The Wrath of Tito - RAW review, WWE vs. UFC, HBK, ECW, more
Submitted by Mr. Tito on Tuesday, September 20, 2005 at 2:40 PM EST
Welcome to the Wrath of Tito, the column that has honestly critiqued the wrestling industry for almost 7 years now. Great feedback keeps pouring in about the Unions and Winner's Curse columns, probably moreso with the Winner's Curse. I personally thought that the unions one was a better column, but the readers enjoyed the second one better. Fair enough. With the Unions column, most agreed with my points with the exception of the sociology crowd (not saying that's a bad thing). It's mostly taking into account the need for a union to back up the emotional distress that wrestlers suffer from being on the road. One reader pointed out an interview with Roddy Piper where he'd return from a night of wrestling to his hotel, only to break down and cry. The emotional wreck that wrestlers suffer through by being on the road most of the year, away from their families, trying to measure up physically, and dealing with the pain. It could very well lead to many wrestler deaths after the WWE.
With the Winner's Curse column, someone brought up a great point about why maybe the WWE's ratings have dropped since 2000. Teenagers and young adults have a lot of choices on entertainment these days. DVD sales are going through the roof, there are 3 video game systems to always play, and many channels to watch on cable television. Maybe there's too much to do? I don't know, but I figure my discussion about wrestling trends might have covered this, given that many fans have moved on to other forms of entertainment?
Regardless, great feedback on both. I've been scrambling to look for a topic to cover in the near future. Right now, however, I'm back to work after a nice 2 week vacation and short on time. I'm teaching a statistics course this quarter and I have to use Microsoft Excel quite often. Just to brush up on Excel, since I haven't honestly used it in about 5 years (I've used other, more powerful, statistical packages), I'm plugging in wrestling data. I'm attempting to statistically prove why the WWE's ratings have changed. WWE RAW rating will be my dependent variable while I'm testing it against quarterly dummy variables, Monday Night Football, WCW while it was around, among other things (anybody with regression experience could suggest a variable or two, I'd be happy). I'm also going to test if Triple H was a draw as World Champion in a statistical fashion. Yeah, it's sick, but it's helping me brush up on using Microsoft Excel.
-The BIG NEWS OF THE WEEK continues to be the new Monday Night WAR brewing between USA Networks and Spike TV. The TNA commercials all over RAW is just too hard to swallow by the WWE and they aren't even allowed to advertise their move to USA Networks on RAW. The WWE has less than 2 weeks to teach fans that they are moving back to USA Networks. Many suggest that the 3rd hour added to RAW was just a response to UFC. Actually, it's smarter than you think! Say you're waiting for RAW to come and you're flipping through channels from 8-9pm. You happen to tune into the first hour of WWE programming and wonder what's up. This could cause you to keep watching and suddenly realize the move back to USA Networks. This could also make you become baffled and check your local listings to see what's up with the WWE on USA Networks. I know I flip around a lot during the 8-9pm hour before RAW comes on, and I'm assuming that's the same thing with a lot of viewers as well.
As you can clearly see, the WWE is beefing up their October 3 show to be almost Pay Per View like. Many older stars are coming back for the show, such as HHH, Foley, Hogan, and Austin. The WWE is quickly putting together a what-they-perceive to be a supercard of wrestling matches (I like the "Loser Leaves RAW" match between Hardy and Edge, but Bischoff vs. Cena? Who cares about that?), while aptly naming the event "RAW Homecoming". Not only in the sense of many wrestlers coming "home" to the WWE, but for the WWE returning "home" to USA Networks. USA Networks was huge for the WWE for almost 20 years. They gave the WWE a strong cable television home in addition to their many syndicated shows out there. They gave the WWE prime time slots on Monday nights for "Prime Time Wrestling" and later "Monday Night RAW". When WCW was kicking the WWE's ass in 1997, USA gave the WWE the earlier starting times and later a second hour to be positioned to compete with WCW.
USA Networks is handled with much more class than any Viacom channel. USA Networks knew how to showcase the WWE and make it presentable in the fashion that newer fans might want to tune in. On Spike TV, it was a total mess. Viacom quickly pulled the plug on advertising WWE on their other networks and threw all kinds of shit at the wall to see what would stick (also called Spike TV original shows). Mtv doesn't play music, Nickelodeon is all cartoons (no good shows any longer, like Alex Mack and Salute Your Shorts!), VH1 is either hit or miss (seriously, who watched Kept?), and Spike TV is in its third renaming in the last 6 years. Spike better thank the lucky stars that they got the rights to CSI reruns or their nightly ratings would be in the tank!
