Can They Be Champ? 01.08.08: New Year’s Champs

This is the first Can They Be Champ? of 2008. It’s also the first Can They Be Champ? to not be written in 2007. Come WrestleMania, I will have been writing here for a year. What a spectacular column my one year anniversary will be.

In today’s column, I’m going to be looking ahead. I’m going to take a look at the WWE wrestlers who I think have a chance of becoming either the WWE or World Heavy Weight champion in 2008. Mind you, I’m not going to talk about obvious ones like Cena or HHH. I’d personally shit a brick if either of those two don’t win a championship in 2008.

I’ll also be looking to the past. Yes, another Best Matches of 2007 list. I know you’re probably all a bit sick of this sort of thing at this point, so I’ll keep mine short. I’ll only discuss my top five matches.

Now, let’s get to it.

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Will Jeff Hardy be champ in 2008?

Let me come out and say that I’m a bit of a Jeff Hardy mark. Sure, he may not be the most technically proficient wrestler, and his mic skills may be lacking, but can he ever dance! Seriously, Jeff has improved immensely as a singles wrestler this year. Just look at the Jeff/HHH match at Armageddon. A match that Jeff, to the surprise of many, won. Now Jeff is the number one contender for the WWE title, and will have a championship match at the Royal Rumble.

Now that is what you call a push. Mind you, I doubt that Jeff will win the title at the Royal Rumble. The WWE may have some new found faith in Jeff, but I doubt they’re ready to have him main event a WrestleMania. What this really is is a test. A test to see how the fans will respond to a main eventing Jeff Hardy. So far, it looks like the fans are responding incredibly well. Did you hear the pops Jeff got on Raw last week? Deafening. Despite his lack of mic skills, Jeff has really connected like the fans.

All Jeff needs to do now is deliver a good match against Orton. Considering how well Orton has been doing in main events since becoming champion, this shouldn’t be a problem.

Like I said, I don’t think Jeff will win the title at the Royal Rumble. However, I do believe that he will become a WWE champion sometime in 2008. Probably around summer. Who know, maybe we’ll see a Mr. Money in the Bank Hardy.

Will Matt Hardy be champ in 2008?

May as well cover the other brother. Matt was in a real hot program against MVP, but like Mr. Kennedy, Matt has become a victim of bad timing. His inevitable winning of the US Title has been postponed, and it remains to be seen if fans are still going to care about the rivalry when Matt comes back.

Still, it does look like Matt’s singles push will be continuing. And with Jeff getting the push he’s getting, well, there are a lot of things that can be done there. Maybe they’ll go all Owen Hart on us and turn Matt heel. Make him the jealous brother, and you have a pre-made feud. Of course, Owen never became champion himself, and I’m predicting a similar fate for Matt, at least for 2008. But who knows, maybe the WWE will get all sentimental and have the two brothers hold the two belts simultaneously.

Will Mr. Kennedy be champ in 2008?

Predicting anything with Mr. Kennedy is dangerous. Every time he appears to be getting a push, he either gets injured or busted. Considering that Ken appears to be getting another push after his clean win against HBK, it feels like the safest prediction to make would be that Kennedy is about to get hurt or suspended.

However, if Ken remains clean and healthy, we can see his push gain some momentum. Still, it’s clear that he’s not in the position that he would like to be. Let’s not forget that Mr. Kennedy was supposed to be main eventing WM24. Now he’s still placed firmly in the mid-card going into the WrestleMania season.

Plain and simple, it’s going to make more than a single win against HBK to propel Kennedy to the main event. Fans need to consider him a major threat, and the current heat he receives from the crowds is underwhelming. He needs to go on a path of destruction. Raw needs another top level heel. We can’t depend on Orton to hold that role forever.

Alright, so do I think he’ll be champ in 2008? Well, if it does happen, it will be later in 2008. Still, I think Ken needs more time to establish himself. Talk to me again in 2009.

Will Chris Jericho be champ in 2008?

