WWE is thinking: "Anything you can do, we can do better."

[D-Man]

It's been done since the beginning of time. Wrestling promotions see an idea used by another promotion, put their spin on it, and make it either better or worse. Some examples of this in the past have been.

Ideas made worse - AWA's vs. WWE's version of the Weasel Suit
Back in the AWA, Bobby Heenan was given the moniker of "Weasel" by their loyal fans. So Bobby and Verne Gagne came up with the idea of an angle that involved Bobby Heenan to wear a "weasel suit" if he lost a match. It generated good rating on ESPN and a lot of chatter amongst the fans.

Vince McMahon decided to use this angle in the WWE, only this time he made the mistake of pairing Heenan against the Ultimate Warrior. Due to Warrior's complete lack of depth, in-ring skill, acting skills, and personality, the angle was a complete waste of time.

Ideas made better - ECW vs. WWE's version of a Crucifixion
Many of you probably recall a story that Kurt Angle told about ECW... he visited the ECW Arena to view the show with possible interest in joining the promotion. However, his decision became easy, once he witnessed a very risque angle. Raven was wrapped up in a feud with the Sandman that culminated in a public crucifixion that didn't go over well with Angle... nor did it with the live crowd or the majority of the viewers. It was so bad that Raven had to come out later on in the evening to give a public apology for his actions.

The WWE decided that, if done correctly, this angle could be a success. So, they decided to make sure that their top stars would be involved. Bring in Steve Austin, the Undertaker, and a cult faction called the Ministry and you've got yourself a successful angle. Austin was crucified by the Undertaker on live television. But instead of using the Catholic cross, the WWE decided to use the Undertaker's symbol of power, instead.


I believe that the WWE is at it, once again. They spotted a very smart idea from another popular promotion, took its bare form, added a few elements, put their twist on it, and created gold. Of course, I'm talking about:

Team Laycool

vs.

The Beautiful People

I know what you're all saying... "There'z no comparisonz!! Teh Beutiful Peoplez iz, like, 20-timz hottr thn Team LayCoolz!!!" But that goes without question. It also has nothing to do with the point of this thread. I'm referring to the fact that in present day pro-wrestling, Team LayCool has finally surpassed The Beautiful People when it comes to relevance in the wrestling world.

I doubt that I need to give all of you a backstory, but here goes anyway...

The Beautiful People
The Beautiful People faction was a BRILLIANT concept created by the powers that be at TNA management. It started off with humble beginnings, just as every great, original idea normally does. In December of 2007 (at TNA's Turning Point PPV), Velvet Sky and Angelina Love were paired together as a tag team which was aptly named "Velvet Love Entertainment." After seeing the great crowd reaction from their entrance, TNA decided to run with the idea and rename the women "The Beautiful People."

Sky and Love ran with this idea in every way imaginable, entertaining us with their bitchy antics. They began by enhancing their ring entrance to consist of a stripper-esque pose-fest. This was followed by placing paper bags over their fallen opponents' heads after their matches. Not so long after, they began using "hairspray" as a foreign object during matches to steal wins.

The Beautiful People were on such a roll that they normally had the highest rated segments on the broadcasts of TNA Impact. They were given another member in Madison Rayne. Their merchandise was selling like hotcakes. Men around the world swooned at their ring entrance. And they finally gained the TNA Knockouts championship after Angelina Love gained a pinfall over Awesome Kong.

Unfortunately, not too long after and due to visa issues, Love was forced to be written out of TBP faction since she could no longer compete with TNA wrestling until her visa issues were cleared up. In the meantime, Love and Rayne were forced to carry TBP torch alone... or at least until they picked up a new member in Lacey Von Erich on October 1st, 2009.

Since then, TBP has become a bland shadow of its former self. The faction is nowhere near as interesting as it used to be. No members of the faction have any impressive skills in the ring and Lacey is as useful as tits on a bull. They were given the TNA Knockout tag titles in a last ditch attempt to make them interesting again, but have been unsuccessful thus far. Basically, The Beautiful People have gone from dining at fine restaurants to eating off the dollar menu at Mickey D's.

Team Laycool
Team LayCool was the WWE's answer to TBP. Michelle McCool and Layla El first teamed up in June of 2009 on Smackdown. After a few tag matches together, the October 2009 Divas trade, and as the WWE began to notice their chemistry build, they were thrown into the mix of a very involved feud with Mickie James. Hence, the "Piggy James" segment was born. This is when Team LayCool decided to enhance their look by adding matching ring attire and were placed in many backstage segments to hype up the new feud with Mickie James.

