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411 Fact or Fiction 6.3.10: Daniel Bryan vs. Michael Cole, the NXT Winner, Mr. Anderson’s Face Turn and More!
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 411 Wrestling Fact or Fiction for the first week of June, 2010. The first season of NXT is over and we have a winner, not to mention the continued appearance of the most prominent rookie on the season that didn’t win. TNA has seen the continuation of a face turn for Mr. Anderson and some cross-promotion with Spike’s new fighting show. We have questions of all that and more this week! Stepping up to the podium this week we have the newly-matrimonied Stephen Randle, the man who gives us “The Wrestling News Experience” every Monday. He’s going up against a man who’s making his debut in Wrestling Fact or Fiction…the man who does the Sharpshooter Video reviews, Kyle Fitta! Both men are ready to go and the questions are set; let’s get it on!
1. The Daniel Bryan/Michael Cole feud is doing exactly what it needs to in order to establish Bryan and get him over.
Stephen Randle: FACT. The entire wrestling world knows Michael Cole’s on-air character (because one would really hope he’s not like that in real life) is a gigantic douche. Hell, WWE knows it, they play it for laughs every chance they get (which begs the question why the lead announcer on the flagship show is deliberately played as a complete joke, but that’s for another time). And while it might be presumptuous to give the Bryan-Cole interactions the stamp of the early Austin-McMahon work, there are definitely certain parallels, and we know how effective it was the first time. After NXT and his feud with Cole, even if the fans didn’t know about the career of Danielson, they now know enough to get invested in his character. And we can easily get behind someone who hates Michael Cole, because let’s face it, everyone hates Michael Cole. Face it, Bryan didn’t win a single match on the NXT program, he was eliminated early, and he’s still the guy everyone knows about from the show, which to me, means he’s established and over.
Kyle Fitta: FACT. Since NXT started, Cole has been verbally assaulting Daniel Bryan on everything. Cole’s comments have really been getting oodles of heat on him (especially from the Internet fans), and for Daniel Bryan to finally attack him, had a triumph feeling to it. It is old school booking 101, and it is working better than any angle WWE has going for them right now (how ironic). It will be interesting to see, though were it goes from here, but thus far, it has helped to re-establish Daniel Bryan. The thing that might hurt Daniel Bryan is being on Raw, not Smackdown, but that is a completely different story.
Score: 1 for 1
2. Mr. Anderson’s face turn has been a success thus far.
Stephen Randle: FACT. Crowds want to cheer Mr. Anderson. He’s a cocky son of a bitch who has an entertaining gimmick that encourages the fans to be interactive, and he’s not a half-bad wrestler. In that respect, TNA turning him face has been a success, so far. On the other hand, it’s been one week since he turned, so we’ll see where Anderson ends up in the future.
Kyle Fitta: FACT. I think this angle with Mr. Anderson and Jeff Hardy has a chance to lead up to something good. With Anderson playing kind of face/tweener, you can go either way on this feud. You can have Jeff Hardy turn heel on Anderson, or Anderson deceive Jeff Hardy in order to seek long-term revenge because of Jeff being able to beat him. Judging by the crowd, it seems as if Mr. Anderson might be better suited as a baby-face, but turning Jeff Hardy heel could be very hit or miss. We will see how it plays out, but knowing TNA, they will find some way to make this angle irrational, silly, useless, uninteresting, or all of the above.
Score: 2 for 2
3. This week’s SmackDown is a good indicator that CM Punk needs to find a new finishing maneuver.
Stephen Randle: FICTION. I’d say it’s an indicator that people should really learn how to sell a frickin’ knee to the face. Seriously, I’m not saying I could do it as well as a professional, but all the move asks the recipient to do is slide off Punk’s shoulders, land on your feet, and sell a knee to the head. I’m still not sure how the hell Kane screwed that up so badly. It’s not that it is a bad finisher 99% of the time, but when that 1% screws it up, it looks visibly awful.
Kyle Fitta: FICTION. I am going to have to say Fiction because I have seen Punk deliver the GTS to a good degree of big man, such as Mike Knox and Umaga, so to get rid of the move because he botched it badly seems unreasonable to me. Plus, you would have to make the move credible and make it seem legitimate enough to finish a match.
Score: 3 for 3
4. With Scott Hall’s recent arrest for being drunk in public, TNA should take the Tag Team Titles off the Band at Slammiversary.
Stephen Randle: FACT. Although that’s more an excuse covering a personal desire to see the entire Band shuffle out of TNA in the near future. Seriously, when the only guy you can expect to show up every week able to wrestle is Kevin Nash, to the point where you have to nonsensically turn Eric Young so that they can at least have someone who can work the majority of a tag match, and even then, you put them in a triple threat tag match on Impact and have them never actually do anything, how can you claim that The Band is of any benefit to TNA?
Kyle Fitta: FACT. They should not only take the belts off the Band because of this; they should take the belts off the band because two out of the three guys are as old as my Grandfather. I will admit that I liked both Kevin Nash and Scott Hall in WWF and somewhat of WCW, but it is 2010. Also, they aren’t just wrestling in 2010—they are the tag team champions. I mean there is a problem right there; nevertheless they are having problems out of the wrestling ring that just make everyone in TNA’s office look bad.
