Why I've Stopped Watching WWE

In the late 90’s I got into watching the World Wrestling Federation (now World Wrestling Entertainment). It was a good time to get into professional wrestling as it was in the prime of the Monday Night Wars against World Championship Wrestling (though I seldom watched WCW) and just after the start of the “Attitude Era” which saw the rise of such legendary names as Stone Cold Steve Austin, the Rock, Triple H and Mankind (a personal favorite).  Within a few years I was reading spoiler sites with behind the scenes information. I gradually came to appreciate technical wrestlers as well as high flyers and high risk performers such as luchadors and hardcore wrestlers. I had become what industry insiders call a “smark,” which basically means a fan who follows the behind the scenes action and leans toward the technical side of wrestling (such as Bret Hart and CM Punk) above the showy character side (such as Hulk Hogan and John Cena).

Fast forward to today and it has been over a year since I have watched any wrestling programming. What brought about this change? There are a lot of reasons that really speak to the overall state of professional wrestling in the United States as a whole and why I really see no improvement in the near future.

Reason #1: Lack of Competition

In 2001, WWE owner Vince McMahon bought out WCW and ECW (Extreme Championship Wrestling), the number two and three companies and effectively eliminated his competition. While this allowed for many dream matches to occur such as Jeff Hardy vs. Rob Van Dam or Hulk Hogan vs. The Rock, the move caused stagnation to the product. The Monday Night Wars brought out the best in both WWE and WCW, as competition often does. In a way, by eliminating the competition McMahon came to believe that he “won” this ratings war and was able to consider himself “right” in terms of his vision of professional wrestling as “what the fans want.”

Reason #1.5: The Almost Competition

So you say “Toaster, there is competition!” Okay, it isn’t entirely accurate to say there is nobody to compete with McMahon’s empire. It’s just they’re barely worth mentioning. You have Dragon’s Gate and Ring of Honor, which are the smark dream promotions featuring truly great wrestling… but with little storyline, production values and especially next to no exposure. NWA (not the rap group! It stands for National Wrestling Alliance) probably still exists in some form. This of course leads me to Impact! Wrestling (formerly Total Nonstop Action Wrestling, formerly NWA: TNA in its inception).   

NWA: TNA formed about a year or two after the buyout of WCW by disgruntled WWE wrestler Jeff Jarrett. Not only was his intention to build a company to rival Vince’s but to give himself a platform to be the heavyweight superstar centerpiece that WWE never saw in him. For a while, it looked like TNA would gradually become that company. However, somebody decided that in order to succeed, TNA needed to emulate what WCW did (as they beat WWE for like a year or two in ratings) without seeing the obvious fact that WCW died for a reason (well, many reasons, actually).  This strategy is akin to deciding to reuse Germany’s World War II plan of invading Russia, focusing on the fact that for a while it worked very well and ignoring the overall colossal failure of the military maneuver and how it essentially lost the war for Germany.

I could (and probably will in a future rant) explain the many problems and failures with Impact, but for now I will say that a combination of lack of money and various egos are really holding that company back. It’s a shame since there is a great deal of talented wrestlers that are or have been affiliated with TNA, many of whom would never get a fair shake in WWE for one reason or another.

Reason #2: What Vince Wants

Since Vince McMahon has crowned himself the messiah of all things professional wrestling, I have seen a trend develop. Vince doesn’t so much evolve as he looks to the past for the future. A great example of this is his turning the WWE programming into PG ratings to try to convince everyone that it’s family friendly (as family friendly as a show can get featuring people who beat the holy hell out of each other). Vince is trying to return to the late 80’s era of wrestling.

Now to be fair, I can see a few reasons for this. First, I have a theory that Vince may have noticed that the kids who watched WWF in the 80’s grew to be violence loving teenagers in the late 90’s but now have children of their own. So Vinnie Mac has decided that by making the show kid friendly again (complete with the modern Hulk Hogan in John Cena) he can draw in the old fans and create new ones under the pretense of ‘family time’ entertainment. If this theory is true I have to hand it to the man, that’s not a terrible idea. Second, a disturbing trend developed in the 90’s. Wrestlers were developing major injuries that would put them out for months at a time, namely neck injuries that required spinal fusion surgery. This wasn’t something that really plagued the 80’s stars, but high risk and hardcore wrestlers were extremely prone to serious injuries. This leads me to the third point… Chris Benoit. If ever there was a cautionary tale of wrestling injuries gone wrong, this is it. Everyone knows the story and Vince’s company and reputation suffered a lot because of it. I imagine the PG thing was made in part to shed the image of brutality and go back to the more traditional professional wrestling of the 80’s.

However, I think Vince has made a few mistakes here. Thirty years later, the world isn’t the same place that once embraced Hulkamania. To believe lightning will strike twice is naïve. McMahon should look to make change, give us something new that will excite us. I see very little of this in the current WWE product and where I do see it is with those who represent the unorthodox methods that usually get them held down in terms of success. (Yes, CM Punk is at the top of this list.)

Truth be told, the guys I would love to watch are almost always underutilized and eventually released. Established TNA talent Frankie Kazarian came to WWE, but you never would have known it; I’m not sure he ever even appeared on television. Most ECW stars like Raven, Taz, Sandman, Rhino and Sabu were never pushed. Paul London and Brian Kendrick had a decent tag team championship run, but when the team was broken up (an all too common practice in WWE as they hope to find a new Bret Hart or Shawn Michaels from the split) London was almost immediately released and Kendrick had a half-ass push that really only served to put over his “bodyguard” Ezekiel Jackson, the typical ‘big man’ that Vince loves.

