I've seen a lot of threads lately discussing what is wrong with Wrestling these days? Some argue the Attitude Era killed wrestling, some think the IWC and spoilers killed wrestling, there are several different theories. The fact is, the current product is "struggling" right now because the people doing are simply not as good as the people that did it before.
No matter which theory you personally subscribe to, you have to accept that as a symptom rather than the cause. I will make a concession myself.
It is harder to have a successful and entertaining product today than it was 20 years ago. Part of this is because the business has been exposed. Part of this is because the increased television time, and PPV slots to fill. Part of this is even because of the invention of HD creating the necessity to for moves to be crisper to look realistic. And while it is more difficult to create entertainment for these reasons, none of the reasons are the cause, again, they are symptoms.
To me, the biggest talent disparity between today and 20 years ago is the announcers. There was a thread a few months ago criticizing the work of Gorilla Monsoon. I grew up with Gorilla and am fond of his work as a result. But again, I'm willing to make a concession. Monsoon was not as talented of a play by play guy as Jim Ross.
But Monsoon was very effective at getting over angles. And while his PBP was not up to par for today's standards, there are no color commentators as good as guys like Bobby Heenan and Jesse the Body. It does not matter which announcing team the WWF threw out there in the 80's and early 90's, the banter between Monsoon or McMahon or whoever was on PBP and the color guy was fantastic.
I've been watching old PPV's in order from Wrestlemania 3 recently, and the commentary units as a whole were vastly superior back in the day.
The next biggest talent disparity can be found with the wrestlers themselves. I feel safe in saying that todays wrestlers are more athletic, take higher risks, and generally do more complex moves than their 80's counterparts. Yet despite of all this, their matches for the most part are not as entertaining.
20 years ago everything a wrestler did meant something. It is interesting to go back and watch a match build, and take notes of how many closed fist punches were thrown compared today, and what juncture of the match the first one was thrown. They meant something. Watch when the first bump was. Watch when 3 bumps in quick succession was the highspot of the match. These things are executed differently these days, and not in the most a good way.
In addition, many of these wrestlers are too green and inexperienced to tell a good story, or cut a good promo, which is why the are working harder to less of a reaction.
There is also a huge talent disparity as far as who is booking the show.
In some cases, the bookers are the same, which could be part of the problem. Too often angles are hot-shotted and poorly put together. While there are far more PPVs today than 20 years ago. But where is there a rule stating a storyline has to start and end within the boundary of 1 pay per view? Recently they gave Jericho/Michaels several months and it has been the best feud in a long time, IMO. There are ways through known allies, stables, managers, to have wrestlers involved with each-other, without putting them in the ring. Fans used to WANT to see a specific match. Wrestlers were kept apart from each other until fans were salivating to see it. Through creative booking the match used to sell itself, where as now they plug it at every opportunity they get for a ridiculous price +10 for HD. I'm not going to harp on brand extension, but I'm not accepting that there are too many superstars to be on one show. Part of a way to carry on an angle would be to not feature every star every week. Sure we all want to see Triple H every week, but holding him out just to further an angle every once in a while would go a long way in creating a larger demand. It would also give more television time to mid-card performers that have no real gimmicks or hot angles or feuds going on.
People talk a lot about the lack of importance of the midcard belts these days, but thats because mid-card workers themselves are unimportant. Again, a symptom. Very rarely are they unique or well-developed characters that the fans really care about. This is a combination of the talent being called up too soon, and creative not being really creative. When the proper time was devoted to the midcard, people cared about it. I really like what I've seen out of Kofi Kingston as a wrestler, but I've seen no development of his character since his debut and no real reason to care about him. Some of the most interesting angles to me as a kid were the mid-card feud.
Another symptom is tag-team wrestling, which because tag-teams rarely main event is essentially because of the erosion of detail when it comes to the mid-card.
People want to blame the IWC but there have been "smarks" for a lot longer than the internet has been around. And even when it was just Bob Ryder and a few of us other geeks on Prodigy spoilers were out there. I would even argue that the IWC helped further the Attitude Era as much as the Attitude Era helped furhter the IWC.
