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Archive for October, 2007

I have to admit it: I’m behind.

I TIVO’d Cyber Sunday and have yet to watch it, but the buzz I hear is mostly positive. While it would have been more fun without John Cena on injured reserve, the whole affair does possess that “air of the unexpected” that makes for a good PPV.

Here’s the deal: I’ll watch Cyber Sunday soon and be back with my match-by-match reactions. I’ll also catch up on RAW and be back on schedule before you know it.

Deal?

Deal.

I’ll confess up front: I haven’t seen Cyber Sunday yet, but everything I’m hearing indicates it was a fun PPV. While it might not have been the home run it could have been with more WWE superstars healthy, like the much-missed John Cena, word is the event was enjoyable, at least, and didn’t have a lot of dragging moments.

That’s what I like to hear; that at least a couple matches exploded like model rockets and the rest were at least watchable and advanced a storyline.

Now that I’ve admitted my sin of missing Cyber Sunday so far, you can rest assured that I’ll soon be watching through every match and will soon be back with my reactions. Then I’ll get caught up on RAW and all will be right on this blog once again.

Who would have thunk it? I’m actually getting excited about Cyber Sunday.

I bopped over to WWE.com to vote tonight, just because I’d been putting it off for too long, and some of the matches actually look fun. I really want to see Orton take on my Mr. Kennedy, though the vote probably won’t go my way there.

And I’m eager to see C.M. Punk face off with a back-from-suspension John Morrison, and the vote MAY go my way there, since the other two choices are a five-time retread (Big Daddy V) and a comic-relief wrestler in The Mizh.

Most of all, if Stone Cold is voted in as the guest referee for the Smackdown title, the bit of nostalgia will be a fun thing, too. I’m actually potentially excited about a SmackDown brand match in this upcoming PPV, even if it’s only about the guest ref!

And we all know my low opinion of the SmackDown brand. This’ll prove interesting!

Cyber Sunday could very well be the next-best thing since avoiding truck accident lawyers after a big winter mess on the highway. No one wants to deal with lawyers after an accident, and Cyber Sunday means that no one has to deal with a wacky GM character deciding the next PPV for us!

Instead, WWE fans take control this Sunday in the booking. Sure, some of the decks are stacked to favor a WWE-preferred matchup, but heck, if it bugs you that much, go in with a “Vote for the Worst” mentality and screw with ‘em to your heart’s content!

Aside from a really good WrestleMania or a proper, traditionally-booked Survivor Series, Cyber Sunday has become one of my favorite new-age WWE PPVs. Might even prove fresh enough to be fun!

You can influence the next WWE pay-per-view. Cyber Sunday is a once-a-year PPV event in which WWE lets fans have a hand in deciding opponents, match types and other key elements of an upcoming PPV event.

The idea was originated about three years ago and has been a popular one with fans ever since. Personally, I find Cyber Sunday a bit limiting and wish they’d offer fans a wider palette of options, especially on main events.

Not that Shawn Michaels, Jeff Hardy and Mr. Kennedy aren’t good options, but what if fans wanted to vote for someone else to lock up with Randy Orton? That’s all I mean.

Anyway, here’s WWE’s press release on the whole thing… two weeks and counting!

==

Log on, take over. WWE Cyber Sunday is the only interactive Pay-Per-View that lets fans take control. Visit WWE.com and vote to decide matches and more as the fans will control the fate of WWE Champion Randy Orton, CM Punk, Rey Mysterio, Triple H and all your favorite Superstars at WWE Cyber Sunday on Sunday, October 28th, live at 8pm ET/5pm PT, only on Pay-Per-View. A World Wrestling Entertainment Production. Go to wwe.com for more details.

You won’t have to worry about cell reception in order to influence the next WWE pay-per-view. Unlike American Idol, in which such concerns are a hindrance to voting on the outcome, Cyber Sunday is a once-a-year PPV event in which WWE lets fans have a hand in deciding opponents, match types and other key elements of an upcoming PPV event.

The idea was originated about three years ago and has been a popular one with fans ever since. Personally, I find Cyber Sunday a bit limiting and wish they’d offer fans a wider palette of options, especially on main events.

Not that Shawn Michaels, Jeff Hardy and Mr. Kennedy aren’t good options, but what if fans wanted to vote for someone else to lock up with Randy Orton? That’s all I mean.

Anyway, here’s WWE’s press release on the whole thing… two weeks and counting!

