sek69

https://wwe.2k.com/wwe2k17-roster Some interesting names popping up among the usual suspects on the Legends roster, like Fujinami and Lex Luger. I wonder if that means we'll see Lex in the HOF this year.

That's only a portion of the story though. It wasn't just people booing Roman because he wasn't Bryan, it was because the company was making a deliberate effort to push the guy they wanted at the expense of the guy the crowd clearly wanted. All the self serving "we listen to the fans, we do this all for you" speeches came home to roost for WWE when the fans saw it for the bullshit it was. That's a part of the whole Roman saga that seems to be surprisingly glossed over to me, at the root it was a case of a company digging in their heels and doubling down when their fanbase was clearly rejecting what they wanted to do.

Well if he's a heel that gets cheered, at least that's a backdoor way for them to get what they wanted. The Rock should have been the blueprint they followed the moment he started getting booed out of the building. Allowing him to vent on the fans who hated him allowed him to show the personality that changed him from dorky Blue Chipper Rocky to the MF'in ROCK almost overnight.

When do you ever say anything positive about WWE? You are one of the biggest complainers on the board. I just posted about how I love how Smackdown has been doing more with a roster that most people would consider lesser than Raw. I used to almost never watch SD and now it's my favorite WWE show. Really, my only issues with WWE is positioning Steph as the Alpha Female beyond reproach which at this point is what it is, and their insistence on continuing to miscast Roman as Smiling Babyface Diesel when he could be used 1000% better as a heel. I get far more annoyed by "wrestling twitter" types who seemingly don't realize how snobbish they come off when they browbeat the plebs for not liking the same things they do.

Of all the various types of smart fans being discussed, one that always confuses me are the types like Parv who clearly hate the current WWE product but seem compelled like a moth to a light to any and all discussion of it. I honestly don't get it. I personally find most of 70s and early 80s (W)WWF boring as fuck so I don't really spend much time watching it, but I've never felt the need to run in to a group of people talking about it and go on and on about how much it's garbage and everyone involved in it is boring and awful. I was close to just assuming Parv was working some kind of gimmick, but reading posts where he's clearly not interested in anything that might challenge his view makes it clear he's just posting to get a rise. Calling it trolling seems to harsh since it seems like he has some very closely held beliefs. I just don't know what his end game here is. Everything about WWE seems to offend him on a cellular level, which is fine, different strokes and all that. I'm not sure what he seeks to accomplish by continuing to bang his drum.

They really haven't been on screen much after the first week or so. The promo last week with Bryan announcing the new titles was the most he'd been in front of the crowd since the draft it seems. Speaking of, I really like how it seems like whoever is writing Smackdown realized they got the short end of the draft and went "you know what, fuck it, we'll make it work". They've really made a more entertaining show and revitalized guys who were dead in the water previously.

It's not so much a justification as much as an acknowledgement that there's far less people who share the same level of concern than there are people who would rather not support a large business that frequently takes a dump on their heads.

I feel that's overstating things a bit. It's not that people were having a temper tantrum over that one Rumble, it's that it represented the company taking what it knew the fans wanted to see and giving them a giant middle finger. So in turn the fans did the same thing to Roman knowing he means as much to the company (well, Vince at least) as Bryan did to them. It's petty, yes, but considering the company's history it couldn't have happened to more deserving folks. Not giving the company any money would have been a much clearer message. You could say the same thing to NFL fans IRT fleecing the public for taxpayer funded stadiums and covering up and/or overlooking players' criminal activities, but every Sunday's going to have 16 packed stadiums. In an ideal world, the proper response to poor booking would be for them to face empty arenas (and for a lot of houseshows, they pretty much are) but the truth of the matter is that WWE is the only game in town for 3/ths of the country so if you are a wrestling fan it's them or nothing.

I feel that's overstating things a bit. It's not that people were having a temper tantrum over that one Rumble, it's that it represented the company taking what it knew the fans wanted to see and giving them a giant middle finger. So in turn the fans did the same thing to Roman knowing he means as much to the company (well, Vince at least) as Bryan did to them. It's petty, yes, but considering the company's history it couldn't have happened to more deserving folks.

It could be why they've been stockpiling guys that serve no further purpose being in developmental though. I'm sure that's giving them way too much credit for long term planning,

The only flaw with an NXT invasion style gimmick is it would pit HHH vs Steph. Given the life-imitates-art nature of pro wrestling, it would be funny if he ended up Kevin Sullivan-ing himself. Other than the other flaw of every WWE invasion angle ever being booked to fail after the first week, that is.

From their website: Makes sense considering their partnership with CMLL, but like cubsfan joked on Twitter they could have just asked to use one of their titles since they don't seem to remember who half their champions are.

I guess my main problem is he's clearly got it in him to be a super heel, but the company has such a hard on about making him the new John Cena it takes me out of his matches to a degree. And let's not kid ourselves here, when they started with the Shield he was not very good. Didn't they start the barf inducing zoom in on strikes in part to cover for him? I give him all the credit in th world for improving, but he went from bad to pretty decent and suddenly folks are giving him Wrestler of the Year.

Why is she demanding that Paul come out and apologize for something she doesn't care about? Why have another segment of her flexing on someone who can't fight back (either in storylines or for real) just to set up another segment eventually where she reveals it was part of her brilliant plan to book Shane-Brock?

So are we really going to keep acting like Roman is some kind of super worker now? I mean, yes he's improved from when he was just the big scary dude in the Shield, but I feel like a lot of this Reigns love is a kneejerk reaction to fans continuing to boo him.

So I noticed there was nary a peep from the "people who dislike Steph are misogynist troglodytes" crowd after that promo with Heyman. Never mind that the whole build to the brand split was that the McMahon kids want to destroy each other, now we're supposed to believe either Steph now suddenly wants to avenge her brother or this is some big long con and she really wants Brock to destroy him (because Steph is the sun and the moon and all good things come from her).

Balor wasn't trying to break his fall, he was going to land short of the dasher boards and was putting his arm out to grab it the same way you would if it was the ropes. If he hadn't have done that it might have been an uglier bump to take and possibly another Sting situation.

Pretty sure she was on more than once, may not have been identified every time though,

I love how after weeks of being on NXT TV and pointing out her family history, Rachel Ellering got a new last name at the latest tapings now that her dad is on the show.

Also the fact that they seem to want to portray her as the female version of the Mr. Mcmahon character, while forgetting that Austin was constantly foiling his plans and one upping him.

Yeah, Johnny's out to lunch here. No one hates Steph because she's a woman boss, but for how nearly every segment she's in turns into her talking to guys like they are misbehaving children. Women too, since she decided to co opt what was an organic movement in NXT to another corporate branding exercise that she can play Den Mother to.

Too bad his career has been less like that promo and more like him in a chicken suit for a KFC ad. I hope this is a turning of the page for him, but let's not act like he was doing much of anything before Maryse came back.

No, and it made anyone talking about them sound awkward having to say "Smackdown tag team/women's championship" each time.

I wonder how much of that was done on the fly, poor Renee looked like she was witnessing a train derailment.

I know it's the same design, but silver makes the tag belts look so much better than the pennies on Raw.