He damn sure is! All hail the King of the Swing!

How anyone can think that a 34-second gap between the Pedigree and a cover in that storyline is anything short of shitty is beyond me. CyNick cannot possibly believe this shit.

I also laugh at the basic implication: "When Booker T ended up being terribly booked, he ended up exactly where I thought he would -- a poorly booked upper mid-card guy." I'm NOT saying that Booker T could have changed the industry, and I'm not saying he WOULDN'T have. That is besides the point. I just want people to reflect on how over the guy was and how the WWE booked him from day dot with the company, and reflect on whether or not that might have affected the ceiling EDITED: lovely folk like CyNick put on him.

lol Good post Noid, BUT calling Nick a moron is a bit harsh. Keep in mind we're all friends in the wrassling forum!

I'm not genuinely being nasty -- sorry if it comes off that way. CyNick has just been pushing buttons for so long, I think he's earned a few "cunts" here and there.

CyNick knows I am ambivalent towards him.

It will only add to his delusions that he's a maverick/rogue in the same light as Han Solo.

Yeah, good point. Best I just ignore it and keep my laughter to myself.

For the sake of wrestling discussion though:

Is there an angle that is widely considered terrible that you actually didn't mind? I'd rather just cut CyNick out of the conversation. He can answer, of course -- but I'll ignore it.

Point of order: can anyone speak in the notion that the booking of the mania 19 match was changed last minute? I was under the impression the build went how it did because booker was going to go over, and day of hhh pushed to keep the belt. Any truth to this?


It would explain why the build seemed to come off poorly.

For me the mania 7 blind fold match that gets shit on I enjoyed.
The invasion angle finale I enjoyed
Nash ending the streak

People were behind Booker long before they decided to go the to the racial thing all that did was make the conclusion to their feud that much more illogical.

You asked how highly we rate Booker t I seriously don't think Batista is or was as great as you think. On the mic he's still pretty average(his last go round was actually kinda terrible) you said him blowing up in Hollywood is all him no it isn't Leviathan from OVW wouldn't have gotten the call to be Drax the destroyer Batista from the WWE however... He isn't The Rock(who oozes charisma like crazy) I used DB as an example earlier because while he isn't strong on the mic he actually does have A weird charisma that connects with people. I don't recall Batista's following being especially strong. Was he over sure, but I wouldn't rate him too far up. Nothing sticks out about him in the ring either now that I think about it. all that said Kanyetista was amazing. This last time his clothes were the most interesting and over thing about him (I'm not even joking)

Bryan got so over in WWE partly because he was already so well known by indy fans from his decade plus on the independent circuit. He was also a guy who was seen as relatable due to having to attend therapy all the while keeping a strained (to say the least) relationship with Kane going as they were tag champs, plus he had to fight against a perceived injustice in a quest to regain his WWE Championship by standing up for himself against his boss. Between that and the positivity that radiated from the "YES!" chants, he was made to come off as a very down-to-earth man of simple pleasures.

His in ring work with the WWE got people on board too he is a joy to watch in the ring the connection he made with fans runs amazingly deep like the Rock my overall point is the Rock and DB are two vastly different people but both are darlings to fans they are extraordinary Batista is...average Cynick makes it sound like he was something special.

No, I'm not saying he should have lost to all of them by any means. I'm saying that he got out of losing when he was planned to lose to all of them, and in the end nobody was elevated of those four because the Goldberg loss came too late, he feuded with HHH the entire time he was champion, and HHH walked away with the belt. Again, the numbers fell during this whole period of time, and Raw needed a new focus, and Triple H wasn't the answer.

And the "they aren't good enough" argument is dead as soon as you say he singlehandedly made Batista, because that is completely correct, he just chose not to do it for those other guys, all of whom had more going for them at the point the feud started than Batista did.

Beautiful post.

I wasn't even a massive Goldberg mark, but my interest in RAW dropped to 0 when Triple H walked out of the Chamber champion. Almost as egregious as the Booker T fiasco. I was surprised to see it come up as often as it did in your "jumping the shark" podcast recently, although it makes total sense.

Let's just say there's a reason I decided to AVOID the Batista discussion between you two. Mostly because I don't want to end up endlessly arguing with CyNick, but that's a whole different issue altogether.