==

Log on, take over. WWE Cyber Sunday is the only interactive Pay-Per-View that lets fans take control. Visit WWE.com and vote to decide matches and more as the fans will control the fate of WWE Champion Randy Orton, CM Punk, Rey Mysterio, Triple H and all your favorite Superstars at WWE Cyber Sunday on Sunday, October 28th, live at 8pm ET/5pm PT, only on Pay-Per-View. A World Wrestling Entertainment Production. Go to wwe.com for more details.

It wouldn’t surprise me at all of No Mercy turned into the most “blah” PPV the WWE puts on this year. Lacking its top star in the main event match is only the least of the WWE’s problems going into No Mercy 2007. The undercard doesn’t look that promising, either. By the time it’s all done, WWE may realize it overspent on wholesale clothing playing off the promotion of No Mercy 2007.

The biggest undercard match is Batista vs. The Great Khali in a Punjabi Prison match. While the gimmick isn’t a bad one, having it be a one-on-one affair between two stiff plodders is not great booking. Batista’s a bit too big to be perceived as an overmatched underdog against Khali, and without a more athletic, energetic participant, this one could get ugly.

CM Punk versus Big Daddy V has some David vs. Goliath potential, but the feud was hastily constructed and poorly built. Underwhleming heat will equal PPV apathy, and can only be spiced up by the potential, post-suspension return of previous champ John Morrison. Also, I’ve just never cared for, or bought into, any incarnation of Viscera. He was far more effective as comic relief on Raw.

Finlay vs. Rey Mysterio inspires apathy, as Rey-Rey has lost some heat since his return to action and Finlay is one of those superstars who I blame for the downfall and “craptacular” status of SmackDown. Not interesting, not convincing, shallow character, not fun to watch. Demote him out of the company and let him go wrestle or TNA or some other minor league promotion. How this match made it on a PPV card – any PPV card – is beyond me.

Candice Michele vs. Beth Phoenix might turn out OK, but Beth Phoenix’s “Glamazon” gimmick is simply annoying, and not in a good way. The feud, again, is poorly built and has little to no heat behind it.

Triple H versus Umaga also inspires yawns. Umaga has been overpushed and is a one-dimensional heel that lacks the depth of character for long-term appeal; he strikes me more as the next Viscera, more than the next Andre the Giant. And Triple H simply is a shadow of his former self since his return. That is he being promoted in a storyline almost identical to one used earlier this year to promote Cena is … disappointing, to say the least.

Uhhh, was there even a tag match scheduled? I vaguely recall something about a couple of rednecks versus a couple of cruiser-weights… whatever.

Hope springs eternal, but tonight’s PPV is looking dismal so far. We’ll know more in a couple hours.

As a native Minnesotan and Minnesota Viking fan, it only took four words to get Mr. Kennedy over with me as a heel. The first night he appeared on SmackDown and was introduced, the ring announcer included these four words: “…from Green Bay, Wisconsin…”

Nothing gets the blood of a Viking fan boiling more quickly. And Ken Anderson, whose ring persona is “Mr. Kennedy,” didn’t disappoint, playing the classic heel while stealing a bit of his gimmick from classic boxing announcer Michael Buffer, grabbing the mic from Harvey Finkleman and re-announcing himself to the crowd in Michael Buffer style.

It helps that Mr. Kennedy is a good talker on the mic, cutting sharp heel promos and enjoying the boos, taking his heel sensibility from classic Minnesota wrestler, Jesse “The Body” Ventura, who always liked to say he was just “telling it like it is.”

It also helps that Kennedy can wrestle a solid match. He does this while delivering solid basics in the ring, showing a decent understanding of ring psychology, which was prominently on display in his now-classic SmackDown feud with Undertaker. He doesn’t require a special outfit or ring entrance to demand attention; it’s all pretty straight-forward with Mr. Kennedy, because it works without the extras. His only gimmick is to get in front of the camera and “be an ass.” Which is how the best heels get over.

What I like about Mr. Kennedy’s potential is that he’s more of the cocky ass than the cowardly type. I’ve never been a fan of in-ring heels like Triple-H, who go around talking like they’re completely unbeatable, but whine like little girls when someone builds a match that stacks the deck against them. I’ve always thought true cocky heels were easier to hate; they never back down, quake in their boots or complain because they’re just too overconfident to ever worry that things might not turn out in their favor.

That’s the kind of heel Mr. Kennedy tends toward, and it’s a lot more appealing. Wise up, WWE: Make Mr. Kennedy the new WWE champ in Cena’s absence. He’s the kind of heel who can not only earn boos, but sell WWE product, from Mr. Kennedy t-shirts to personalized pens.

Ever since Cena’s injury on last week’s Monday Night RAW took him out of action for the next 6-8 months, e-mailboxes everywhere have been filling up with “what will WWE do now” suggestions.

