Hey Scott,
I hope you're enjoying your vacation. I'm pretty envious of you.
As there appears to be an old school nostalgia wave on the blog this week, it got me thinking of a question: could the Big Fat Heel/Foreign Monster system work today like it did with Hogan back in the 80's?
In the new PG era of WWE with super hero John Cena leading the way, they're throwing back a bit to that era anyway. Could Vince just start getting big awesome looking guys from development/indies/wherever, give them a cool intro, gimmick and look, have them squash midcarders for 6 months until they look unstoppable and then feed them to Cena for a couple PPV's? Once might Cena emerges victorious they get sent back down to the midcard, development or just released.
If anything it would freshen things up from the usual Cena vs. Orton/Punk/Kane/Show. Your thought?
Sure, and in fact you don't even need the traditional big fat heel, you can build up Antonio Cesaro further as an evil European and then have Cena beat him to avenge the honor of the US, blah blah blah. The other thing is that instead of the slow 50/50 build they generally do, you can immediately give someone the main event rub by going that route. Rocket them to the top, have them do a hard-fought job for Cena on PPV to blow it off, and you've created an immediate midcarder who people buy as a threat in that role. Worked for Hogan and his crew of challengers for a long time, no reason it can't still work today. King Kong Bundy has been living quite well off indy appearances for a couple of decades now based off Wrestlemania 2.
Sandow would be a perfect opponent for Cena even if he's not "foreign".
ReplyDeleteThe other component for Hogan rogues' gallery was Big Fat foreigner.
ReplyDeleteTbh, Cena did the Monster run in 07 for a second.
He fought Umaga twice on PPV and the Khali once and we know Vince loves Black guys and ran Lashley at GAB 07, IIRC
Didn't they just try this with Tensai? That worked pretty well...
ReplyDeleteUm, how about we build new stars instead of feeding people to John Cena?
ReplyDeleteI think we can figure out you hate Cena Mar.
ReplyDeleteSay what you will about that but at least WWE had the balls to give Tensai a clean win over Cena so the intention was good if nothing else. Now if they'd do that again with someone like Sandow I'd say that's a good sign.
ReplyDeleteThey skipped over the buildup part. Tensai went from
ReplyDelete1) Character introduction (3 weeks)
2) Clean win over Cena + win over Punk
3) Crowd still was busy chanting "ALBERT" instead of respecting him.
Do that same build except with 3 months of introduction, squashes + a midcard feud and they could have got 2 PPV main events out of Cena/Tensai.
Yeah they definitely skipped the buildup part. Like I mentioned below it was good that they let him beat some top guys cleanly but it all happened too quickly.
ReplyDeleteWait, what clean win? I saw a Raw where he beat Cena with a ton of interference, when did he beat Cena clean?
ReplyDeleteThe problem with the evil foreigner gimmick is that the WWE is much more global now than ever before with a lot of their income is from touring other countries and their product being on a lot of foreign television. That's why they have people like Del Rio, Khali, Gabriel and Santino on their roster when they weren't really before.
ReplyDeleteI think a better use is what they did in 1997 with the Hart Foundation being a heel in the US and a face everywhere else.
What does building new stars have to do with his divorce?
ReplyDeleteHe just needs to tweak the HULK DOWN formula.
ReplyDeletePlus they never really adequately explained Tensai gimmick. Tensai would have been the perfect candidate for pre-introduction interview vignettes.
ReplyDeleteThey could still get away with a Chinese villain, though I hope they never try it.
ReplyDeleteActually, a hyper-patriotic angle might be the one thing to solidify the whole fanbase behind Cena...
We need to feed more people to Ryback. FEED! HIM! MORE! FEED! HIM! MORE!
ReplyDeleteHell, they pretty much made Carlito credible from day 1 when he took the US title off Cena in his debut. They built him through his vignettes (*swipes cell* CAN'T YOU SEE CARLITO'S ON THE PHONE?!) and audiences took him as a legit player when he started off the bat as a champ. Character + threat = interest.
ReplyDeleteYou mean having him salute like a marine and showing vignettes of him supporting the troops didn't already show how hyper patriotic he is?
ReplyDeleteDude, who cares about his divorce settlement, would you just drop it?
ReplyDelete+1 Internet Points.
ReplyDeleteLook at guys like Umaga & Khali, Huge push leading to title shot on PPV, then pushed back down the card jobbing to the same upper-midcarders they beat on the way up. No different from how guys like Bundy, Volkoff, Slaughter, etc were booked.
ReplyDeleteI think WWE is doing a decent job of building up characters/backstories etc, they're just wimping out as soon as the character hits TV. It's like playing poker and betting $2,000 before the flop, then following up with $2 bets on the next three rounds.
ReplyDeleteLook at the debuts over the last few months:
* Sandow - hardly wrestled any matches, lost MITB, beat Brodus but gave him his heat back after the bell.
* Brodus - squashed jobbers in 60-second matches, lost to Big Show, lost to Sandow.
* Cesaro - squashed jobbers, went back to NXT, beat Santino for a title.
* Ryback - still squashing jobbers.
Then look at what they're doing with Otunga, Prime Time Playaz, Alex Riley, Primo/Epico, Camacho/Hunico, The Usos, DiBiase, Tensai, Tyson Kidd...
It's the "go over people for 6 months" part that they're failing miserably with. Just pick 3 or 4 of these guys and let them win a big run of matches.
Santino's there to appeal to that large global "Canadians who pretend to be Italian" contingent, I take it?
ReplyDeleteWithout some foreigner to hate, it doesn't mean much.
ReplyDeleteI would argue that Sandow is one of the few they are getting right, so far. Mind you, he is still in the "go over people for 6 months" phase," so they could still screw it up, but so far they are doing a good job establishing him. The relatively few matches he wrestled was more about establishing his character as a snob than him not wrestling his matches but once that character trait was established he has been beating the lower card wrestlers. He was placed in the high profile MITB match. No one expected him to win but it did establish that he is a threat. Now he is involved in a midcard feud with Brodus Clay where he is getting the upper hand. He is moving up the card and is well protected in terms of wins and losses. Judging from the crowd's responses to him he is getting over.
ReplyDeleteNow as he moves up the card hopefully they will continue to protect him and establish him as someone who belongs in the upper card but at the moment the WWE is doing a good job of building up Damien Sandow.
If they've gotta book a foreigner in this role, let it be Cesaro. Sandow bores the hell out of me. I just can't get fired up for a reheated Genius gimmick.
ReplyDeleteIt would be great if they set up some type of call & response with the crowd where Ryback comes out & screams "I'M HUNGRY" and the crowd chants "FEED ME MORE"
ReplyDeleteCesaro wouldn't work: he's Swiss. :)
ReplyDeleteI love that his finisher is called The Neutralizer.
Is it really?
ReplyDeleteThat's chuckles.
right by your name..
ReplyDelete'Hustle, Loyalty, DIVORCE!'
Yeah, I was being an ass.
ReplyDeleteNow I'm leaving it there because it bothers him so much.
Zap Brannigan: "What makes a man turn neutral?!"
ReplyDeletehahaha i was just thinkin in my head isnt he from like toronto or some shit??
ReplyDelete