So, for the first time in years, the women's division was thrown an in-depth storyline involving their top female babyface and top female heels. Shortly after the feud began, Vickie Guerrero decided to get herself in the middle of the struggle between LayCool and James, thus siding with Team LayCool. This feud continued for close to four months, which made it one of the longest lasting feuds of the women's division in the last five years. After McCool regained the WWE Women's title back in February, the Piggy James feud finally started to dissolve.

Recently, Team LayCool got themselves involved with Beth Phoenix, and after a few more women's title changes, Layla El captured her first women's championship by pinning Beth Phoenix last week on Smackdown. This past Monday night on Raw, Team Laycool appeared on the broadcast. Only this time, not only did Layla sport her new women's championship title belt during Laycool's entrance, but they revealed duplicate women's titles around both their waists. In my eyes, this is a direct mockery or a direct "one-up" of the TNA Knockouts titles that are currently around the waists of The Beautiful People.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I feel these events are the WWE's way of saying to TNA, "Anything you can do, I can do better." The WWE one-upped TNA by creating Team Laycool in comparison with The Beautiful People. They split the women's championship between the members of Team Laycool to mimic TBP's use of spreading the tag titles between the three members.

Granted, if The Beautiful People didn't go through such a downward spiral (along with the majority of the mishaps and decline of TNA's programming and writing), I'm sure they would still be the superior women's faction in the world of professional wrestling. But let's face it, the WWE has clearly surpassed them now.

What do you guys think? Am I right about this one? Do you disagree? Please give explanations behind all of your answers.

 

[Ferbian]

I know what you're all saying... "There'z no comparisonz!! Teh Beutiful Peoplez iz, like, 20-timz hottr thn Team LayCoolz!!!"

Arguable, kill me if you want, but on an off note, I'd rather do both of LayCool than I'd do The Beautiful People (unless you include Lacey)

On to topic:

Yes, I think the comparison is very well there, the whole "Perfection" thing is there, the group in itself, the championships are there, the thing with the Mickie James angle as opposed to the whole thing The Beautiful People had with the bags over their heads.

I do definitely agree with you, while I sincerely doubt that WWE can capitalize on the popularity that The Beautiful People has gathered, mostly due to the edginess of The Beautiful People as opposed to LayCool being, well a more heel like PG thing.

From a heel concept, I think WWE definitely overdid TNA with LayCool, and success wise you could argue as well that they succeeded, although the whole part of the popularity behind the groups as to the point where they actually draw, WWE has yet to cough up anything to overdo the TNA version, but again, that is most likely due to the edginess of TNA's version as opposed to the fact that I really do believe that WWE would be showing clean improvements if LayCool was to become edgy, to say the least I would be eagerly awaiting their arrival at each WWE Smackdown taping.

I think LayCool has great potential to eventually become a better version of The Beautiful People, it's all about time, but right now, TNA is putting on the better version.

 

[Schizophrenic]

I agree that WWE seems to have that way of thinking. And as good and great as the angles can be they sometimes seem to come off as cheap ripoffs. I know many who still call Lay-Cool "Beautiful People Lite". Same goes for the Heenan/Warrior angle with the weasel suit. It's interesting though that there are some WWE die hards who really have it engrained in their heads that whatever WWE does it's better and was done first by them when it's been decided that the original was better. I still just roll my eyes when I look at WCW Thunder videos on youtube and people write "LOLZ Thunda wz a SmackDown Rpoff!" It boggles my mind that people have this idea that WWE always has an idea and someone else copies it. WWE has honestly taken more angles and gimmicks than they ever created. But that's the way of the buisness. Although it's irritating that some seem to think that if TNA does something WWE has done than it's a horrible thing and another strike to TNA but if WWE rips off any other company (old or new) then it's ok cause "it's wwe." If one company is guilty of ripping shit off and gets crap for it than every company should.

 

[shattered dreams]

I am not sure how this is a "one-up." Most of your case about how good LayCool is draws on comparison between what they have done in WWE womens division relative to what was there before. So I am a little confused how the poor state of WWE's division prior serves as evidence of one upping a team that competes in TNA. I have not been following LayCool much so I can only comment so much on them, so feel free to dispute some of my comments about them. However, unless something drastically changed with Layla then I seriously doubt she is "interesting in the ring," while Madison Rayne absolutely is a good worker. Velvet Sky is the best of those mentioned on the mic and is often the victim of overstated negatives about her in-ring work, IMO at least as good to probably better than Layla. TBP benefit from what others are calling allowed "edginess." As long as this is the case they are going to be sexier, which is important to the look but can't touch part of the gimmick, and have better "bitchy" actions. So to me it is more like WWE took an idea and got something arguably useful out of it but this LayCool thing is not better than TBP.

