Credit: Uproxx.com
I haven't written anything, for one simple reason. WWE wrestling is garbage right now. Whenever the top WWE star isn't around, WWE doesn't even pretend that they want to do anything major to elevate other talents. I'm not trying to imply that I think WWE should have 10 talents at the same level that can step into being the number one guy. I look back at when Stone Cold went down with his neck injury and HHH and The Rock carried the company and they didn't miss a beat. I think the main reason fans resent the top talents in WWE, ie Roman Reigns and Cena before him, is because they see so transparently WWE doesn't want anyone else at that level. What that does is make everything not interesting. I literally do not care about anything they are doing right now. God Bless Cody Rhodes. I sincerely hope that that brother does promotion the right way and now, I shall enumerate and articulate, point by point, how he will either succeed or fail.
Whatever Cody does, if he tries to compete with WWE at sports entertainment, it WILL fail. Vince McMahon invented sports entertainment, that is precisely why no one will ever beat him at sports entertainment. Professional wrestling is a dirty phrase with that dude, and that is what fans such as myself, and likely you the reader, are starving for. The idea that THIS is all that matters. Not some star in Hollywood. Not some tv show or movie. No pop culture. THIS. No forced comedy. Just wrestling. And not that indie bullshit where people do 27 devastating moves no one should ever get up from in a real fight but then they lose to a clothesline and there are countless dives. Actual wrestling. Storytelling with holds. The match itself mattering more than some story some writer came up with. If Cody can make this new promotion REAL wrestling that his father would have wanted to work for? I am ALL IN. If it is Stardust and polka dots... keep that.
I think a benefit that Cody Rhodes will have, like he did getting fans to buy in to the All In show and selling it out before there was even a card(!)... is that unlike WWE, which is corporate wrestling, publicly traded, with a board of directors and all that, this... is the boys. A lot of wrestling fans do not know the true history of wrestling. That history goes like this: Wrestling used to be a shoot, or... it was real. They were having REAL fights. At some point, the boys started working the matches. Then, things started to go to hell when the promoters got wise to it and took control of booking. What was once a secret, that everything wasn't on the up and up became widely known. That's why now, if you're a certain age and a wrestling fan people ask you "Why do you still watch that? It's FAKE!". I posit that wrestling was better when the wrestlers were in control. So, if Cody Rhodes runs this wrestling promotion, it will already be a 1000 times better than every other promotion which is ostensibly being run by some "promoter" who is not a wrestler. Vince McMahon being a multiple time winner of his own championships be damned.
One of the worst things Cody can do is repeat the mistake WWE has been repeating for about the last 20 years: heeling the promotion. Cody can never be a heel. If Cody is a heel, the promotion is a heel. This means that, psychologically, the promotion is bent on making the fans upset. Not giving us what we want. BOOOOOOOO. The reason that fans have rejected Roman Reigns, why marks still believe WWE is holding talent like Daniel Bryan back.... is because the McMahon family has been heel for so long you associate heel things with the company itself. Those bastards think THEY know what's best for business. They have cut long boring promos about these things for years! Cody can't repeat that. Let me add this: NO AUTHORITY FIGURES, JUST WRESTLING. There is not going to be a better President Jack Tunney. Him being the high point of wrestling authority figure is sad. The "Mr. McMahon" character was aight, but I am jaded by him largely playing that role to death for 20 plus years. My best friend told me a few weeks ago the McMahons came out and promised a new direction and I was like "how is the McMahons coming out to say they're running things new?" And I needed to be told this.... because I am not watching.
I want very badly for another wrestling promotion to succeed as a WWE fan. I feel largely the malaise that is WWE creative is because they have no REAL competition in America. Nothing makes them sit up and go "hey we have to do something to make the best talent want to work here and the most fans tune in and buy tickets" because right now, they're taking that for granted and that's why they keep having "new record low viewership" which is sad. So, I'm not hoping Cody can put them out of business, but rather, if Cody can offer a dope alternative that makes WWE step their cookies up... that's good for all wrestling fans and sports entertainment fans alike.