DaveyBoy’s Wrestling Menu – Night Of Champs, IC Title + Tri-Branded PPVs
Submitted by DaveyBoy on Wednesday, July 11, 2007 at 12:51 AM EST






THE WRESTLING MENU #238

Welcome one and all to the 238th edition of ‘The Wrestling Menu’, the column that is sure to satisfy your taste buds when it comes to discussing all things wrestling.

I feel like crap! Just thought I’d get that out straight off the cuff. Between it being smack bang in the middle of winter down under, being flat out like a lizard drinking at work & staying up practically all night on the weekend watching the Live Earth concerts, I am running on empty. But here I am still somehow churning out a column for the masses to read.

The above fact plus the retrospective realization that last week’s column was darn long has resulted in me “attempting” to make today’s column shorter than my usual offering. Of course, I’ve said that before & reneged… Oh well, let’s see how I go today.

A good start would be to stop waffling here & say “On with the show…”


APPETIZERS – Night Of Champions

The feedback to my Vengeance review last week was actually quite weird. Many felt that I was a little harsh with my overall PPV rating of 59. Yet when those same people went through each match, they had very similar ratings, or at least ratings where some lower scores out of 10 for some matches would negate some higher scores elsewhere on the card. To that extent, Vengeance’s whole may have exceeded the sum of its parts. I suppose that is a fair’ish comment.

One of the reasons for this conclusion may be that all 9 matches on the card were for titles. While the quality of a match-up & the match itself clearly doesn’t live or die on whether a title is on the line, I think it is a fair comment to suggest that a title does make a bout seem all the more important. To prove this with some sort of an example, compare Chavo Guerrero vs Jimmy Wang Yang at Vengeance with a hypothetical bout between the 2 at a future pay-per-view where someone else has snuck in & won the title in the meantime.

During some of the feedback to my Vengeance review, I was asked what I thought of the ‘Night Of Champions’ concept & whether or not it should be used again in the future. One of the reasons why the question was obviously asked was because of Vengeance not rating through the roof, both from a quality & (most likely eventually) buyrate perspective. In short, I like the concept & believe it is something that can make for an annual event. But as seen by the WWE’s latest ppv offering, some bugs still need to be ironed out with regards to pulling it off better so as to best make use of the idea

The first step is to get the TIMING right. To be honest, I felt this was a terrible time of year to debut the concept. Not that I have anything against the month of June, the season of summer or the 24th day of any month. But because it came so close behind the shake-up to the 3 WWE rosters that was the draft. Fans had hardly got the chance to become familiar with who was on what brand when here was a bunch of new match-ups thrown at them way too quickly following the previous ppv event. This resulted in the likes of Ric Flair, King Booker, Mr.Kennedy & Chris Benoit/Johnny Nitro being thrown into title matches where there was practically no reason for a feud to begin with. And don’t even get me started on the challengers to Deuce & Domino’s WWE Tag-Team Championships.

I actually feel that the WWE missed a huge opportunity here to have the King Of The Ring tournament. It would still need to be proven in practice, but I’m not so sure that draft movements would be all that detrimental to such a tournament presuming that is was open to all 3 brands. It would almost be irrelevant if it was a current Raw vs Raw bout or an interbrand bout. It would just be a free for all & I think prior draft movements would actually help the concept. The bottom line though is that I would move the ‘Night Of Champions’ away from mid-year where a draft is always possible. A stab in the dark would suggest the September or October ppv events as being the most likely.

The other issue throughout the night was the LENGTH OF MATCHES. This is a tough one to get around without (a) eliminating title bouts or (b) lengthening shows. I doubt the latter possibility would happen while the former isn’t the perfect scenario. As could be seen with Vengeance, the opening tag match, the ECW title bout & the Raw main-event could all have done with a few extra minutes. I would actually say that wasn’t a bad effort all things considered, although this was allowed due to the squash of an InterContinental bout not lasting too long. But that will tend to occur somewhere along the way, so I think the WWE could book things well enough to get around the ‘length of matches’ potential problem.

Finally, I think there is a small issue with FORCED MATCH-UPS. Basically what I mean by that is that there is a match-up being put on the card just for the sake of having the title defended. While that can always occur & did so at Vengeance in at least 3 cases, I don’t buy this as a problem to not incorporate the concept in their annual schedule. As long as medium to long-term booking is used by the WWE, then there should be very few matches that appear to be forced, if any at all.


MAIN – Tri-Branded PPVs

Well I finally arrived at writing about this topic. I was almost annoying myself with the amount of times I announced that this was what I was going to be writing about the following week. But in a way, I wanted to at least wait until after Vengeance so that we had a few ppv events to use as reference points with regards to the policy that WWE instigated earlier this year regarding having all 3 brands participate in every single pay-per-view.

