Where is the WWE heading?

[big_bluto]

Looking for opinions here.....

In the past the WWE has frequently seemed to have a good grip on where they want to go, and how they want to deliver the package. (although there has frequently been changes and chaotic push/non-push/push-again decisions to disprove this theory)

In the last few months they have seemed to have a good strategic view of their product development for the next few years, especially with the talent they have been bringing through.

In the last few weeks everything seems to have fell on it's ass.
Confusion seems to be the order of the day, and the scripting seems to be written by the guys who never made it into Monty Python, the editing by a guy who should be an ex-wrestler by now (HHH?), and Vince doesn't seem to be able to make any sort of decision with any apparent sense behind it.

Does anyone else think that Vince/WWE needs some competition to thrive?
It seems that the only competition they have at present is themselves.

So comments please, on the present confusion, the lack of competition, or details of Vince's hidden masterplan on the next step towards world domination.

[The CyNick]

Well I think they stumbled onto a good concept that should be used everyu year in the draft lottery. Only a handful of guys switched shows, but as we've seen its created a lot of fresh angles, and will create some fresh matches.

I thought the build to Mania, and the long-term planning was really well done.

Unfortunately they ran into a bunch of problems with Austin's issues, Brock leaving, not being able to sign Goldberg and Angle's health. So thats a lot of talent to lose and obviously they have been scambling to create new stars ont op, especially on Smackdown. Its also hurt Taker because he hasn't been given a new program with Brock gone.

In terms of RAW, they seem to be trying to make new stars, but at the same time you can see the company is still being focused on HHH.

They seem to be in a holding pattern on RAW. Backlash is essentialy a replay of Mania, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, because most of the matches that they are redoing were really good. The interesting thing will be to see where they go after backlash. They will have a couple of months beofre the next RAW PPV in June, so thats plenty of time to build up new stuff, hopefully they have the show already planned out, so we dont see matches picked out of a hat.

On Smackdown they are in the process of creating a lot of new feuds and giving new characters big pushes. You got Bradshaw headlining which is a little odd, but at the same time he plays his gimmick well. Then you got Rene Dupree being established as an upper mid card heel. And Booker T is falling into his new heel role nicely. However SD is still hurting because they dont have that top line heel to work a program with Eddie.

So its not an easy time for them, they seem to be throwing a lot of stuff against the wall, hoping for something to stick. Will it? I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

[Loose Cannon]

The last few weeks have been great TV IMO. We are seeing a ton of new stars getting pushed right now. Look at what they are doing with Shelton. Now tell me, how is that bad? Look at Dupree, Cena, Orton, La Resistance, and now Jindrack with his new push. This is what I want to see. I want to see the young guys to start to take over. Add in Guerrero and Benoit as Champions and I have no problems with the show right now. Also, look what they have done with Bradshaw. He went from being on of my most hated superstars in the WWE to very enjoyable to watch on Smackdown in the last few weeks. This is definately his best character to date. So, I am very high on the WWE right now and I'm even going to give the Dishmore character a chance before knocking it.

[big_bluto]

I agree with all your saying, and I think that they have had a nightmare of a time recently with injuries, the brock-walk, austin, goldberg, the rock, etc, etc.

The flip side of the coin is they are also letting go wrestlers who are apparently, talented, good on the mic, or are capable of getting pops from the crowd.

The reasons we are given is ' we didn't know what to do with him' or 'it wasn't fair to keep him hanging around' or other similar media bollocks-speak.

Pure and simple - Lack of imagination! If you have talented guys that you don't know what to do with, then shouldn't you be looking to revamp your writing team. and more to the point, why hire them in the first place?

Take Matt Morgan - this guy will be a solid performer in years to come in my opinion, but he was brought up to early and not given enough support by the writers. WWE just grabbed him for Survivor Series, stuck him into Brock's Team Gargantuan, and then when Nathan Jones walked, they stuck him onto Velocity for ages, and done nothing with him.
What's the point in bringing someone up from OVW with that potential and doing nothing with him?

Take Sean O'Haire - apart from sticking him in a cage (sorry, but I love that joke!). Try that again. Apart from bringing him on to work with Roddy Piper, they had nothing else planned. They done these excellent trailers for him. 'I'm not telling you anything you don't already know', etc. and then he arrived on the show and never got the opportunity to spout his catchphrase. Disappeared backstage when Piper got the bullet, and then nobody had the sense to try and get him some other work.