I honestly believe that Spike TV is taking a big gamble on pushing Ultimate Fighting Championship. I just do... competitive fighting sports tend to lose their sizzle over time. People keep insisting that the government shut UFC down from Pay Per Views, but if you look at the buyrate trends, UFC isn't that great of a draw on Pay Per View. By checking out THIS LINK, you'll see it took older names like Tito Ortiz or Ken Shamrock to draw something over 100,000 buys. Otherwise, the buys are very minimal. WWE does 200,000 or more buys and they run 2 Pay Per Views monthly. The highest buyrates from the earliest events where UFC 5 and 6 and who main evented? Ken Shamrock.
I don't believe that UFC has the goods to really compete with the WWE on the male audience. I really don't. They lack that big name that would draw everyone into one of their shows. I couldn't tell you a single guy who competes in UFC right now and I'm as casual of a fan of mixed martial arts that you can get. I don't even follow boxing any longer, but at least I KNOW some of the names of the top guys in that sport. UFC needs a star or a draw and present something other than two guys beating the shit out of each other in an octogon. While I do believe they'll take a share of the male audience away from the WWE, they won't defeat the WWE in the ratings on a regular basis. If anything, it would lower the WWE to a 3.0-3.5 ratings range on a regular basis. I would personally put NWA-TNA on the timeslot instead of UFC. UFC has the problem of just being about the fighting, whereas wrestling is also about the fighting, but the chaos the ensues before the fight. Plus, I don't see anybody running into an octogon with a steel chair or someone holding the tights to get a pin.
But if UFC grows and grows and eventually unseats WWE on Monday Nights, I'll gladly eat some crow.
-You just gotta love Sean Waltman. He's actually in a bargaining position between TNA and the WWE for whatever reason, and when being booked for TNA's Pay Per View, he no showed! Now, I actually hope that he only no showed the TNA Pay Per View because the WWE snatched him up (though I don't want to see him in the WWE). I sincerely hope that old habits didn't catch up to Waltman after supposedly straightening up his life. Regardless, he just burned down the bridge in TNA, so thus his only option is the WWE and they can lowball him on a deal now. Good one, Waltman. You continue to fuck up opportunity after opportunity. You wonder why you can't stay in a promotion for longer than 4 years at a time.
-I believe people are looking more into Shawn Michaels tantrums than they should. It's been reported that HBK blew up at the creative team after being put with Chris Masters after wrestling and putting Hulk Hogan over cleanly at Summerslam (but HBK later apologized). I completely understand HBK's position. For the entire year on RAW, nobody has outperformed Shawn Michaels. He could be potentially hitting another prime in his career. The creative team and Vince McMahon became total "yes men" for Hulk Hogan and never even came close to demanding anything less than what Hogan wanted. Hogan wanted a clean win at Summerslam and it was granted. If there was to be a rematch, Hogan wanted to win that match too. NOBODY EVEN GAVE SHAWN MICHAELS A BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT! Seriously, this is a man who has put on the best matches in the WWE for the last 3 years. He's wrestling with a fused back for Christ's sake and was told to never wrestle again by doctors. My spinal chord is fused to and if you only knew the lack of flexibility we can have compared to others. I usually get lower back and neck pains, so you can imagine what Michaels feels by taking bump after bump in the ring.
Michaels deserves better. In fact, if I were the WWE right now, I would have given Kurt Angle the title and had a face Shawn Michaels chase him. Those are two of the very best characters and performers on RAW right now, and they have 2 great matches to back up what a legitimate title match they could have. Their match would be a huge draw on Pay Per View, just as it helped to boost the Pay Per View where Batista vs. HHH Hell in the Cell match was about to stink up the place. Instead, we must push John Cena who can't back up his "cool" or "hip" personality in the ring. Instead, we must push "Triple H", who has been World Champion for the majority of the time that the WWE has sunk in the ratings on Spike TV. Make sense?
-A big "I told you so" should come my way when advertising revenues for UPN's Thursday night programming came in. The WWE was only commanding $30,500 per 30 second commercial spot last year and they were a proven commodity. For "Everybody Hates Chris", UPN is receiving a cool $178,000 per 30 second commercial spot. Everybody Hates Chris could become a total bust, yet it commands a higher advertising rate than UPN's top rated show, Smackdown. Utterly amazing. I told everyone that WWE receives a lower advertising rate than other shows with lower ratings. All of the other UPN shows to fill up the remainder of the Thursday night line up will also have higher advertising rates than the WWE. WWE, thanks to the PTC, ratings studies on income demographics, and just the overall lack of respect that pro wrestling gets through the media, cannot command high advertising rates despite its high ratings. Viacom should have realized that 5 years ago, but as I've said before, that is a very messy media conglomerate.