Score: 4 for 4
SWITCH!
5. The right person won the NXT Competition.
Kyle Fitta: FACT. I think Wade Barrett was a good choice. From what I have seen from him, he’s agile and can move for his size, he has a unique look to him, and he can cut a good promo and get to the point he’s getting across. Overall, he is a good and future great big man talent (something that has been lacking in WWE for a long time). According to what I hear, though, he will receive a title shot for the next ppv. That might be very premature because hotshoting him from a C-show winner to an A-show contender is day and night, and it might not help him either way. We’ll see how it plays out, but I wish they give him some time to get over, established, and well-defined his his gimmick before they pull the trigger premature, and it ends up backfiring, which WWE has been doing with these young stars for quite some time.
Stephen Randle: FACT. Wade Barrett has IT. He has size, skill, and charisma. He has an association with Chris Jericho, who spent the entire run of NXT making sure that everyone was aware of his guy and how great he was. Once it was clear that Daniel Bryan was getting a losing streak and David Otunga, for all his Hollywood ties and alleged charisma, can’t wrestle worth a damn, there was only one possible winner of NXT, and that was Barrett. Now get him his damned entrance music, already!
Score: 5 for 5
6. Ashton Kutcher made for another lackluster Raw guest host.
Kyle Fitta: FACT. Different day, same shit is which sums up virtually every non-wrestler Guest Host on Raw. Seriously, what do these non-wrestlers Guest Host do for the show? They do not enhance angles or expand characters. They do not make the show any better, as most of them do not know have much knowledge to the business. Comparing Raw to what it was before the Guest Host, the ratings have actually decreased. Of course, that could be blamed on several of things, but the Guest Host sure aint helping. On top of that, mostly every non-wrestling host has done some hokey, cheesy, tasteless, bad comedy skit with dire acting, and nothing to do with the shows flow or wrestling in general. Comparing how much they pay these people and how much they do for the show—it would be like Mabel and Spike Dudley on a seesaw.
Stephen Randle: FACT. And it’s been going on ever since they took away their powers after the Draft. WWE has apparently decided to have their cake and eat it with guest hosts, and we all know how that turns out. When the hosts had ultimate power, at least there was a point to their presence, no matter how small, since they could make matches. Now they can’t even do that, so we’re stuck with meaningless sketches with limited comedic value and no purpose. Hell, it was pretty clear to everyone that Kutcher wasn’t even present at the arena on Monday, and that’s incredibly lame. If the guest hosts have no power, all we’re doing is wasting time that could actually be spent on, you know, the wrestlers who are there every week.
Score: 6 for 6
7. The Puppet the Psycho Dwarf portions of Impact hurt TNA more than it helped Half-Pint Brawlers.
Kyle Fitta: FACT. Since WWE over-exposed the life out of Hornswaggle, I do not think anyone wants to see midgets in Mainstream wrestling anymore. Plus, they are hyping it on a show that does poor ratings as it is. So no, I do not see how this helped a show that will not last at all. I know some midgets are actually amazing wrestlers, but in my opinion, I just think midgets on a wrestling show make the product look silly and carnival-ish.
Stephen Randle: FICTION. I think it was pretty harmless. It’s not like Puppet ate up a whole bunch of in-ring time or anything, he did commentary over an essentially meaningless and short Knockouts tag match where he put over the people in the ring and promoted his show, and then made out with Lacey Von Erich in a sketch that took about a minute and played into her established character (I mean, I assume she’s supposed to be playing a crazy whore, but that could just be me). So, it didn’t really hurt Impact, and frankly, a show about midget wrestlers needs all the help it can get.
Score: 6 for 7
8. A potential feud with R-Truth over the US Title would be an unnecessary demotion for Chris Jericho.
Kyle Fitta: FACT. Fact-ish. Jericho is at a point where he has nothing much to do since they reused him repeatedly jobbed him out to everyone. R-Truth is contrived, unrealistic, spotty, and legitimately dangerous in the ring. Therefore, anyone who has to work with him is receiving punishment, but as far as Jericho being in the mid-card feuding over the US title belt, I do not see that as punishment, though.
Stephen Randle: FACT. But what are you going to do? Raw is completely overloaded with people after the draft and they know it, and even did it intentionally. And with Miz sidetracked by Daniel Bryan, and John Morrison and Ted DiBiase temporarily sidelined, the number of people who would make legitimate challengers for R-Truth and don’t already have something to do pretty much starts with Chris Jericho. Yeah, he’s a multi-time World champion and deserves much better, but at least he gets to be on TV regularly. Plus, it’s Chris Jericho, you and I and WWE all know he “gets it” and would be more than willing to put Truth over clean as a sheet, and his heat is practically bulletproof regardless of wins or losses. That is a rare quality in pro wrestlers that you’d be stupid not to take advantage of.
Final Score: 7 for 8
There we have it, folks. Kyle and Stephen mostly agree on things and give us our second 7 for 8 week in a row! I’d like to thanks the both of them for their great responses this week, and you the reader for coming to read what they had to say! For Stephen Randle and Kyle Fitta, this is Jeremy Thomas saying join us next week for another edition of 411 Fact or Fiction!
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