I may just cut to the chase here & answer the relevant question; Do I think tri-branding ppv events is a positive or a negative…??? I would have to answer that it is a positive, but just like the ‘Night Of Champions’ concept, there are still a few bugs left to iron out. In fact, there are so many footnotes to that ‘positive’ answer that maybe my answer should be “negative”! Confused? Well, let me try to explain… The most general of footnotes is that at the very least I think it is worth a try. I doubt it will actually occur, but I do see it as a possibility that if they didn’t work out (and there is no reason why they shouldn’t) that the WWE could always return to single-branded events.

So why do I think it is worth a try…??? Well, to put it simply, so that the cards can have the best match-ups possible which would then theoretically result in better quality events & more buyrates. Of course, that is in theory and as can already be seen, it just doesn’t happen magically!

Some critics of the move suggest that having all talent on pay-per-views undermines the brand extension. I can see such a point, but don’t necessarily agree with it as I do feel that the television shows & ppv events can be separated to a large extent. Pay-Per-Views should be more special than regular weekly programming. Hey, we are paying for the events, aren’t we!?

Other potential negatives of the change of policy are that some match-ups can be forced & that feuds are not given the proper time to play out. I actually agree with these points, but they are both controllable to some extent. There is no reason that the WWE need to rush any match-ups or have feud-settling bouts before they need to occur. At the end of the day, they are still responsible for what match-ups they put on their ppv cards, so the deeper talent pool that they now can choose from should allow them to simply say “no” to a match-up that is not suited to the particular time. And I’d practically say that goes for anyone. If John Cena didn’t have a suited opponent for any ppv, then give Cena the night off! There are plenty of others that can take that place with all 3 brands involved.

But just in case the WWE needs a reason to ever do such a thing, I think a compromise of sorts can be used as an excuse. In fact, it’s the way I always thought things were going to be anyway. Why not keep the pay-per-views as strongly dominated by the brands that used to control them & have a maximum of 2 matches each from the other 2 brands. So for example, if we were talking about the upcoming ‘Great American Bash’ which used to be a SmackDown only event, you would have 4 SmackDown matches, 2 Raw matches & 2 ECW matches on the card. I know this is a bit wishy-washy, but I think it is a compromise that satisfies the most needs in practice.

The only other alternative that I feel is worthy of consideration is simply extending the tri-branded events to 6. So, in addition to having WrestleMania, The Royal Rumble, Summer Slam & Survivor Series, the WWE could add 2 more similar events. The most likely would be the return of The King Of The Ring & the ‘Night Of Champions’ concept thrown on to an existing pay-per-view (as long as it is a few months removed from the draft). This would then allow the remaining 6 ppv events (presuming the WWE go back to 12 ppvs a year) to be shared equally as single-brand events.

I hear that some of you may be asking why is there a need to change what we have currently anyway…??? This may be the old-school talking in me, but I just feel for the overall good of the WWE, then as much talent as possible should be able to show their skills at pay-per-view level. That includes undercard talent, tag-teams & most importantly as many midcarders as possible. And while some of you may think that should occur anyway, don’t fully bet on it. Add Triple H & HBK back into the mix & you could easily get 4 singles matches out of the Raw main-event alone. Combine them with separate Edge & Batista/Undertaker matches for SmackDown & an ECW Title match, and that only leaves maybe one ppv spot for all tag-teams, the US Champ & the IC Champ. That is just ridiculous!

By having one brand dominate the non big 4 events, wrestlers in the tag-team divisions, cruiserweight divisions & some other lower midcard wrestlers (EG: Kenny Dykstra, Shelton Benjamin, The Miz, etc…) should be able to get a gig when it is their brands turn to host an event. Yet, we hopefully shouldn’t see the quality of such events drop to mediocre levels (as has been seen a few times over the past couple of years) because other brands will chip in with headline matches that could range from World Title bouts to gimmicked matches.


DESSERT – Santino & the IC Title

I have been meaning to write about this topic for a while. Other columnists have jumped in on it in the meantime, but I thought I should address it anyway, especially since I talked about the topic of titles & title matches in the ‘Appetizers’ section of today’s column. The topic I speak of is the recently ended InterContinental Title reign of WWE rookie Santino Marella.

The idea hit me like a brick to the forehead during one of my infrequent viewings of the ‘WWE Heat’ television show a few weeks back. Actually, it wasn’t that bad of an episode that week as I got to see Shelton Benjamin wrestle as well as view the progress of Tough Enough entrant Daniel Rodimer (aka Dan Rodman). But anyway, the main-event of that night was Shelton Benjamin challenging Santino Marella for his InterContinental Title that he had held for roughly just over a month at that stage. You can see why the WWE booked this bout; To have fans such as myself be fooled into thinking there was a genuine chance of a title change on Heat, of all places.