I will predict, however, that "Everybody Hates Chris" will be HUGE on UPN. I'm serious... the art of the sitcom has been lost in the fold of reality shows or dramas. I can remember back in the day when I'd watch various sitcoms nightly with my family. Now, there are barely any sitcoms around to choose from. I figure this show will be not only huge with UPN's built in urban audience, but it will be a mainstream success. It just seems well put together and it could outdraw Smackdown by millions upon millions of viewers over time. UPN was smart moving Smackdown to Friday nights. WWE was taking up 2 prime hours on the same night with the most television viewers out there. Thursday nights have been historically the most watched prime time night of the week and UPN, led by Viacom, should have known this ahead of time.
-I actually bought the Hardcore Homecoming DVD. I kept quiet about it since I didn't want the source shut down before they could ship it to me. I'm getting the sense that Hardcore Homecoming won't be allowed to hit store shelves, ever. I figure the WWE will take legal action to keep blocking it from shelves, suggesting that the event had the persona of being "ECW like". The only real thing I saw that used ECW copyrighted stuff was Tracy Smothers and JT Smith wearing "Full Blooded Italian" shirts, which I guarantee the WWE has trademarked. Outside of that, Styles and other former ECW wrestlers were very careful not to utter the letters "ECW". I do have to wonder, however, how many ECW gimmicks that the WWE has actually trademarked. I'm guessing that the WWE will find something in this event to keep the DVD from being placed on shelves in stores, nationwide.
You can buy it, however, if you CLICK HERE. If you are an ECW diehard, I suggest you BUY NOW because your opportunity to own a copy of this show might be disappearing.
My thoughts on the show? Piss-poor production is my biggest criticism. The graphics weren't bad, but the audio on many things were horrible! The mixing of wrestler themes away from the DVD sounds much worse than the One Night Stand DVD, and the P.A. system was one of the worst I've ever heard on a wrestling show. You could barely make out a single word uttered by any of the wrestlers all night long. Otherwise, the good ol' ECW feel was there and the fans were rabid as usual.
One Night Stand had better wrestling, though. With Hardcore Homecoming's wrestlers, you could really see how injuries and age have taken their tolls on the wrestlers. Nobody even compared to going all out like Tanaka and Awesome did on One Night Stand. Of course, One Night Stand had the benefit of having wrestlers in much better shape physically and guys who were more pure wrestlers than just wrestling the hardcore style.
The best part of the DVD, however, was hearing the wrestlers talk between matches. There were sitdown interviews throughout the DVD and the wrestlers gave their good insights into doing the show and their ECW careers. Funk's comments were especially good and telling from an ECW standpoint.
Do I recommend this DVD? Only if you're a big ECW fan. Otherwise, buy One Night Stand.
-I did NOT catch Unforgiven, by the way. Good to see Ric Flair accomplish the WWE triple crowd, although it's not as meaningful as it once was before the brand split and several dissolvings of the Intercontinental Title. Flair seems to be working quite well with Carlito and Carlito seems to be learning a lot of in-ring stuff during this feud. About time that the WWE got serious about the tag team division again, as Trevor Murdoch and Lance Cade won the tag titles. GOOD. Now, build up some strong face teams to allow the tag division to once again be somewhat of a draw in the midcard. WWE, in my mind, is making a big mistake by keeping the World Title on a very weak champion in John Cena. It's better suited on a strong heel. If necessary, rebuild John Cena up in the ring and then make him defeat Kurt Angle LATER. With Angle not winning the title, I'm quickly beginning to sense that Triple H will be up next for John Cena. Talk about some horribly worked matches!
-I completely GET the thinking behind the WWE's latest effort to push Big Show as a specialty act. People used to marvel at the size of Andre the Giant and his freakish stature helped to draw big crowds, even without the benefit of television. Though Big Show has been overexposed, I absolute get what the WWE wants to do with him. They are making him fan friendly and pushing more about his freakish size. I'd push harder to get him on Leno, Letterman, or Conan (he's a regular on Conan, actually), as well as other venues to display his massive size. Once you build up the fans' trust for several years, you can do the same exact thing that you did with Andre in 1987. Turn him heel! The problem with Big Show is that he's flip flopped from heel to face on a matter of weeks. The best use of Big Show was in 2002 when he was traded to Smackdown. I thoroughly enjoyed his feud with Brock Lesnar and Show was finally made into the scary monster as advertised.
