Yes. Fat heels who have signs in the crowd about them being fat get shown on TV.

 

"Oh but he's not fat!" Yea, he is. That's not me shitting on his skill as a wrestler (although I'm not very high on him and thought the Cena matches were shitty spot fests) it's just pointing out a fact.

Here's a question: if he were in better shape, would he be worse off as a heel? I feel like a lot of the ammo people have against him is his weight. It's an easy target.

I don't see the problem with just one or two guys on the roster who look like ordinary guys. A lot of people like to see themselves in the ring. That was part of the appeal of Dreamer and Sandman in ECW, that they did look kinda like they'd stepped out of the front row. The important part is that most of the wrestlers on the show didn't look like that (unlike your average shitty local indy full of dad bodies in street clothes), so the ordinary-looking guy stood out as appearing different.

Owens doesn't look like an "ordinary guy ". I see ordinary guys every day. Lots of them. I see one in the fucking mirror. Owens looks like an guy who can kick your ass, so let's bury this dopey talking point.

I don't care about Owens weight. I wish he would something about his promos though. His Bill Shatner delivery is horrible.

I don't care about Owens weight. I wish he would something about his promos though. His Bill Shatner delivery is horrible.

 

It's also different than what anyone else is doing, which I think would be a good thing.

It's not so much Owens' weight as it is the incongruity with his gimmick. He's supposed to be a "prize fighter" who's willing to do anything it takes to feed his family. Well, you'd think that one of those things he'd be willing to do is get in shape. In any fighting sport the people in the prize fights don't look like Owens. He also can't grow a good beard; he probably keeps it because it hides the double chin.

 

He has great instincts about so many other things in wrestling. If he worked harder then he could be a top heel, and he would pull in the audience enough to make the eventual face turn a big deal. It doesn't help him much that two of his biggest feuds, the ones with Sami Zayn and Samoa Joe, were cut short due to reasons outside of his control. Maybe it will work out better for him in the end because they can now do the Zayn feud on the main roster.

The character works because its not just that he is a prize fighter. It is that he is one of the better prize fighters that is out there that the company never wanted. He is the guy who wrecks the company's plans by being the badass fighter who beats your top guys when he should have been done away with by now.