In a roundabout way though, I not only looked forward to the bout for a possible title change, but also to get a chance to see Santino strut more of his stuff. I figured that being Heat, the WWE would use the opportunity to experiment a little & see what Santino could do in front of a large live crowd, if not a large viewing audience. And Shelton could be the perfect opponent for him too as he is not a bad seller. But boy was I disappointed with what was thrown out there on the night! Benjamin dominated the bout for minutes on end, with Marella getting the *cough* “surprise” *cough* rollup win to end the bout. No Santino offense, no different ending, no new finisher & no experimentation of any sort.

This pretty much summed up Santino Marella’s InterContinental Title reign and how he held on to the title for the weeks following that (up until last Monday) was not only a mystery, but a genuine travesty. I could tell at the point of the Heat bout that the WWE had no idea of what they were doing with regards to the title reign. It basically could have & should have ended right then & there. Every further day that Marella held on to the InterContinental Title damaged that title’s reputation.

And when the abysmal bout took place at Vengeance 2.5 weeks back, the WWE could not possibly ignore the fact that the heel Umaga was getting cheered so much. Why they didn’t decide to have the Samoan Bulldozer win the title then & there is beyond me. Then again, they shouldn’t have been shocked at that rebuff as Marella was a face being booked to win like a heel anyway during his title reign! And I don’t think that last comment needs to be explained.

The strange thing here is that I wasn’t necessarily against the shock title win in Milan-Italy a couple of months back. For whatever reason, it didn’t bother me. And it didn’t necessarily bother me that he held the title for a few weeks. But what did bother me was the total lack of imagination with which the title reign was booked. Furthermore, even what I would call the standard booking of the reign was all wrong. How about sending out a jobber or two so that Santino could show us some offense? How about using some of his title wins where he would gain a fluke rollup win (which is fine when used sparingly) as a platform for other feuds somehow?

Could the messed up booking of this title reign derail Santino’s future for good…??? I would actually say that there is a good chance. I just don’t see how he can have any credibility as a character if he now just rolls on & on as is. Well, that is unless that the long-term plan for him was to be a Funaki-like jobber and I wouldn’t wish that upon anyone. For mine, if the WWE actually feel that the man behind the character (John Carelli from memory) has any potential, then he may just have to disappear for the better part of a year to train up in OVW. Of course, when he returns, that huge tattoo of his will most likely lead to fans remembering what was a horrid title reign & then Santino (if he will be called that) will really need to prove his worth.

And as much as I hate a young career being spoilt, that is nowhere near the greatest disaster of this whole schamozzle. No way no, as that prize goes to the tarnishing of what I still consider to be a respected & important title within the WWE. Sure, the InterContinental Title has been dragged through the mud previously (Chyna, A-Train, retirement) & has always come back to some semblance of importance, if not right to its peak. But in a time when there is so much main-event depth on Raw & this is what the title is going through, I genuinely fear for its future. And I’m telling you right now that the WWE would not be a better place without the InterContintal Title! I don’t care what anyone says on that debate, I am strongly in favor that a healthy InterContinental Division (of sorts) makes for a quality WWE product overall.


That is all for edition #238 of 'The Wrestling Menu'. That really wasn't all that much shorter, was it!? Oh well, it’s been a while since I wrote on 3 separate topics that were not reviews or predictions of some sort like I did today. In a strange way, I think the topics are linked to some extent too. If anyone has any feedback on any of the 3 topics, please do not hesitate to email me. My email address is DaveyBoy123@bigpond.com, but if you are an LOP Forums member, it would be much appreciated if you could leave feedback on my thread at http://www.lopforums.com/showthread.php?t=217&page=7

And while you are on the LOP Forums, why don't you check out my weekly contributions to the Album Review thread. So far, I have reviewed 2 albums each by groups such as My Chemical Romance, Muse, Rise Against, Razorlight, The Killers, Kasabian, The All-American Rejects, The Kaiser Chiefs, AFI & Panic! At The Disco. Just click on the following link & scroll down: http://www.lopforums.com/showthread.php?t=99&page=2.

I should be able to find the time to write a column next Wednesday & already have a few thoughts in my mind. Along with my predictions for the upcoming ‘Great American Bash’ ppv, I may actually speak on a couple of topics where I am unusually in the minority with my opinion. Whatever comes your way, my column will be posted at the same Wednesday time on the same LOP channel. Until then, this is DaveyBoy signing off & asking you to remember that dinner is best served in 3 courses.


DaveyBoy’s Wrestling Menu. 2002-2007

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