-Odd how the WWE is getting permission to produce Scott Hall/Razor Ramone and Kevin Nash/Diesel figures. I'm sure it's the right thing to do professionally, out of respect for two guys who have been successful in pro wrestling, but did the WWE care about being professional in 1996 with Fake Diesel and Fake Razor? I have to wonder about the WWE's position on Scott Hall and Kevin Nash, both of whom were total BUSTS when they returned to the WWE in 2002. What does the WWE owe them? They already paid those guys well for not delivering. Why not just put out Razor Ramone and Diesel figures from Jakks and not get permission. You can do that, for the WWE owns both of those characters. Neither guy stepped up to the plate in 2002 and even made "cents" of the large amount they were paid, so why give them a dime now over action figures?
-And finally... Before, I suggested that TNA should be on Monday Nights instead of UFC... I don't know. Jeff Jarrett is NWA-TNA champion, once again. I'm beginning to sense that he's actually WORSE than Triple H. At least Triple H can boast that he was the main heel during 2000, and what can Jeff Jarrett boast? Let's see, he was a failure with the "Double J" character in both the WWE (twice) and WCW. How about his NWA gimmick with Jim Cornette? BUST! His only relative success was from tagging up with Owen Hart, but the real draw was a hot Debra McMichael. Jarrett's only WWE success was wrestling women for a while, but that was a total ripoff of Andy Kaufman. Jarrett was a total waste in WCW, for his "big jump" as the Chosen One certainly didn't set the wrestling world on fire. He was lousy throughout 2000 and the WWE didn't even bother calling him after 2001.
Jeff Jarrett is NOT a draw. He's not even a guy fans are willing to see get his ass kicked by a top face. As a wrestling fan, why watch NWA-TNA when this boring character will always be on top? It's clear that there's no upward elevation in NWA-TNA because the owner/booker is having a fun time being champion. TNA is coming to Spike TV soon. I refuse to watch NWA-TNA as long as Jarrett remains champion. I believe he sucks THAT bad and I won't support an wrestling promoter who is that ignorant to wrestling fans. At least Triple H has shown more of a tendency to drop out of a title picture after a while, for we saw that last year from Wrestlemania to Summerslam and this year after his losses to Batista. NWA-TNA is all about Jeff Jarrett and he's never been a draw in the wrestling business to even merit that consideration!
On to RAW.
RAW is TITO
The show started off with Eric Bischoff coming out to the ring and boasting about an announcement. He brought out Kurt Angle and suggested that he was going to strip John Cena for his disqualification actions last night. Before he can officially crown Angle the champion, Vince McMahon's music hits and Vince does his usual strut down the ring. I guess we learned something new... General Managers cannot strip champions, for the title can only switch hands by pinfall or submission. REALLY, for there's a lot of holes in that argument, considering Eric Bischoff was allowed to create the World Title that Batista currently has in 2002. What says he doesn't have the power to strip a wrestler? Vince would go on to make Eric Bischoff wrestle John Cena on the WWE Homecoming show on October 3rd. Really, who will want to watch yet another executive versus wrestler match? Been there, done that, many, many times. Also during this interview, Vince officially announced that HHH, Foley, Austin, and Hogan will all be on the October 3rd show. However, Vince couldn't even breathe a word about what channel that show will be on. Ouch.
The first match was Trish Stratus vs. Torrie Wilson. Torrie was looking SMOKIN~! in her tight ass pink shorts. Torrie, Victoria, and Candice Michelle have new theme music together, although I liked Torrie's music as their overall theme. Oh well... For some whatever reason, I LIKE this feud, although its weakspot is the lack of an explanation as to not only why Trish is a face, but why she wants to hang out with a Diva Search winner. Who feuded with Christy Hemme at Wrestlemania 21? Just from her actions, Ashley seems to "get it". She hasn't absurdly blown any spots in the ring whenever called upon. She did well here with the double clothesline and selling other moves. Trish won the match on an easy roll up, but afterward, the heel trio was too much for Ashley and Victoria. Kudos to Victoria for not killing Trish, too, for she felt that she didn't have a good hold of the Widow's peak, so she didn't lock the neck on the way down. That's accounting for safety and screwing up that move could potentially put someone out of commission. I really like the Torrie, Candice, and Victoria connection! Now, if there were only more face females to deal with...
