Matt D

I think we agree regardless of the fact that agent told Rusev to sell throughout the match versus the old school think where Rusev would have had to contributed that on his own that this was good shit and we can't credit or fault Rusev for the current operating environment. So I don't want to belabor the talking point I had in the past with friends on the overemphasis on praising singer-songwriters versus those who just sing. Everybody has their role that maximizes their value. Some great artists like Elvis are best suited for singers and don't make them any less worthy of praise than a singer-songwriter. It is great that wrestlers used to call it in the ring, but now it is time for those who can execute. At the end of the day, even if Rusev was told to do it, it is up to him to execute. How many times have we seen wrestlers blow off selling or forget about it. It could have been very simple for Rusev to get caught up in his offense and neglect to sell. Where we disagree is that if you insert another member of the roster into a similar match that same praise would be given. What made this so impactful was that Rusev has been this unstoppable force, but last month Swagger was able to wound him with the Patriot Lock and almost get a countout. Rusev sold that through his finish and the next night on RAW. From there Rusev tried to jumpstart the match, but it backfired and Swagger slaps on the Patriot Lock again to great effect. It was the perfect confluence of how Rusev had been built up, previous match storytelling and Rusev's excellent execution. If they did something similar in Miz/Ziggler or Paige/AJ I don't think would be as effective because those feuds don't have the same heat and build. To me it does not matter who the brains because you could tell two wrestlers the greatest layout in the world, but as a fan I ain't going to see that. i am going to see the match that those wrestlers put out. Rusev executed the vision of the agent to great effect and deserves all the credit for doing just that. I don't disagree with a lot of what you said. I did think that I had to say what I said, however, if only because it needed to be raised. I'm fine with then people dismissing it. It was playing devil's advocate. Where I disagree is the last sentence. I think over time, you can figure that out. Like I said, if this is something that Rusev, coming out of this match, comes to appreciate, and it's something that plays into his matches for years to come, then that's great, and I think at some point, it will become very easy to start to attribute that to him. In the scope of one or two nights, no, not yet. He can get all the credit in the world for the execution of it, however.

I got asked today by someone at work who's a lapsed fan why John Cena took a "HHH squashes someone" beating against Lesnar. He was energized by the possibility of Rock coming back to face him at Mania though. On the other hand, I had to try to explain Dean Ambrose.

Ok, Rusev continued to sell the ankle last night. Million billion stars.

I missed chunks of the show. Are Goldust and Stardust going to challenge the Usos now? Also, the head writer of Smackdown is obviously a huge Dolph fan (he's much more prominent on that show, including challenging batista right after his turn for a few weeks, etc), so I'm curious how he's going to use him as IC champion.

A couple weeks off at this point is just going to make the crowd hotter for Ambrose when he comes charging back.

If they didn't for Fuji Vice... Neither here nor there, but I have this feeling that if the Bobby Heenan show dropped today, on Adult Swim or IFC or something, it'd have a huge cult following. Way before its time.

Yes. I bet all of us would agree on that but Will, who would go with headbutts.

What's even the difference between No Holds Barred and No DQ?

He was pretty clear about only wanting to come back as a heel, but who knows.

Selling on offense is the greatest thing in the world. That said, It was so blatant that I figured someone had to take him aside and specifically tell him to do it. That doesn't make it less of a positive trait and hopefully it's something he keeps in mind in the future, now that he successfully done it once, but I still thought it was a point worth raising.

I wish i was that talented and dedicated.

It's a way to set the stage for the HOF next year.

The difference between that and let's say The Beautiful People is that people in and/or around the industry were talking up the Beautiful People relative to what WWE was offering in a comparable area.

It's weird to me that they're not using Cesaro (maybe with a secondary belt) as the Heyman guy stand in for Brock while he's off Raw. He could be the herald of galactus, basically.

I made it to the start of the Ambrose stuff and Dylan being wrong about the gimmick before I had to stop listening due to time constraints. BUT I want to call out Kris on something. Re: Rusev. It was a great performance. It was very good selling. It was especially good due to the fact he's got so little in the way of main roster experience. The problem I have with overhyping it is that i feel that a huge majority of the roster could probably have done a comparable job if they were put out there by the agents and told to do so. It was so one-dimensional a match in that regard that it was less challenging than managing that selling as part of a broader whole. It stood out because they don't do it much but I don't know how much that has to do with Rusev being somehow special or whether he was just lucky to be put in a situation where he got to show off something that most guys usually don't get to show. I loved it but I do think you have to keep that in mind.

If the match is Rene Goulet vs SD Jones, for 13 minutes, then it is his job. Less so for Santana vs Savage.

I had to hit refresh once during Swagger's entrance. That was about it.

The flip side is this: What the hell will they give us in Brock's absence in the meantime? Part of me thinks that hilariously Cena wins it back at NOC.

You weren't watching last year after Summerslam, Charles. Were you watching when the Nexus angle hit, or during the Pipe Bomb angle? The answer is that they'll fuck it up within a month and a half. I wish it wasn't, but yeah. The only saving grace is that maybe they don't have enough dates with Brock to fuck it up immediately.

I'm not sure I want to see Bryan in a match even half that brutal.

After this, they have to do Cena again, basically. If it had been more even then it would have been another story but they have to let Cena get revenge now

The animated gif back and forth between Lesnar's grinning ogre face and Cena's beat up face in the corner will be amazing.

So he actively defied a stip that he chose that lead to him losing . Kinda makes him a dumb babyface. He's freaking nuts! He's Dean Ambrose!

I still think there was a relatively big Total Divas following in the crowd. The cool part about that is that while we all saw the turn coming, none of them did and there was a sense of huge surprise in the reaction.

But this way they put Ambrose over for actively defying the stip. It wasn't just haphazardly that they broke it. It was with purpose.