 

[Tastycles]

The difference between the WWE and their rivals generally comes down to the fact that WWE's gimmicks fit the moulds better. The Beautiful People was a fine example of how to do it when they put Sky an Love together initially. The chemistry shared was obvious. However, Madison Rayne really doesn't fit the bill, and Lacey Von Erich doesn't belong anywhere in wrestling, so the angle has become diluted.

Over on Smackdown, Layla El, who is probably in my top 5 workers in the WWE right now, an Michelle McCool have been able to get heat close to the original BP, without needing to be as risque. The reason? Firstly they are both more attractive than the BP. Secondly, they have similar chemistry, and thirdly they just look the part. Michelle McCool looks like a bitchy bully and Layla looks like a sidekick.

You can look at these sorts of things throughout time. The WWE just knows and has always known, by and large, which wrestlers will fit in a gimmick. If you compare the nWo to DX, they actually ended up lasting as long as each other, but people always say the former lasted to long. Why? Well, put simply, the WWF knew that the four wrestlers in DX were far more interesting as a quartet and played off each other well enough to form a brilliant group. Conversely, WCW started with something better and ended with something worse.

I think ultimately and historically, that is what has made the WWE the best promotion in the world. They know their talent. One only has to look at how much better Foley, Austin, Hart and Hennig fitted into McMahon's vision than Bischoff's for evidence of that. If Michelle McCool got released tomorrow, the WWE would forget about this angle and try and find something else, all to often other promotions try and shoehorn other workers into the angle in their places. The WWE is not always an innovator, but if they do copy someone else, they generally plan it out much better, and never put the cart before the horse.

 

[Ruthless-RKO]

Another they did was DX to NWO...they thought why not, both IMO where good stables.

I believe when you talking about TBP, if anything TNA copied WWE, remember VKM's group of girls, i don't know what they were called but I do remember Candice being in it, not sure about anyone else, i think Torrie aswell.. So that covers that, as for now the Lay-Cool is a blatant counter to TBP, they call themselves Simply Flawless, IMO, both groups are hot, I wouldn't just choose one.
Even if WWE do get ideas of other promotions, they make them work, some better than their rivals..Give them credit for that.

 

[TheMainEvent]

I agree to some extent that at times WWE tries to "outdo" TNA. Look at recent examples of LayCool and the Beautiful People. TNA has an all cage PPV and WWE has a main event cage match on the same months PPV. TNA has the King of the Mountain 6-man ladder match mainevent in June and WWE has the Money in the Bank ladder match mainevent in June, etc...

 

[maar130]

I really think that the concept was made before but if anything WWE got the concept from TNA, which probably got it from the "Minnesota Home wrecking crew" which is an stable from the indies that was formed by Rain (Payton Banks in TNA) and Lacey (from ROH), a team of Beautiful (Certainly not as hot as any of the groups previously mentioned) and anoying girls, which had really good chemistry in the ring.


Lay-Cool is a good remake of the Original BP, I mean the in ring skills are were a little even with Angelina and Michelle being pretty even when it comes to ring skills, I mean Angelina in my view is better in ring worker but as a face she has had the same evolution that Michelle had, they are not given or does not give enough of a character for people to care that much about them, and therefore stars to lose spark, which is a shame because given the right direction as face they can actually do wonders, specially Angelina, and if you don't believe me about Michelle, just check that at some point she wa so over as face that they put Palumbo along with her to give him momemtum so he could get over, that it didn't work is another issue.

On Layla, she serves as puching back very well, by no means a believable World champion because of the way she was built (losing all the time and cleanly to everyone), the same can be said about Velvet Sky, who is slightly better than Layla due experience in the business but by not means spectacular, her forte is the mick but her in-ring skills are average at best and sorry kids but just look at the matches and yes, with less experience Michelle is far better than Velvet, still no Angelina but better than Velvet.

The current BP is a shadow of what they were and eventhough Madison is the better of the group, still as acharacter has to prove being a champion (since I thing she has only won 2 matches before getting the belt), her victory angainst Tara was a good step on that direction but still a long road a head. The tag titles are a joke since there are only two teams in the Whole TNA, Sarita and Taylor and TBP and only like 10 KOs.

Is Lay-cool betther thant the BP? No, not at all but WWE is capitalizing on that Idea way better that TNA is doing it right now.