You don't like wrestling as much anymore because you read spoilers or you knew Christian was going to debut. You don't like it as much anymore because it simply isn't as good.
No matter which theory you personally subscribe to, you have to accept that as a symptom rather than the cause. I will make a concession myself.
It is harder to have a successful and entertaining product today than it was 20 years ago. Part of this is because the business has been exposed. Part of this is because the increased television time, and PPV slots to fill. Part of this is even because of the invention of HD creating the necessity to for moves to be crisper to look realistic. And while it is more difficult to create entertainment for these reasons, none of the reasons are the cause, again, they are symptoms.
To me, the biggest talent disparity between today and 20 years ago is the announcers. There was a thread a few months ago criticizing the work of Gorilla Monsoon. I grew up with Gorilla and am fond of his work as a result. But again, I'm willing to make a concession. Monsoon was not as talented of a play by play guy as Jim Ross.
But Monsoon was very effective at getting over angles. And while his PBP was not up to par for today's standards, there are no color commentators as good as guys like Bobby Heenan and Jesse the Body. It does not matter which announcing team the WWF threw out there in the 80's and early 90's, the banter between Monsoon or McMahon or whoever was on PBP and the color guy was fantastic.
I've been watching old PPV's in order from Wrestlemania 3 recently, and the commentary units as a whole were vastly superior back in the day.
The next biggest talent disparity can be found with the wrestlers themselves. I feel safe in saying that todays wrestlers are more athletic, take higher risks, and generally do more complex moves than their 80's counterparts. Yet despite of all this, their matches for the most part are not as entertaining.
20 years ago everything a wrestler did meant something. It is interesting to go back and watch a match build, and take notes of how many closed fist punches were thrown compared today, and what juncture of the match the first one was thrown. They meant something. Watch when the first bump was. Watch when 3 bumps in quick succession was the highspot of the match. These things are executed differently these days, and not in the most a good way.
In addition, many of these wrestlers are too green and inexperienced to tell a good story, or cut a good promo, which is why the are working harder to less of a reaction.
There is also a huge talent disparity as far as who is booking the show.
In some cases, the bookers are the same, which could be part of the problem. Too often angles are hot-shotted and poorly put together. While there are far more PPVs today than 20 years ago. But where is there a rule stating a storyline has to start and end within the boundary of 1 pay per view? Recently they gave Jericho/Michaels several months and it has been the best feud in a long time, IMO. There are ways through known allies, stables, managers, to have wrestlers involved with each-other, without putting them in the ring. Fans used to WANT to see a specific match. Wrestlers were kept apart from each other until fans were salivating to see it. Through creative booking the match used to sell itself, where as now they plug it at every opportunity they get for a ridiculous price +10 for HD. I'm not going to harp on brand extension, but I'm not accepting that there are too many superstars to be on one show. Part of a way to carry on an angle would be to not feature every star every week. Sure we all want to see Triple H every week, but holding him out just to further an angle every once in a while would go a long way in creating a larger demand. It would also give more television time to mid-card performers that have no real gimmicks or hot angles or feuds going on.
People talk a lot about the lack of importance of the midcard belts these days, but thats because mid-card workers themselves are unimportant. Again, a symptom. Very rarely are they unique or well-developed characters that the fans really care about. This is a combination of the talent being called up too soon, and creative not being really creative. When the proper time was devoted to the midcard, people cared about it. I really like what I've seen out of Kofi Kingston as a wrestler, but I've seen no development of his character since his debut and no real reason to care about him. Some of the most interesting angles to me as a kid were the mid-card feud.
Another symptom is tag-team wrestling, which because tag-teams rarely main event is essentially because of the erosion of detail when it comes to the mid-card.
People want to blame the IWC but there have been "smarks" for a lot longer than the internet has been around. And even when it was just Bob Ryder and a few of us other geeks on Prodigy spoilers were out there. I would even argue that the IWC helped further the Attitude Era as much as the Attitude Era helped furhter the IWC.
You don't like wrestling as much anymore because you read spoilers or you knew Christian was going to debut. You don't like it as much anymore because it simply isn't as good.