At least with Brock, they got Paul Heyman working with him and they built him a reputation that - love or hate - the fans got on board with. If Paul Heyman had have walked when he was managing Brock, do you think that WWE would have let him sink onto Heat, or disappear entirely?

They need better writers, better plans, and better depth to their planning for talent development.
Otherwise they are gonna end up being known as talent-wasters.

[big_bluto]

The last few weeks have been great TV IMO. We are seeing a ton of new stars getting pushed right now. Look at what they are doing with Shelton. Now tell me, how is that bad? Look at Dupree, Cena, Orton, La Resistance, and now Jindrack with his new push. This is what I want to see. I want to see the young guys to start to take over. Add in Guerrero and Benoit as Champions and I have no problems with the show right now. Also, look what they have done with Bradshaw. He went from being on of my most hated superstars in the WWE to very enjoyable to watch on Smackdown in the last few weeks. This is definately his best character to date. So, I am very high on the WWE right now and I'm even going to give the Dishmore character a chance before knocking it.



Bradshaw gets a new character. Great.
Has he been given a talent injection to give him more moves to botch other than his clothesline from hell? Probably not.
Will he disappear into mid-card obscurity again soon. Probably. Please!

I think it's great that they are giving guys like Shelton Benjamin a push, giving guys like Eddie and Benoit a shot of the title, because everyone knows that they deserve it, and have done for a long time.
Personally I think it's fantastic work they've done with Cena and Orton too.

I just don't understant how they can be saying we have no heels/faces/big names, when they frequently waste a lot of the talent they sign, and are unable to be consistent with a lot of the talent they have.

Jericho - great wrestler! Absolutely huge fan of Y2J. He got the undisputed title and all he has been given since then is a couple of token shots of the tag titles and a quick shot of the IC.

This guy should be challenging for the main event. He should be challenging Triple H for the main heel spot on RAW, or he should be the main heel on SD.
Instead where is he? Same place as last year, or the year before.

[Loose Cannon]

Well I was never high on Morgan. He needed more time in OVW and I think he will be huge one day. But as for O'Haire,(the cage thing was mine BTW) I seriously don't understand WHY WHY WHY WHY they did nothing with the character. I mean, they had a golden oppurtunity with the character and they wasted it. O'Haire's character was very unique and I loved it. I wish they put out a T-shirt with that catch phrase on it. Jackasses.

But that's what wrestling is all about a lot of the times today. the WWE likes to experiment with new characters and sometimes they flop and sometimes they work. And sometimes they work, but the WWE never uses them in the right manner. I think "Eugene" is an experiment that will flop real soon. But take Bradshaw and I think it will succeed. So, the WWE is doing the right thing is giving the fans new chracters and storylines, but as CyNick said, it's just a matter of sticking or not.

[big_bluto]

Whoops!

Just realised that if you are reading all these posts I should have warned you to get a comfortable chair!

Sorry y'all.
(Not from Texas)

[big_bluto]

I get where your coming from and I'm not disagreeing with what you or CyNick are saying.

WWE are experienced enough that they must have a good idea of what will work and what won't.

Likewise they should know better than anyone on this site which wrestlers should work and which shouldn't.
Apparently that's not the case though. (see above)
Either that or they have no interest in public opinion, which I don't believe for one minute.
The WWE has been smart in the past in reacting and controlling the publics opinion about wrestlers, but it seems to me that on one hand they are paying some attention, but on the other, they're just 'slinging a deafy' (not listening in Scottish!)
No way to run a business when it relies on Joe Publics hard earned dollars.

[Moongoose Mcqueen]

I think the WWE has been great from the entire lead up to wrestlemania, to everything recently, and the road ahead looks promising.
As for Jericho, I def feel its his time, but this time around, it should be as a face. He has the crowd in the palm of his hands and is way over as a face, his quick reception as a face shows the fans just need the ok to cheer him. In fact, his pop monday night was eery.
He was all set for the main event in 2000, in ring and on the mic and was WAY over with the fans, but they passed on that and decided to wait, and then gave him his first title reign and huge push as a heel, but made him very cheap and gave him low credibility and focused his fued on Stephanie and HHH, instead of him and HHH.

[Shaggy]

I have liked the new way WWE is going. 2 out of the last 3 weeks have been some of the best raw shows that I have seen. Hopefully WWE will remain doing good. There are pushing wrestlers now that have needed a well deserved push.

