No one will ever be "that guy" if the presumption is correct in panicing over buyrates. They'll keep booking potential main eventers in a "why should I give a shit about them?" kind of way while trying to hotshot the next new face into credible world dominance in the span of two PPV's.
Again, I point out that both the storyline face of the company AND the literal face of the company (Orton and Cena, respectively) were both seen as an "experiment", and kind of pushed out of neccessity. They didn't have the cast of reliable top-teir talent anymore either from injury or pursuing other interests.
And it's funny when you control a huge chunk of the perception of a character in how "good" they are. When people talk about being marks for a win/loss record, it pretty much means obsessing over getting wins, but if you're trying to get someone over to make them appear *better*, you'd think WINS would accomplish that. Face wins is final triumph. Dirty heel wins cement them as heels. Clean heel wins proves they're as good as they say, and make you want to see him dethroned all the more. Going back to Punk's magical 434, in with hindsight and the announce team trying to put that over
now make it seem like a bigger deal than when it was happening. When it was happening, you had your champion- self proclaimed "best in the world"- losing clean in non title matches on a regular basis. 20 years ago in the same situation, if Punk even appeared on TV outside of a canned promo, he was going to squash a jobber to solidify his claim, or at least put on a show with someone up the card but ultimately come out on top. Help from Heyman would be optional, but he would get the win. Punk losing all the time in his reign plants the seeds of "how the hell is this guy champion?", and nobody wants to see a hole where there's difinitive doubt. The same can be said for Axel's re-christening and IC run. His backdoor victores at the beginning were at least interesting because they were victories. He's been booked like a baffoon from jump instead of becoming somewhat of a badass force to be reconed with. Instead everyone's like "why is this guy a title holder"? Simply having the Intercontinental Championship doesn't make him instantly better, he's supposed to make the title better, and being made to look like a chump all the time doesn't do that in the least... something WWE has been pretty bad about for awhile (let's throw Title/MitB on someone and see if it gets them over) instead of being a stamp of approval, it just becomes a rotating gimmick to unsuccessfully try to get the next guy over.
What's so disheartening about the Bryan situation is that timeless tale that many wrestlers have shot about over the years about how the face chases and chases and then that moment where he finally wins. They didn't deliver on the "finally wins" that's supposed to come. It makes it appear the heel was telling the truth. That's not what people want; the villain to be honest in the end. Repeating Bryan is a "B+ player", and then making good on just being a "B+ player", makes everyone believe he is, in fact, that B+ player, and doesn't deserve to be there. It was the same with Christian when he started the "one more match" thing, yet he kept blowing all his opportunites. After about the 5th/6th/7th loophole into a title opportunity, everyone is believing that he couldn't get it done and no one wanted to see him try anymore.
Meanwhile, trying to strap rockets to the asses of people like Ryback (throwing the hoss thing to the side) who wasn't even around long enough or been through enough angles to have some character development depth, is suddenly supposed to jump to the top of the mountain while he was still pretty vanilla. Roman Reigns and Big E have the same issue at this moment with all the speculation swirling about them getting impending pushes. That same issue that plagued guys like Zeke Jackson, Heidenrich, and Chris Masters.
You'd think they would have learned that lesson with The Rock. WWE tried to force him down everyone's throats when there was nothing to him yet. All we knew he was yet another guy of Samoan lineage and muscles. He may have had "the look", but most of the time, nobody CARES if they have the look and nothing else. There's a reason why EVERYONE doesn't have the success of an Undertaker, Bill Goldberg, or a Brock Lesnar. Most of the time, people see it, are in awe, and then go "okay... and now what? Yeah, he's big and muscular like everyone else, so what makes him different/special?" The Rock had to go through all the "Die Rocky, Die", and joining The Nation and IC battle with SCSA and Hunter and The Corporation to flesh out that character... for people to be "familiar" with him; for him to gain the "and then what".
All the while, the under/midcard is littered with people with TONS of "and then what", and all they truly need is the machine behind them for longer than 8 weeks at a time. Instead of following through on guys that have been red hot WHEN they are red hot (Zack Ryder was insanely over in spite of barely being on TV; people were CHANTING for Dolph Ziggler while he was still a heel; etc
, they're off chasing the next giant nobody will remember. For a company that is looking to create "larger than life superstars", they seem to get hung up on it being literal physical build instead of people who emotionally connect with the ticketholders.
Daniel Bryan has THE WHOLE WORLD going "YES! YES! YES!", but you know, he's not "that guy"...