March 16, 2020 - Evan Luebbe

AEW Makes its Presence felt in the Wrestling World

March 16, 2020 by Evan Luebbe

The presence of AEW is bringing WWE’s primary issues to light. None of it is Triple H’s fault even though he is the man who got demoted. AEW provides a mainstream alternative to the formulaic product WWE provides that is very teamwork-oriented and everyone affiliated with AEW is committed to presenting the best possible product each week.

The primary issue with WWE right now is that they are recruiting too much talent for Vince McMahon to employ the centralized, micromanaging strategies he prefers. NXT used to permeate the field of an attractive alternative to WWE when it was on the WWE Network, but it’s been replaced by AEW. The new mindset Tony Kahn has introduced serves as a breath of fresh air to the wrestling world.

Build of Drew McIntyre and Roman Reigns going into the Show of Shows

March 16, 2020 by Evan Luebbe

While WWE is succeeding in just about every way possible in the company’s efforts to get Drew McIntyre over and make him look like a credible challenger to Brock Lesnar, the same cannot be said for Roman Reigns. Unfortunately, the company is still having trouble adequately getting The Big Dog over as their top babyface. On the March 13 edition of SmackDown, the company focused on Roman getting another major title match in WWE rather than building his animosity with the champion Goldberg.

Instead, Goldberg has appeared on The Bump on the WWE Network recently and explained openly how much he admires Reigns and has no negative feelings towards him whatsoever. It’s great that they respect and admire each other so much, but this does not build any sort of tension between the two superstars to make fans interested in their Mania clash. The WWE universe, however, will still be very interested in this match simply because of how big of superstars Reigns and Goldberg are, so it might not matter. There might not need to be any more build for this.

Goldberg simply looks to squash opponents and is not big on storytelling. It might prove to be enough of a story that he can still give a somewhat decent performance at his advanced age – 53 years old. However, I have to say that I am still looking more forward to Drew McIntyre almost certainly taking the WWE Title from Brock Lesnar.

The Beast has displayed his respect for the hierarchy within WWE by being extremely unselfish and doing everything possible to put McIntyre in position for success as the WWE Champion post-WrestleMania and in the months ahead (I imagine McIntyre will have a pretty long first run with the WWE Championship).

SmackDown 3/13/2020

March 16, 2020 by Evan Luebbe

The March 13 edition of SmackDown on FOX was truly unprecedented as it was the first ever episode of Raw or SmackDown to be held at the WWE Performance Center (PC). NXT additionally aired live from the PC this week. This was also the first WWE event to ever be held with zero fans in attendance. It reminded me of the time when Mick Foley and The Rock had a WWE Championship match in an empty arena on Super Bowl Sunday in 1999 (I believe it was Super Bowl XXXIII). I don’t remember who was playing, because you have to remember I was only two years old.

All that can be said is that WWE did the best they could do given the circumstances that are currently going on in the United States with Covid-19. Fortunately, the best they could do was pretty damn good because I guarantee it took an awful lot of last-minute planning on Triple H’s part.

I would fully assume that WWE will be having every event (SmackDown, Raw, and NXT alike) in this setting at the PC for the foreseeable future. Unfortunately, there is also a good chance WrestleMania will be postponed by at least a month given the conditions. It’s very good, however, that WWE’s most experienced broadcaster in Michael Cole was the first one of WWE’s broadcasters to experience this, because he is so trusted by WWE officials.

This was probably not a huge deal for experienced superstars like Jeff Hardy, John Cena, Daniel Bryan, or Roman Reigns. Fortunately, even the younger superstars did not seem to be at a loss for words or what to do because of the different environment, and that is a very good thing. They have been trained extremely well to do what they do no matter the environment.

Triple H did a fantastic job on commentary, and Mojo Rawley hyping up Michael Cole was the funniest thing I’ve seen on SmackDown in months. This will not be the type of environment Rob Gronkowski can expect to experience regularly, but he will likely most likely debut on SmackDown in this environment with an empty arena.

AEW Dynamite 3/11/2020

March 16, 2020 by Evan Luebbe

My primary takeaway from this episode of Dynamite was the organized feel to the first segment of the night, and how this reflects AEW’s organizational culture. The segment was so impressive because the company successfully incorporated several different storylines into one organized segment. Over the years, I have seen many different companies try to advance multiple storylines forward in the span of about 15 or 20 minutes and fail miserably. The entire segment normally feels disjointed and fans are left feeling very confused by what they’ve just seen.

Quite the opposite happened on Wednesday Night and it felt very refreshing. First of all, Cody had a great match with Ortiz of The Inner Circle and got a much-needed victory. Lance Archer also showed up with Jake The Snake Roberts, establishing who Cody’s next feud will be with. Matt and Nick Jackson also furthered their animosity with Hangman Adam Page. Lastly, Chris Jericho is establishing the fact that his losing the AEW World Championship is a big deal and he looks more dangerous than ever.

The fluid feel to this opening segment reflects the organizational culture of AEW. One can obviously see that all the employees within the company are on the same page. They work towards the same objective which is putting on the best show possible and not worrying about the success or failure of their competition. They are instead simply immersed in what they all love, and that fosters an extremely successful, healthy organization. This is a prime example of why I believe this company will do great things – and maintain a presence in the professional wrestling world for years to come.