Credit: WWE.com
Last thing I wrote I didn't have much to say. I said that I didn't have much to complain about. THIS WILL BE MUCH DIFFERENT. I have a lot to say. I watched the main event of Hell in a Cell bewildered as I tried to think if I have ever seen anything take a harder shit on the entire sport of professional wrestling. Words like "bad" and "horrible" don't even do it justice. This match crystallized SO many points I've been making for months. And I am here to repeat myself.
First off... This match is what happens when you are forced to do a match because you have too much programming.
I have been vocal in saying WWE has too much programming weekly to also have monthly PPVs and have people not get burned out. There are only so many stars. There are only so many big matches you can do with your stars. Now try to sell out arenas and get people to watch tv every week while MOST of your programs are holding patterns until you put together your big programs. Bray Wyatt has gotten over to where no matter what he is presented as, he is babyface to the fans. So WWE knew it could get us excited to watch this show just on the strength of him being in a championship match. Full stop.
New paragraph.
I want people to stop saying dumb shit like "he is bigger than the championship" or "he doesn't NEED the championship" because the reality is that the belt can't make someone the man, but you are NOT really the man without the belt either. Fact is, part of why wrestling is shit now is that the belt no longer means you are one of the best characters, promos or workers in the history of the business and therefore you being in the main event = $$$.
Back to my point.
Bray Wyatt was not rushed into this match because The Fiend was a fresh coat of paint on his character. Fans love it. We all were ready for his coronation. WWE for some reason does not seem to like coronating its stars. (Disclaimer: I'm not saying this is the first case or these are the only ones but they stand out in my mind) This reminds me of when Ryback was hot then they not at all ironically threw water on him in the SAME Hell in a Cell main event. They could have just NOT booked the match where they didn't want Punk to lose but also didn't want Ryback to win. Roman Reigns will always have the stink of the last four years of him both being presented as THE BIG DOG but also repeatedly failing to win championship matches. Then there is the crossover of last year's main event where it made no sense that Hell in a Cell had no winner because Brock beat Roman and Braun Strowman up. Braun Strowman has failed repeatedly to win the world title despite being billed as a monster amongst men. Whole time... WWE COULD JUST NOT BOOK THE MATCHES. But these are the decisions you make when you have to make cards with big matches on them.
Second point: I told yall Seth Rollins is a failure as a babyface.
Remember when people were booing anytime Roman Reigns punched the mat to do a Superman Punch or primed to do the spear? People booing that curbstomp fest that was the main event to Hell in a Cell reminded me of that. You are not over as a babyface when people are booing you even attempting to win the match. Another parallel is that the perception is the match was laid out this way to make Rollins look strong, not to give the audience what it wanted. No one is going to sympathize with Rollins. You have failed Wrestling 101 when you can't get people to sympathize with your babyface.
Third point: the only way WWE gets any face over is if fans think WWE didn't want to push them.
Kofi Kingston's entire WWE championship push copied the Daniel Bryan template perfectly and ironically culminated in Kofi dethroning Bryan. The problem here is, after this, now Kofi's just lucky to be there. How many times was his reign referred to on tv like it was magic or a dream or a fluke or a ride? People were mad it ended in a way indicative of his true position in the company. Yeah. Roman or Seth would have kicked out of multiple F5s because they ARE WWE main eventers. Kofi is just a guy. He got hot at the right time. WWE went with it. He is still NOT a top guy. But hey, maybe he'll get another participation trophy reign next time they want to push someone "they don't really want to push"... More likely it'll be someone else though.
Back to my point. You can't tell the audience guys like Rollins and Reigns are guys the company is trying to hold down when people are trying to keep down their food at their booking and presentation.
Fourth point: maybe you don't have a rejection of company choices for top faces if the company isn't heel.
Back in 1997 when Austin was raging against the machine, and over in WCW, the president of the company was a member of the nWo... It was both cool to be a heel and also cool to be anti authority. Feuds like Austin and Rock, Hogan and Sting felt so fresh. In 2019, it seems impossible to make a babyface people like who also wins a lot, and put him up against a heel that people want to see lose.
It feels like fans actively rebel against WWE by wanting all the heels to turn face. Remember when you loved Rollins as a heel? Hmm? Wanted so badly for him to be a top babyface? HOW DO YOU FEEL NOW? On the flip, they want every face to turn heel because they don't like them as a babyface... And this is the part that makes no sense to me from a logic standpoint... Because once you make them unlikeable then I will start to like them??????? Yeah yeah yeah it worked for The Rock. Blah blah blah but The Rock Roman Reigns is not. So that was never going to work. All you were going to do was cut his merch sales in half to please marks.
WWE has to stop presenting authority figures as heels. I would appreciate if there were no authority figures at all. But imagine if we went several months where the only time you see a McMahon or HHH on TV, they're babyface. I think that over time fans would stop making the association that the family running the company are bad people holding back all the talent they like. This is the ultimate shoot that's killing the work. Now they need to work on changing the shoot perception so they can work us effectively.
Fifth point: a finisher isn't really a finish if the match keeps going afterwards.
One of the other hallmarks of Seth Rollins being champion is the complete bastardization of one of the coolest and most devastating looking moves in all of wrestling. A grown man gets a running start and then fucking jumps up and stomps your head into the mat. YOU SHOULD NOT BE GETTING UP FROM THAT. At SummerSlam Brock took several of them joints. Braun took several of them. As Bray was not selling all that damage at Hell in a Cell, I thought, "Ok, so after Bray wins what kind of dark magic or contraption do you need to beat a dude who isn't kept down by shots to the head with weapons and having his head stomped many times?" And that's where the entire sport of professional wrestling was shat upon. It was silly. It was goofy. It was not well thought out. It was sloppy. Instead of just having Bray win and ALL I'm thinking is that I'm happy he did it, I'm thinking "Rollins sucks as a face, WWE booked itself into a corner and they didn't want to beat him because there are too many shows, finishers mean nothing now etc".
I'm going to end by saying: this didn't bury or hurt anybody except WWE itself. Fans still want Bray to go over, if anything even moreso. Rollins can be rehabbed as a guy chasing the belt. I didn't cancel my WWE subscription because the show had two really good matches at the beginning and decent filler leading to a terrible main event. If they change the finish to Bray going over no one is mad. WWE just has to stop over thinking and doing dumb shit.
Lmaooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Aight, I'm out.