You see, Vince McMahon was spoiled by Andre the Giant, a huge man who could actually wrestle and as such could really draw a crowd. Since those days, McMahon’s been chasing Andre. In speaking of trying to find a new Andre the Giant, I’ve watched the slow, lumbering, untalented Great Khali get massive pushes because he is over seven feet tall, even so far as to win the heavyweight championship, while a highly talented technical wrestler like Nick Dinsmore gets saddled with a mentally challenged gimmick that left him with nowhere to advance. While I am amazed that talented wrestlers that don’t fit Vince’s big man mold such as Rey Mysterio, Bryan Danielson and the Miz have gotten the occasional heavyweight pushes it’s the more boring in-ring performers like Batista, Sheamus, Randy Orton and John Cena that stay on top with long title runs that frankly don’t interest me.

Reason # 3: Wrestlemania 23

I have to admit, this reason is very selfish, but it really made me lose a lot of interest in the product. Wrestlemania 23 was my Wrestlemania. It was the first time the huge show had been in Detroit in I don’t know how long. I managed to score great seats and was looking forward to a cool show. Now for those who don’t know, Wrestlemania tickets are like Superbowl tickets in that they go on sale long before you know who is playing or in this case wrestling. I just assumed that the show would be awesome. Instead, the big draw of the show was Vince McMahon vs Donald Trump in a hair vs hair match with the wrestlers Umaga and Bobby Lashley representing them in the ring and Stone Cold Steve Austin as the special guest referee. I’m getting pissed just typing that! I can’t stand Donald Trump… I never could. To pit him as the “good guy” against Vince was just obscene to me. The match was terrible. There was nothing good about it that I can remember. Perhaps my personal hatred of Trump has tainted my perspective of the match, but I would have rather seen a couple of talented wrestlers put on a good match, even if nothing was on the line.

Truthfully there were only 2 positives of the show I remember. The Money in the Bank match was cool as always, with Mr. Kennedy winning. (Unfortunately he would “lose” the suitcase to Edge a couple of weeks later.) The other plus was Undertaker beating Batista. The match itself was so-so, Taker carried his opponent in what seemed like an average match and not a Wrestlemania match. I was really just happy Taker kept the streak alive.

The rest of the show was not Wrestlemania worthy. The Ashley versus Melina match has gone down in history as being one of the worst ever. The ECW originals beat the New Breed… in an ordinary wrestling match. Why not let them tear it up hardcore? No, that match took place at the next ECW taping. I would have loved to see a long hardcore match featuring legendary ECW names like Rob Van Dam, Sandman, Sabu and Tommy Dreamer, but no… I had to watch Vince get shaved… like we thought that Trump was really going to get his head shaved.

Then there’s the main event… John Cena versus Shawn Michaels. It was nothing more than any other Cena match. Michaels dominates the match until Cena pulls out the “5 Moves of Doom” and wins. It was nice to hear him get booed so loud though. What really angers me about that main event is that they had a rematch on Raw a week or two later that was awesome… so awesome it should have been the match at ‘Mania. But no, not at my Wrestlemania. My Wrestlemania had to suck. It had to be a massive waste of money and leave me with an everlasting bad taste in my mouth. Honestly my interest in WWE has never been the same since.

Reason #4: Pay-Per-Views Are Way Too Expensive!

For a while there was a theater near me that would play WWE Pay-per-views for the admission price of $7. That is a hell of a lot cheaper than paying $40 to watch it at home, plus you’re in the company of other wrestling fans. It was great! Then WWE put a stop to it. As a result I almost never watch their PPV’s. I cannot bring myself to pay $40-$60 for a WWE pay-per-view, especially when many of the shows I saw at the theater left me thinking I overpaid for what I saw at the $7 price!

Since all major storylines and matches are built for the pay-per-views, it honestly feels useless to watch the ‘free TV’ shows since they’ll just dick me around with lame matches and dumb filler like “contract signings.” Honestly, WWE pay-per-views are way too expensive and are almost never worth it. I can’t tell you how many times I have looked forward to a match only to see it end with some stupid interference or never even happen thanks to a cheap shot. In fact, this year’s Wrestlemania saw a heavyweight title match between Sheamus and Bryan Danielson that had been built up for months end with an immediate “boot to the face.” That’s at WRESTLEMANIA! That’s supposed to be where all the stops are pulled out! People paid $55-60 for the show and one of the biggest matches on the card was a joke. That’s why I can’t justify ever buying a WWE pay-per-view. Either they need to improve the show for the large amount of money it costs (Note that these days the average American household income has dropped by 30-50%; paying $40 a month seems like a very frivolous expense.) Or WWE needs to substantially lower the price of these shows if they are going to pull those kinds of shenanigans.

So in summary, the shows are lackluster, the writing and booking are crap, the wrestling matches are boring save for a few talented individuals that occasionally are allowed to show what they can do and without any competition there is no reason to believe any of this will change. Vince McMahon will never step down. He will only stop having creative control with his company if he is either left a vegetable by a stroke or dead. In the meantime he has already established his heirs to the throne in his daughter Stephanie and her wrestler husband Triple H. Maybe they will bring about some incredible change to make WWE entertaining again… but I highly doubt it. Those odds are about as good as Impact Wrestling getting it’s shit together and becoming a threat World Wrestling Entertainment.

Sigh. What else is on?