I tend not to read these as I have my own ideas of what might work and what might sell.And as we’re a mere three hours away from the PPV, we only have limited time left to guess at what way the company will go. Guessing games such as this are always more fun than the reality, but let’s indulge while we still can.

1) A Realistic Scenario: Move MVP over to RAW. Immediately set up a triple-threat Last Man Standing Match between Montel Vontavious Porter, Randy Orton and Mr. Kennedy for the WWE title at No Mercy. This would immediately elevate Kennedy and MVP to a status they’ve been working hard to achieve for the past year or so. Turn MVP babyface in the switch, but an edgy ‘face so as to keep some continuity to his character. Have MVP and Kennedy work together to take Orton out, then have a go against each other, either putting the title on MVP or on Orton in a last-second sneak-attack finish.

Personally, I’d love to see this be the direction the company goes. Although MVP and Kennedy are not top draws yet, both have huge potential and for months when SmackDown was the suckiest broadcast in WWE’s arsenal, it was Mr. Kennedy and MVP’s feud against Kane and Undertaker that kept me tuning in — not because of Kane and ‘Taker, but because of Mr. Kennedy and MVP.

2) A Popular Option: Bring back Chris Jericho and insert him into the feud with Orton in a “Legend vs. Legend Killer” match. This has been suggested elsewhere and seems to be the favorite of Internet smarts. I could see it working, since Jericho may be coming back soon anyway. Jericho has the honor of being the WWE’s only “undisputed” champion who held both the WWE and former WCW belts at the same time. He’d make a tasty target for Orton, and Jericho can still deliver great promos.

To sell the feud, Jericho would have to play the face and do a run-in, rather than be introduced by Mr. McMahon. And to legitimize Jericho’s sudden reappearance, he’d have to win the title clean over Orton to kick things off.

3) A Likely Cop-Out: Instead of further diluting the SmackDown brand or bringing in an outside solution like Jericho, WWE will likely have a typical, “Vince walks out, gets interrupted by four or five stars who all they they deserve their title shot, and Vince puts them all in a cluster-fudge match with the last man standing claiming the WWE title… and someone “reliable” like Triple-H taking home the championship gold.

Translation: BOOOO-RIIIIING!

Between injuries and suspensions and “more” causes for the recent WWE talent drain that we won’t go into, to avoid dredging up painful memories, the WWE has never been thinner on top-of-card talent than it is right now.

This is proven by hard how the WWE is struggling to replace the No Mercy main event in the wake of John Cena’s career-interrupting pectoral injury. The lack of top talent is so thorough, it’s as though WWE has figuratively undergone a colon cleanse.

Here’s a partial list of some of the top WWE talents that, for various and sundry reasons, are not available to step up and fill Cena’s shoes:

* Shawn Michaels
* The Big Show
* Edge
* John Morrison
* Bobby Lashley
* King Booker

That’s not even counting the numerous lesser talents who probably wouldn’t be very good choices to step in for Cena. It also points out that WWE hasn’t done very well developing undercard wrestlers into folks who are ready to step up.

So who could they turn to?

That’s next on our agenda to discuss.

OK, this is old news by Web standards, but on last week’s Monday Night RAW, WWE Champion John Cena suffered a career-interrupting injury in the ring against Mr. Kennedy, a promising star on the rise in WWE over the past year.

Predictably, as is often the case with genuine injuries, the moment of the actual injury was not during a dramatic moment or a devastating move. Instead, it came as Cena Irish Whipped Kennedy into the far ring ropes and bounced off them himself. As Cena bounced back from the ropes to meet Kennedy in the middle, he was holding his right arm in a wounded, chicken-wing position.

From that point in the match, Cena wrestled on but barely used his right arm to do anything. It became painfully obvious he was hurting and at least Kennedy was enough of a professional to make a good show of things without performing any action that would worsen Cena’s actual injury. The show finished out as scripted, with a post-match sneak attack by Orton on Cena.

It was a bit painful to watch and may have made some sensitive viewers wish they had faux wood blinds in front of their TV sets that they could draw closed.

By Tuesday on ECW, Vince McMahon opened the broadcast to announce the big news: Cena had suffered a complete tear-away separation of his right pectoral muscle and had been rushed post-broadcast to undergo immediate surgery.

Here’s the kicker: The injury and surgery combined could keep Cena out of action between six months to a year, meaning that WWE’s biggest current star will almost certainly miss the 2008 WrestleMania event.

One PPV Cena is a cinch to miss is today’s No Mercy PPV. Right now, WWE is scrambling to replace the scheduled Cena-Orton hookup with a watchable match. More on that in a bit.