A lot of people predicted that after Jericho’s title shot against Orton, he would be regulated to mid carder status. It makes me sad that they may be right. Putting Jericho against Orton so early was probably a mistake. They didn’t want Jericho to win the belt, but having him lose makes him look like a fool after all of that “save us” stuff. They tried to save it with JBL interference, but it still made Jericho look weak.

The real question regarding Jericho’s future will be answered at the Royal Rumble. If JBL goes over Y2J, then I don’t think Jericho will have a good year. If he wins the match, there may be some hope. Still, on a show where faces like Cena, HHH, and Jeff seem in line for time with the belt, it’s hard to imagine how’s they’re going to squeeze any Jericho in there.

Jericho’s best chance at winning a title would be to move to Smackdown, where the title scene is less crowded, and Jericho would immediately be one of the top faces. Will that actually happen? I can only hope.

Will Umaga be champ in 2008?

Umaga has always been used as a tool to put others over. The most recent example was when Jeff beat Umaga cleanly. He’s far from the unstoppable monster he was. Still, that reputation could always be rebuilt, as it already has been a few times. Still, I think that Umaga will continue his jobbing tour of 2007 well into 2008.

Will Shawn Michaels be champ in 2008?

I keep waiting for that fifth HBK title reign. It never seems to happen. A shame that that Shawn hasn’t had a great title reign since coming back. I’m not expecting him to get one in 2008. HBK seems more than happy to put other over these days. Considering how over he already is, I suppose that’s pretty commendable. He doesn’t really need another title reign to remind people how great he is. Still, if we get another bizarre perfect storm of injuries, it is possible.

Will MVP be champ in 2008?

Like with Mr. Kennedy, MVP still needs some time to develop as a heel. His US Title run has gone well, but we still haven’t seem him in many matches with some of the bigger dogs. MVP is on a fine track, it’s just going to take some time before he’s ready for a world title, if he ever is. Again, talk to me in 2008.

Hmm, I guess I wrote all that to pretty much say that Jeff Hardy will win a championship in 2008. Besides that, look for more title reigns from the likes of Undertaker, HHH, Cena, Edge, Batista and what not.

Mike Minotti’s Top 5 Matches of 2007

Like I promised, I’ll try to keep this short.

5. Randy Orton vs. Shawn Michaels (Survivor Series)

I’m probably one of the few people to rate this match so highly, but I absolutely loved the story that it told. The stipulation that HBK couldn’t use his super kick lead to a lot of cool moments, especially when we saw him use every submission move he knew to try to put Orton away. It also gave us a great finish, where HBK cost himself the match when he hesitated for a split second when he was about to use Sweet Chin Music. This was the match that really warmed me up to Orton.

4. Bryan Danielson vs. Nigel McGuinness (ROH Driven)

I actually just saw this match for the first time last night. I bought the DVD when I went to a ROH show in Dayton last year. I even got Nigel to sign it, which was cool. Anyways, this was an amazing match. I’m sure you’ve heard it’s praises sung many times. If anything, you’re mad at me for not putting it higher. Well, I don’t follow ROH religiously, so some of the context and back story of the match was lost on me. Like I said, the match itself was great, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as I could have if I had known more of the context going into it.

3. Batista vs. Undertaker (WM23)

I was at WM23, and this was probably the most fun match to watch. The crowd was hot for this fight, and we all went wild for the finish. There were a lot of cool spots, including Taker’s dive over the top rope, and a great table spot. This was basically everything you want from a match between two big guys.

2. The Royal Rumble (Royal Rumble)

I love the Royal Rumble. It’s always my favorite event of the year. I really felt that this was one of the best Rumbles ever, and I should know, since I got to recently watch all of them thanks to the Royal Rumble Anthology DVD set. Anyways, not only the was the rumble itself gold, but it was capped off with a great mini-match between HBK and Taker. Good stuff.

1. John Cena vs. Shawn Michaels (Raw)

Hard to believe my favorite match of 2007 was shown free on Raw. Anyways, I’m sure you’ve heard this match’s praises sung many times, so I’ll spare you.

Send me any questions or comments you have. The Royal Rumble is getting closer and closer, which makes me a very happy man.

See ya.