year to build up until you had one huge blowoff match at Wrestlemania 5. As Jesse Ventura said at the start of that match, "This is what the term main event is all about. This is truly the MAIN EVENT." This same thing was tried again for last year's Summerslam with Batista vs. Cena. hell they even gave them the tag titles, but they gave them three weeks to build this. It was built on name value alone, not substance. Why should I care that two guys have stared at each other and had a one week tag title run? I didn't and while the match was ok, it was far from memorable. Had it been given a build of say, six months, and I mean a real build and not "this has been built for years" as the commentators would want you to believe, I would have loved a match that big. Alas, in the name of the quick buck, that won't happen.

I agree here too, but wrestling fans are impatient. A feud can't last a year anymore. It simply can't.

 

[ipswichicon80]

I don't really blame Steph,I blame Vince. The problem I have with Vince is he's not a wrestling man,he's a business man. The thing people on forums like this is Vince doesn't book for wrestling fans,and in truth he has never really wanted to.

Look at what's happened since Vince took over.

The 80's explosion: Wrestlemania one(which really kicked things off for the WWF,as it was then) was built around Celeberty invovlement of MTV stars to attract the young of that generation, so Vince was looking to attract a more main stream audience from the very start. Once he had them there he gave them a product he felt would appeal to them and alot of the matches around this time weren't very good from a wrestling fans pov(there were of course some great matches in this era but the majority were throw away). Why? Because it wasnt't being booked for them.

Hulk Hogan was a huge part (in fact the main part) of the 80's explosion,and of course was another reason people wanted to watch mania 1 and the WWF in generel. But he had been made in the AWA. I actully saw his WWF return(he had prevouisly wrestled as a heel) when he ran in to aid Bob Backland and the place went nuts, so Vince didn't make him a star he already was one. Did Vince see the possabilty of making money and drawing with Hogan? Yes, but thats not the same as making them a star.

Wrestling then ceased to be "in" the audience dwindled and only the wrestling fans were left. However outside the main/semi main event spots they had loads of stupid characters and poor matches to sit though. Once again the product wasn't being booked for them. Then with the rise of WCW, fans had a chance to watch a show actully aimed at them! So they watched that and WWF floundered untill...

The Attitude era:Vince now had to booked a show aimed at the 18-34 demographic(which included the majority of "wrestling" fans). He didn't want to. On the Monday night wars DVD HBK talks about being fined for putting guaze down his pants, as Vince didn't like it. Yet when WWE started doing more of this sort of risky thing, they started fighting back.But again Vince had seen something that worked and ran with it. He didn't innovate it.

Steve Austin/The Rock: Vince didn't create these characters ethier. The Rock was lumbered with the white meat babyface character of "Rocky Mavia" and Austin was the ringmaster. This was just after Austin had cut all those great ECW promo's, so of course WWF gave him a mouthpeice (Ted Dibase) and he hardly spoke. HE came up with the "stone cold" gimmick and his(then) wife came up with the name! It's also worth remembering that Austin wasn't going to win KOTR 96,it was to be Triple H(This was changed due to the MSG incident). If fate had worked out diffrently Austin would have never said 3:16(it only really worked because of Jake "the Snakes" Born again character, I suppose it could have been worked into another interview but it never would have had the same impact) never have got the push and we might all be sitting here bitching about WCW. For the Rock he again came up with the shortened version of his name,started cutting great promo's(as opposed to the bland rubbish ones he cut as Mavia) and got himself over once again he was pushed by Vince, but not created by him.

So back to today. In these credit crunch times Vince is once again going for the(more profitable) family market again. His decesions have obvouisly worked as he's very rich and TNA aside(and thier audience is very small compared to wwe's,if they moved to a Monday and tried to compete with Raw they'd lose lots of viewers), has no competetion. However good business decesions haven't made for a better product from my point of view. AS someone earlyier pointed out the IWC only makes up for a very small portion of the WWE "universe" so it's the smart business move to book for the majority. It's just very fustrating for us.

A final thought for those who disagree that Vince isn't intrested in booking a "wrestling" show. A mandate was sent out to all commentaters telling them not to use the terms wrestling or wrestler on air. Don't tell me Vince is a "wrestling" genius.

 

[Viola Moonlight]

There's no one person that can make a good product now, at least not in the current state of wrestling. Good wrestling can still exist, but not under the current system in WWE.

Alas, my good friend. You seemed to have given up hope. In the history of the world, only minorities are the ones who have the ability to change the world for the better. The WWE is America, its fans are the people, the cabinet is the creative team & VKM is President George W. Bush. WWE needs a Barack Obama to come in, maybe join forces with a Hilary Clinton [hint, hint] & save WWE. I believe that one person that can make a good product now in its current state of wrestling has been stated in all of my posts in the form of a code.

325566

NB: Your awesome KB.

 

[Ambiguous Turd]

I don't really blame Steph,I blame Vince. The problem I have with Vince is he's not a wrestling man,he's a business man. The thing people on forums like this is Vince doesn't book for wrestling fans,and in truth he has never really wanted to.

Look at what's happened since Vince took over.

The 80's explosion: Wrestlemania one(which really kicked things off for the WWF,as it was then) was built around Celeberty invovlement of MTV stars to attract the young of that generation, so Vince was looking to attract a more main stream audience from the very start. Once he had them there he gave them a product he felt would appeal to them and alot of the matches around this time weren't very good from a wrestling fans pov(there were of course some great matches in this era but the majority were throw away). Why? Because it wasnt't being booked for them.

