Winning tournaments does nothing for wrestlers

[Tastycles]

The WWE used to have King of the Ring, and TNA have had various tournaments over the years. Winning these events should be seen as a huge acheivement, but more often than not this has not been the case. D'Angelo Dinero won the recent tournament in TNA, but he seems to be falling by the wayside, and the fall from grace for Kaz who won a similar tournament in 2007 was huge, with him needing almost a full year away to restore momentum.

In WWF the original tournament was the Wrestling Classic that the Junkyard Dog won, and he went nowhere, as did Owen Hart, Mabel, Ken Shamrock and Billy Gunn who were four of the ten King of the ring winners.

I think promoters often believe that giving a midcarder a win in one of these tournaments can galvanise them and take them up to the next level. However, I don't think that it ever actually ends up working like that and that basically the only tournament winners that do well out of it are the people destined for the top anyway. I contend that winning tournaments does absolutely nothing to get a wrestler over in the long run.

I know the counter to this will be Austin's KOTR win in 1996, and while I'd agree that event made him popular, people remember the fact he cut an excelent promo on Jake Roberts that night and not that he beat Jake Roberts and Marvellous Marc Mero to win the title.

 

[Ruthless-RKO]

Not true, u mention KotR, this tournament put a lot of wrestlers on the map, back in the 90's it helped wrestlers elevate to the main event status also in the 00's, look at the wrestlers who won it and then look at their career following their win. You will be surprisd to learn the KotR has done a lot to help wrestlers. TBH that is the only tournament that has really meant something huge, unless im missing one.

 

[Ferbian]

I kinda agree, I don't believe the tournament in itself and the victory in it makes you any more of a star, it's how you win it most likely, and the way that you carry yourself afterwards, Austin got over insanely not due to the fact that he won the tournament if you ask me, but because of the promo that he cut afterward, Brock Lesnar didn't get over due to the victory of the tournament, but due to the fact that he destroyed everybody through it.

As I said, the tournaments does nothing, it's the means of which you win the tournament, so they could very well just have the winning wrestler tear through a roster, or defeat numerous people in a period of time rather than anything, and then it would come off in a better way if you ask me.

 

[Blade]

Those are some unfair examples. Shamrock left only a year after he won King of the Ring. Mabel got a WWF title shot and was feuding with Undertaker. But he crushed Undertaker's eye socket so his push was halted. Owen Hart was in the main event of Summerslam. Obviously they weren't going to put the title on him, the WWF was going through a bad time, they didn't even know if Bret Hart was going to be a success. Billy Gunn was shit. Like I said, some bad examples.

But like you said, most of the wrestlers that have won the King of the Ring are guys that are destined for the top anyway. Lesnar, Austin, Angle, Edge, Trips, blah blah.... But to say that the tournaments do nothing is just silly. Yeah, Austin got over because of his promo on the King of the Ring night. But winning the King of the Ring gave him the stage to cut that promo. If Triple H had won the tournament that year like he was supposed to, who knows how long it would've been before Austin had the opportunity to cut a promo like that. It may have been too late, the WWF might have already gone under by that time.

Maybe the tournaments don't make stars out of guys who weren't already destined for greatness. But it sure helps them get over. Or rather, gives them a stage on which to let them get themselves over.

 

[johnbragg]

There also has to be some effort into building up the tournament. Wrestling is fake, so no "accomplishment" is going to make a star out of someone who doesn't have that potential. Ask former world Champion the Great Khali.

But a tournament can definitely serve as a platform. KOTR used to be that platform. It took build, and time, but in 2001 Edge could cut a promo about how "Edge will not be Billy Gunned", meaning that his win would rank with Austin's and Angle's and not with Billy Gunn's or Mabel's. It didn't work out for Edge in 2001, but Jericho's title reign in 2001-02 didn't work out. Does that mean that world titles do nothing for wrestlers?