And for the record there was in fact a point were Booker T as a heel was played completely straight. He had a stint after it was reveled that his was complicit in his wife's cheating to help him win matches.

"...and you don't know what I'm cap'pul of!"

I wouldn't put it as a "jumping the shark" moment since it definitely wasn't the definitive moment when shit went downhill. It was pretty bad though.

Goldberg's presence/"aura" was really all he had going for him. WCW built it up properly, made him a star and put the title on him.

WWE finally had Goldberg to for their own... and decided to kill his aura AND THEN put the title on him. What?

I'm confused. If heels shouldn't win too much, where's the login in Hunter basically running through any credible face or possible top babyface the company had from 2003-2005? Why didn't fans cheer him? I mean, he was winning a lot.

Heh heh.

I wouldn't have put it as a jumping the shark moment either, but it definitely does stand out as a majorly dumb move. I LOL'd at CyNick saying "when the time was right" in regards to Goldie getting the belt, I'll be honest.

It sucked in the same way that Jeff Jarrett beating Monty Brown sucked, but on a much larger scale.

Oh that's because hhh was a monster amazing next level super sayan heel. But I wouldn't expect you to understand the same way Vince and I do.

The money was in Triple H facing Batista in 2005, remember? After they failed to make that money off Triple H vs. Randy Orton in 2004...

Randy only got the belt at that time as a fuck you to Lesnar. He really wasn't ready at that point, despite them feeding Foley to him repeatedly.

Batista benefitted from a better angle (which more or less started after Randy's burial), better timing, and a better look.

There's really only one reason RVD, Goldberg, and Booker didn't get to finally end the reign of terror, and it has NOTHING to do with politics, and EVERYTHING to do with why Batista was chosen: which one of the four guys that I just mentioned was a Vince creation?

Also, RVD is terrible and should have never been anywhere near the WWE Title.

I'd say in the ring he wasn't great but he had an undeniable connection with the audience and could put on a hell of a show. Oh lol and he couldn't talk either. But he certainly had am it factor about him. Pretty neutral towards him tbh. Worst working punched ever.

I was never the biggest RVD mark, but he was over enough to be in the main event picture. It seemed a lot of time was spent trying to cool him.

You have a guy that over, you try and make money off him. And I'm sure the WWE did, but not as much as they could have obviously.

If he hadn't fucked up shortly after beating Cena, Van Dam could have had a really tremendous run as simultaneous WWE and ECW Champions.

I think they would have taken the WWE Title off him before too long. He did fuck up, but it doesn't change the company fucking up with him for the better part of five years up to that point.

WE GOT SOME WARFARE GOING ON IN HERE?

Can the much maligned Cynick explain the much maligned Survivor Series?

STAY TUNED FOR THE CYNICK's REPLY IN "The thread where we get CyNick to defend maligned storylines, and tell us how we don't understand..."

DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN

I really don't need the CyNick, I mean WWE is pretty much dead set on Roman Reigns being the top baby face and tonight set that in motion. Sheamus as champ is better than Reigns at this point and pretty much they're trying to recreate a Daniel Bryan scenerio where Reigns keeps getting screwed out of the title. I don't think it will work but it seems like the plan. Reigns probably gets screwed at TLC and then wins the Rumble. Could see Cena returning and winning the title off Sheamus at The Royal Rumble to set up Reigns/Cena.

Reigns might win it at TLC in order to get to Reigns vs. Brock too. I don't care either way.

Maybe. But the IWC narrative is that Vince won't push guys he didn't create. He didn't create Chris Benoit. Yet he still had him there in MSG closing out his marquee event.

To me both Eddie and Benoit were better than Booker T, so they made the right call putting over those guys instead of Booker. But that's just a matter of opinion.

I hear you, I just don't think it's s big issue. Like I said, the angle did no damage to Booker. He is who he is, he is a upper mid card guy. To me he in no way deserved to beat Hunter, no matter what the storyline.

If Booker's career would have been ruined by not rising up for black people, I would understand the criticism. But that didn't happen, he went on to become even more popular. So I would say WWE did the right thing with .

A lot of guys can gain stream, but being able to carry the ball is a totally different thing. I personally never saw Booker as a top guy.

Rude and spineless. Good combination Noidy.

Do you think every guy who steps into a ring has the potentially to be a successful headliner? Or do you think some guys can only go so far?

Now i wish i watched Star Trek and understood the reference