Hulk Hogan was a huge part (in fact the main part) of the 80's explosion,and of course was another reason people wanted to watch mania 1 and the WWF in generel. But he had been made in the AWA. I actully saw his WWF return(he had prevouisly wrestled as a heel) when he ran in to aid Bob Backland and the place went nuts, so Vince didn't make him a star he already was one. Did Vince see the possabilty of making money and drawing with Hogan? Yes, but thats not the same as making them a star.

Wrestling then ceased to be "in" the audience dwindled and only the wrestling fans were left. However outside the main/semi main event spots they had loads of stupid characters and poor matches to sit though. Once again the product wasn't being booked for them. Then with the rise of WCW, fans had a chance to watch a show actully aimed at them! So they watched that and WWF floundered untill...

The Attitude era:Vince now had to booked a show aimed at the 18-34 demographic(which included the majority of "wrestling" fans). He didn't want to. On the Monday night wars DVD HBK talks about being fined for putting guaze down his pants, as Vince didn't like it. Yet when WWE started doing more of this sort of risky thing, they started fighting back.But again Vince had seen something that worked and ran with it. He didn't innovate it.

Steve Austin/The Rock: Vince didn't create these characters ethier. The Rock was lumbered with the white meat babyface character of "Rocky Mavia" and Austin was the ringmaster. This was just after Austin had cut all those great ECW promo's, so of course WWF gave him a mouthpeice (Ted Dibase) and he hardly spoke. HE came up with the "stone cold" gimmick and his(then) wife came up with the name! It's also worth remembering that Austin wasn't going to win KOTR 96,it was to be Triple H(This was changed due to the MSG incident). If fate had worked out diffrently Austin would have never said 3:16(it only really worked because of Jake "the Snakes" Born again character, I suppose it could have been worked into another interview but it never would have had the same impact) never have got the push and we might all be sitting here bitching about WCW. For the Rock he again came up with the shortened version of his name,started cutting great promo's(as opposed to the bland rubbish ones he cut as Mavia) and got himself over once again he was pushed by Vince, but not created by him.

So back to today. In these credit crunch times Vince is once again going for the(more profitable) family market again. His decesions have obvouisly worked as he's very rich and TNA aside(and thier audience is very small compared to wwe's,if they moved to a Monday and tried to compete with Raw they'd lose lots of viewers), has no competetion. However good business decesions haven't made for a better product from my point of view. AS someone earlyier pointed out the IWC only makes up for a very small portion of the WWE "universe" so it's the smart business move to book for the majority. It's just very fustrating for us.

A final thought for those who disagree that Vince isn't intrested in booking a "wrestling" show. A mandate was sent out to all commentaters telling them not to use the terms wrestling or wrestler on air. Don't tell me Vince is a "wrestling" genius.[

Like I've said earlier, I agree that Stephanie is not the person to be finger-pointed whatsoever and that Vince McMahon is the correct person to blame. It's simply that for whatever reason, people are marks for the guy and can't bring themselves to accept that this Vince McMahon is still the same person that brought the WWF to the National level. I guess they just can't accept the fact that he's lost his touch, and can't bring themselves to criticize the man. So, it's more convenient simply to blame his daughter, despite knowing how hands on Vince is with the entire product to the point where he is even on headset each week with his commentators, despite the fact that all approves or rejects all scripts personally when in reality, Stephanie should be doing this on her own and Vince should be trusting her.

But obviously Vince is approving each and every one of these scripts so his judgment is that everything is fine. So, I don't know what else to say.

Anyway, I went off track and wanted to actually discuss about what was in bold. The ironic thing is that Vince's product today has been more wrestling-oriented since any other Era in WWE television ... probably since going back to the Hogan Era. Unfortunately, this Era doesn't really have gimmicks or anything, so I would have to take it back to before even that Era. This is a VERY wrestling-heavy, oriented product.

Basically, his product is now more wresting-oriented than ever before. He just apparently doesn't want to call it "wrestling". I guess that's nothing new as it was referred to as "Sports Entertainment" for at least little over a decade.

However, I would argue about his decisions and whether they have necessarily "worked" in converting his product and taking it into the heavily wrestling-oriented PG Era. Vince isn't a Billionaire anymore, and last I read, is valued at just over 600 Million. Obviously that hurts the man's ego not to be able to honestly refer to himself as that anymore, but that is his fault for not finding a way to give fans what they want.

As you correctly pointed out, Vince catered to the IWC, most of whom are the Ring of Honor type fans who want wrestling and only wrestling. And Vince has done that on 3 out of his 4 shows ... and has gone as far as eliminating real gimmick type characters, while replacing them with personalities (boring ones at that) ... with basically no storylines to place them in on any of the 4 shows, including Raw. Where as the characters and storylines personally get me into the feuds, which then get me into the matches .... Vince somehow took all of that away from even Raw, which explains why I hate that show, as well. Basically he has wrestlers come out and simply compete over contendership of a title, or feuding over the title. And to Vince, that should be enough of a reason to interest people. It isn't.

But again, the IWC ROH-bot fans are thrilled with what Vince has done to the product, and couldn't be happier. Now that they are seeing that wrestling by itself does not produce ratings, they want to blame everything else under the sun. That 4.5 rating should have been a huge wakeup call to Vince in what the fans want to see on Raw. That being interesting storylines. So we'll see. He didn't seem to take the hint last week, but we'll see next week when the Million Dollar Man is on. I've read the results and that show sounds ten times more interesting than what I read about this week and caught the first couple minutes of. I had to turn my TV off in the middle of Batista's promo, as it absolutely sucked. "A man of few words, folks."

As much as Vince involves himself in day to day affairs with Creative, he essentially is the true head of the Creative Team, not Stephanie. Therefore, the blame should be cast accordingly.