Next bout was Trevor Murdoch vs. Hurricane. OK midcard bout, but it eventually loomed into a clean pinfall win for Murdoch. It's clear and obvious who the next WWE cuts will be, although I'm betting that both Hurricane and Rosey wouldn't mind dropping the stale superhero gimmick by now to wrestle as themselves elsewhere. What a waste on talent the WWE has done with Shane Helms. So much promise in WCW and he did well in 2001 with the Invasion angle... but 4 years later, what does Hurricane have to show for it? Opportunities flushed down the tubes by a crummy creative team.
Backstage, Edge wanted Eric Bischoff to get rid of Matt Hardy for good. Bischoff, however, had a better idea and a slick one for WWE Homecoming on October 3rd. "Loser Leaves RAW" Ladder Match with Edge's Title shot in the briefcase as the bait for the ladder. See, this is a great match to have on the first RAW on USA Networks. It has lots of meaning behind it. However with Cena vs. Bischoff, it's either Cena kicking Bischoff's ass or someone running down to save Bischoff. Hopefully, the match is given time, for I know both Edge and Hardy would bring it for that occasion.
Tyson Tomko versus some jobber. Tomko won with a big boot. I never knew there were knockouts in wrestling. In addition, aren't closed fists illegal in wrestling? What about a solid kick to the face? But whatever... I guess the kick is there to strike fear in whatever upper midcarder or main eventer Tomko will be eventually putting over (my guess is a returning Kane or Big Show).
I LOVED Ric Flair vs. Carlito. Very solid bout and the two went back and forth on cheating, chops, and everything else. Flair can still work a match and I clearly saw signs of improvement by Carlito by working with Flair. The ending was truly excellent, too, as Flair won via grabbing the ropes on the Figure 4. I'm amazed that the Figure 4 actually makes people submit now, for Flair could never make anybody tap back in the day. It was ALWAYS reversed by a face. I'd like to see this feud continue, and it will... Carlito later confronted Flair and they brawled, only for Chris Masters to attack and help Carlito get in several shots while Flair was hooked in the Masterlock.
Fun interview segment with Matt Hardy, Big Show, Shawn Michaels, and John Cena. Nice way to present not only an entertaining segment, but to show fans that the faces were ready to be a cohesive team. Cena suggesting that Big Show should "eat them" to the opponents was hilarious!
The main event was absolute fun to watch, as it was Matt Hardy, Big Show, Shawn Michaels, and John Cena versus Edge, Gene Snitsky, Chris Masters, and Kurt Angle. It was fun in the sense that everybody got to wrestle and showcase their trademark moves. Reminds me of the several 5 on 5 matches that the Invasion era tried, which were total fun. Hell, that's what made Survivor Series events fun. You got to see a whole host of wrestlers hitting their trademark moves, as well as a large group of wrestlers meshing as a tag team. The match was mostly even on offense until the very end when the faces began to wipe the heels out and Big Show really made an impact for the win. The faces celebrated and HBK jumping on Big Show's shoulders was to, again, paint Big Show up as a more fan friendly character. Fun match to end the show!
LAST WORD: One of the more better wrestling shows of the year, as Flair vs. Carlito was great and the 4 on 4 main event was a blast. The midcard was actually better this week. With the USA Networks move being 2 weeks away, the WWE showed no signs of "going through the motions" in preparation for that big show. This show delivered well and was a worthy "night after big PPV" type show. [ A ] in my gradebook!
Mr. Tito's BLOG - Tito opinions on Non-Wrestling Stuff!
LoPForums.com - Message Boards to discuss Sports, Music, Movies, and much more!
Mr. Tito Column Archives
Black Diamond Wrestling.
XWF Inc. Wrestling
@If you want to send an e-mail to me, my mailing address is wrathoftito@yahoo.com and please put something in the title to tell me it's not spam, such as "Feedback on the Wrath of Tito" or something to that effect. Please note that my email account gets pounded with emails, whether it's readers or spam. If you receive no reply, sorry, but the majority of the emails are at least read.
Mr. Tito © 1998 - 2005 LordsofPain.net/WrestlingHeadlines.com
*NEW GALLERY* Go Directly to a RANDOM BACKSTAGE SPECIAL PHOTO GALLERY! Check It Out!
Quick Links -
[Back to LOP] [News Archives] [Results] [Columns] [Forums]
