|
CM Punk’s new entrance music, “The Cult of Personality” by Living Colour morphs into “The Cult of Negativity” by Dr. Chad Matthews Here’s the original… Here’s my version… “Fear less, hope more; Eat less, chew more; Whine less, breathe more; Talk less, say more; Love more, and all good things will be yours” (Unknown) Lookin’ at your screens; all that I see… The Cult of Negativity I read your complaining, and your whining I’ve been everything you’re trying to be. Ohhh… The Cult of Negativity Like Melina and Matt Hardy You’re the Cult of Negativity THE CULT OF NEGATIVITY THE CULT OF NEGATIVITY With online fights, you antagonize When reason’s shown, you just close your eyes You criticize so abhorrently Then say what you’d do clairvoyantly Even when things are satisfactory You moan and bitch incessantly. Ohhh You’re the Cult of Negativity It’s OK to be upset; occasionally But after all it’s a SHOW ON TV… Stop being the Cult of Negativity Like Ultimate Warrior & half the Hart Family You’re the Cult of Negativity The Cult of Negativity The Cult of Negativity With online fights, you antagonize When reason’s shown, you just close your eyes You criticize so abhorrently Then say what you’d do clairvoyantly I feel sorry for you; I wish you the best Please don’t act so – damn – stressed Start to think more realistically Ohh… You’re, the, Cult, of, Neg, Ah, Tiv, Ity You’re the Cult of… You’re the Cult of… You’re the Cult of… You’re the Cult of… You’re the Cult of… You’re the Cult of… You’re the Cult of… You’re the Cult of… NEGATIVITY!!! “When you realize how perfect everything is, you will tilt your head back and laugh at the sky.” (Buddha) “Just for today, no matter where I am going, or what I am doing, or who I am doing it with, it is my intention to focus on the positive.” (Lucy MacDonald) We live in a negative world, people. Life’s too short to bitch about everything, especially the hobby that you like enough to spend an inordinate amount of time on the internet reading and chatting about. Stress is the number one cause of disease in the United States. So, channel your inner Diamond Dallas Page circa 2002 and smile a little more. Three Cheers for Mark Henry When Henry got drafted to Smackdown and turned heel, it did not take long to see that they were about to push him again; and given how thin the roster was on Friday nights, it stood to reason that he was probably going to be in the main-event at some point. Now, I’ve never been a fan of the guy. By and large, I’ve considered him dangerous, boring, and lacking in the in-ring talent department. When you fail to manage a good match against Kurt Angle on PPV (as was the case at the Royal Rumble in 2006), then it would generally mean that you’re ability to have a good match with anyone on PPV is going to come into question. So, I can’t say that I was altogether excited about the idea of another Henry run at the top, but my attitude in recent years (with rare exceptions) has been to simply let things play out. One key difference that I quickly noted between Henry 2011 vs. Henry ‘05/’06/’07 was the character; Henry was cutting much better promos and being more entertaining. Admittedly, this may have been my own mind playing tricks on me since I wasn’t so open-minded about his pushes in the past. Maybe; maybe not? The bottom line is that I notice a change. When the current push officially began during the feud with Big Show in June, one of the big highlights was the moment that Henry interrupted a cage match involving Show and tore the door of the cage off. We’d seen him do that before, but the difference was that Henry looked like a star this time. Again, this may be just what happens when you remove the whiny blinders and see things for what they are or perhaps not, but when Henry knocked Show through the side of the cage and then planted him through the announce table with the World’s Strongest Slam, I instantly became interested in seeing the payoff. I wanted to see a Mark Henry match for the first time since I watched his debut at In Your House: Mind Games in September ’96. The entire little feud was actually handled quite well by both of them. Henry manhandled the World’s Largest Athlete at every turn. Call me crazy, but couldn’t you see some legitimate fire and passion from Henry? It was as if Henry was looking at Show as the guy who came in and took the spot that could have been his had Paul Wight not signed with the WWE in 1999 and forged a largely successful career; as if being the World’s Largest Athlete trumped being the World’s Strongest Man in the eyes of not only the fans, but management, as well. Henry has been around now for 15 years. His match with Orton (presumably) at Night of Champions will mark the 15 year anniversary of his debut. In the IWC, we always talk about how size always guarantees you a big push. Well, sure, Henry’s size has afforded him the luxury of an occasional push, but by and large he’s been put on the back burner in favor of guys like Show, Kane, and the Great Khali – all three of which have done something that he’s never done: become the World Champion. I think that, during this current push, we’ve finally seen Henry show that he’s pissed off that he hasn’t ever gotten the strap, while also displaying some desperation in that this might be his last shot. Never before has Henry carried himself so well or been as engaging on the microphone. If you look back to 2006 when Henry was dominating Batista, Angle, and Undertaker, it looked like it was all business. Just the clunky as usual guy once known as Sexual Chocolate getting an opportunity, but not doing good enough work to stay in the spot he’d been afforded. I’m seeing a lot less business and a lot more personal this summer…and I’ve been enjoying the hell out of it. Look, Henry is never going to be a good wrestler. He’s got a ton of power, but I don’t view him as being a very good athlete, which is obviously going to limit what he can do in the ring. He is not a Kane or Taker type big man that can move around the ring with the ease of a man three-quarters their size. If anything, he’s more akin to the Great Khali or Viscera/ Mabel because he’s carrying so much weight. However, he doesn’t have to be. Right now, he’s a good change of pace in the main-event because we haven’t seen a big man in that spot in roughly one year. Since Kane was the dominant force on Smackdown at this time last year, the main-event on both Raw and SD have been void of any big man presence. We’re coming off one of the better series of matches in recent years in Orton-Christian, so it’s not necessarily a bad thing to give Orton – who’s on a roll – a new challenge. Are the matches going to be anywhere near as good? It’s safe to say “No,” but at the end of the day it’ll give us a better appreciation for when something like Orton vs. Christian comes along again. You know what? Based on what I saw with Henry vs. Sheamus at Summerslam, I’m not at all convinced that the matches with Orton, while not likely to be on the same level as the recent World title matches, won’t be pretty damn good. The matches that Henry had with Show and Kane were designed to make everyone know beyond a shadow of doubt that Henry was the more dominant big man of those dominant big men. Against Sheamus, someone the WWE needed to protect, the match was more of a back and forth affair and I thought Henry rose to the occasion and sold well enough to keep the result in doubt. Henry reminds me of a buddy of mine – a massive dude that I used to play soccer with when we were kids that grew up to be a 6’7” beast, weighing in at over 300 pounds. Naturally, he made the transition to football in high school, but he was a raw, unpolished talent because he’d never played before. They put him at offensive tackle and it took him awhile to figure it out. In fact, he was often criticized for being “too nice.” Well, it got to the point where, when push came to shove, the guy put it together and ended up playing football at Princeton (CMV1 note – In the past, I tried to convince him to go for the WWE contract and bring me with him as a manager). It’s push coming to shove time for Henry and he’s responding. Storytelling is Orton’s game. He may not be the most exciting performer, but everything that he does has a purpose. He’s not had a challenge like this one before (at least not in a major match). Because he’s spent most of his time over the last eight years as a heel, he’s been able to avoid a lot of the Henry types (who are also often heels) during his career. I’m rather intrigued to see how he handles it. As long as the matches are booked competitively, then I think Henry will rise to the occasion this time – based on what we’ve seen from him recently – and that he and Orton will produce some solid or better stories told in the ring. I never thought that I would be saying things that are so flattering about Mark Henry, but he’s finally earned it.
|