There has to be time and effort invested, though, in making a tournament seem important. It has to be believable that winning the "Bockwinkle Championship Series" is an important goal for pro wrestlers. That's very hard to do for the first one. It gets easier as the audience and the writers understand that the "BCS" leads, in turn, to a chance at some higher level.

 

[Da Prophet]

It dosen't do as much as it once did for sure.You can take the 2008 King of the Ring was a bad of a "Tournament" as you could get.They put Hornswoggle in a match and after that I could really never taker KOTR as a really tournament.TNA have a different tournament nearly every month.So why would it b special to win won?If you lose a shot at the X-Division Championship in about a month they will have a world Championship tournament.So yes they have launched stars with tournaments today because some companys have so many they mean just more than nothing.

 

[The Mark of Zur-En-Arrh]

If only KOTR was still an actual PPV like it used to be.

Much like the Rumble or Survivor Series, the KOTR was the perfect opportunity to show off a bunch of the weaker talent amongst some of the better mid-card talent, and give them all chance to show what they could do on PPV for a few minutes.

Look at how WWE managed to make everyone pay more attention to Sheamus, McIntyre and The Miz after their team won at Survivor Series last year. Miz did all the talking and then one more promo later in the show, and we get the first Irish champ and a new IC champ within 2 months.

KOTR did that for a bunch of guys too. The Harts, Austin, HHH, Angle, Edge, Lesnar, all were given the platform to boost themselves further.

Tastycles you used Owen Hart as an example of a guy who didn't go anywhere despite winning that tournament. Because he didn't get a main event push within a couple of years? How long was it before Edge became World champion after winning the KOTR? He won in '01 and didn't become champion until '06. Now, you'll say it was because KOTR did nothing for him and Edge was simply 'destined' to become a wrestling star, but i still think you'd be wrong. Edge didn't get a title shot because he was frequently injured. He broke his neck in '03 and had a significant injury mid year just about every other year between. But when he was healthy he was frequently winning mid-card titles (back when they meant something). He won the IC/US belt loads of times and even won the tag titles with Hulk Hogan. They wanted to push him but he repeatedly had to keep re-building his momentum as a result of injury, and it was really only thanks to fueding with HBK that he managed to develop the persona he's used pretty much ever since.

But before he won KOTR he was Edge of 'Edge and Christian', stuck in a tag team that was going to forever be crashing through tables and swinging chairs along with the Hardys and the Dudleys, if they didn't split up.

IMO, Owen Hart would have eventually stepped into the ME tier if event hadn't played out like they did. We'll never know, but if guys like Kane and JBL can get ME pushes when there's nothing special about them in the ring, then i'm certain Owen Hart would have eventually been World Champion, even if only for a month.

And you also have to think about the guys that lost in the finals of some KOTR's because it even put them on the map. Rikishi got a big rub from losing to Kurt Angle in 2000, otherwise he'd have been shaking his ass the whole time instead of getting the 'mow down Austin' angle and the fued with The Rock.

Obviously Angle losing to Edge was all part of his fued with Shane but still......

Foley losing to HHH kept him relevant for a while before finally cementing himself in the ME in late '98.

I can't speak for TNA's tournaments. WWE's used to mean something. Sure lots of guys didn't go anywhere, probably because they should never have won the tournament in the first place. Billy Gunn was the Shelton Benjamin of the late 90's. 'Most athletically gifted blah blah blah' Mable, became freaking Viscera, disapeared and then came back..... AS Viscera, and then FINALLY got his most workable gimmick in Big Daddy V, and they released him. But seriously did they really think they were going to get another Yukozuna out of Mable?

I whole heartedly agree with Blade, that the KOTR was the means to get the spotlight on you, and make the fans want it to stay on you. The guys who didn't do that either had the 'Carlito approach' of 'I win one significant match and expect everything to be handed to me' or simply had no talent to begin with, except in Vince McMahon's warped opinion.