[PureHatred]

I actually think that Raw lately has been pretty damn good. The Eugene storyline is fairly stupid but Backlash is being built up nicely:

--Foley is singlehandedly making the feud with Orton watchable
--Triple H is helping to build Shelton while simultaneously interest is being built for the match with Benoit and HBK (I still thikn Johnny Nitro will end up as the guest referee)
--Christian and Y2J figures to have a big pay-off
--And it even feels like Kane isn't going to just be "fed" to Edge...Edge will go over and Kane is still going to seem like a monster so it'll mean something.

As for Smackdown, it seems pretty obvious that Brock Lesnar leaving the company and Kurt Angle's injury threw a lot of plans out of whack. Suddenly, Bradshaw is getting a push as a big time heel, and UT isn't on TV because seemingly, the writers don't know what to do with him. The show is in scramble mode....I hope it gets setled down soon because Eddie Guerrero deserves a tile run against some decent opponents.

[tucsonspeed6]

Four years ago if somebody told me that Raw and Smackdown would be in two completely different "leagues", that Austin would quit due to domestic issues TWICE (well, he hasn't really quit, but you know what I mean.), Rock would be gone doing hollywood stuff, the WWE would get Goldberg, only to lose him after a year, Bradshaw would be headlining, Angle would quit his in ring work, and if that person described Bock Lesner's enterance into the business only to tell me that he'd quit too.....damn, man, I'd be depressed. For somebody from four years ago to hear that news they'd probably say, "So WCW won the monday night war, huh?" From the sound of it, the WWE would be down and out. But the thing is, it's not. I rather enjoy what they're doing now. The whole thing is entertaining now. I watch every match (well, almost every one) now, when last year at this time I'd change channels every ten minutes. So the good news in all of this I guess is that maybe when Vince said that "It all begins again" he knew that things needed to be dealt with, and therefore maybe the next few years will be good entertainment.

[SeanMC]

^ point taken. But shouldn't they take the focus of Raw off of HHH for a while atleast when someone else is the champ?That is the only problem i have with the wwe at the moment. The biggest champion should always main event, And as for O'Haire, yes he may of had a good character etc, but there could've been problems backstage maybe? That's the only reason i can think of, we don't know that side of the story after all, but we do know the writers have known to be dickheads in the past/talent wasters,And they should ALWAYS have back up plans for someone like The Undertaker, that's bad management in my view.

[The Mackem]

About the Undertaker, I'm not too bothered if he isn't on TV every Smackdown. I mean, it sort of adds more to the character if you don't know when he'll turn up next as opposed to knowing that he'll have a match every week.

[SeanMC]

^true but they should still have a back-up plan for someone like him it's abit degrading to the undertaker if ehs just feuding on house shows while kane is still competing on TV

[Rock Bottom]

I am assuming they're waiting for the right time to use the 'Taker.

[blake639raw]

I am assuming they're waiting for the right time to use the 'Taker. Yeah, this shit will get played out fast. They need to keep him fresh for some top level feuds, that will hopefully get over some new talent. I wouldn't mind seeing Taker turn heel later this year, and take on Eddie for the title. It could possibly work.

[tucsonspeed6]

^ point taken. But shouldn't they take the focus of Raw off of HHH for a while atleast when someone else is the champ?That is the only problem i have with the wwe at the moment. The biggest champion should always main event, And as for O'Haire, yes he may of had a good character etc, but there could've been problems backstage maybe? That's the only reason i can think of, we don't know that side of the story after all, but we do know the writers have known to be dickheads in the past/talent wasters,And they should ALWAYS have back up plans for someone like The Undertaker, that's bad management in my view.


Baby steps, man....baby steps.

[The CyNick]

^ point taken. But shouldn't they take the focus of Raw off of HHH for a while atleast when someone else is the champ?That is the only problem i have with the wwe at the moment. The biggest champion should always main event, And as for O'Haire, yes he may of had a good character etc, but there could've been problems backstage maybe? That's the only reason i can think of, we don't know that side of the story after all, but we do know the writers have known to be dickheads in the past/talent wasters,And they should ALWAYS have back up plans for someone like The Undertaker, that's bad management in my view.

I agree about Hunter.

Even though its great he's doing a better job making guys look good in the ring, he's still positioned as the main event player ont he show. IMO the World Champ should always be in the main event. If you dont trust a guy to headline then he should get the title, its that simple. Nowadays they do this deal too much where a new guy gets the title, but he doesn'ty get to main event. Thats where Benoit is right now. Sure he's the champ, but he curtain jerks, while the main program on RAW right now is HHH vs Shelton Benjamin. Its hurts the credibility of the title.