The Seventh Dimension 04.25.08: Who Wants To Be A Championnaire?

I haven’t had my mind on wrestling this week. I’ve been too focused on watching snooker, and stepping up my job hunt considerably in the last couple of weeks. Therefore, this may not be of the usual passionate literary standard that I’m notorious for avoiding…I mean, for assimilating in my pieces. I’ll do my best, though. The worst case scenario is that this week’s column is slightly less facetious and smarkish. Mind you, the subject matter is, in my mind, a fairly mellow and positive one so I’ll assume that would have been the case regardless of my shortcomings in the concentration department.

Who Wants To Be A Championnaire?

There are forty-five governmental monarchies currently in operation world-wide. Interestingly, only one country, Japan, still has an emperor. While these statistics are unlikely to change any time soon (which is a story for another day), on Monday we did welcome a new Regent – King William Regal, who earned the nobility by winning the semi-regular ‘King of the Ring’ tournament during WWE Raw.

When the rumours first surfaced that KotR would be returning, there were mixed reactions. The two largest groups of fans either wanted to see a star-studded affair between already-established icons, or a way of giving the midcard some much-needed attention for the night and give someone a bit of a rub who may not have received it otherwise. Another, far smaller minority just didn’t care. These people are also known as ‘Dementors’.

What we got was a mix of the first two, leaning (rightly) towards the second. Although Chris Jericho and the Great Khali are both former World champions, MVP is the United States champion and CM Punk holds the Money in the Bank briefcase, none of these names are currently at the very top of the WWE ladder. This was definitely the right way to go, as having the suspected competitors Shawn Michaels and Batista would only either give one of them another predictable notch in their already perfectly snazzy belt, or deflate the expectant crowd when somebody ‘lower’ than them ended up winning the thing.

Besides, William Regal’s win was not only infinite stars, but logical since he booked the matches himself to aid his plight. And, of course, he’s British upper-midclass so he’s more than familiar with the etiquette of royalty.

It did make me wonder, though…where exactly does being King of the Ring rank with certain other titles and records? Is it a legacy maker, or can you only reach those heights – professionally AND sentimentally – by winning a World Heavyweight Championship? And, by the same logic, are there other ‘minor’ achievements in the profession that can be considered of a similar caliber?

Let’s be clear on this one – becoming his (or her) company’s top-level champion is undoubtedly the most prestigious thing any wrestler can hope to do in his career. In most feds, that entails becoming the ‘World Heavyweight Champion’. In the case of WWE, it means winning whichever World title is represented by the brand you’re working for. World titles are the pinnacle of the business, and even in the post-kayfabe era we can usually appreciate that fact. Samoa Joe’s victory over Angle for the TNA title proved that.

However, it goes without saying that most people will never get the chance to run with the ball. Well, belt. Some of those that don’t earn that chance just don’t deserve it, but there have been many ‘greats’ down the line that many of us feel should have been given the opportunity to carry a show. Yet whether it be due to size, technique, attitude, political maneuverings, lack of ability on the microphone, or purely rotten luck…a lot of potentially brilliant champions have been denied such a privilege, which is a sad fact of almost any industry.

So for Ted DiBiase, who was allegedly due to win the WWF Championship at Wrestlemania IV until Honky Tonk Man screwed Randy Savage and forced a major change in the booking to atone for his selfishness, becoming the 1988 King of the Ring (albeit in relatively unimpressive fashion – via a forfeited semi-final and a count-out victory over the Macho Man to seal it) was probably the highlight of his career. Yes, he won three tag team championships, but he was only one of many tag team champions. And the Million Dollar Championship he created wasn’t a legitimate title.

No, when Ted’s inevitably inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame, he will be mostly remembered for three things – buying the WWF Championship from Andre The Giant which of course didn’t count as an official name, losing to Ho-losing to Savage in the closing match of Wrestlemania, and winning King of the Ring. Only one of those has a positive aura about it, and needless to say it’s the third one listed. The same can be said for Owen Hart. Owen won the tournament in 1994, which was probably his most successful year thanks to his feud with brother Bret. When he pinned Razor Ramon on pay-per-view, his name joined a list that was only (at the time) seven entries long. And that leads to another thing worth considering.

In a long-term tradition such as a recurring tournament, its rarity and its lack of conquerors actually contributes to its overall stature. Because there are far fewer who can claim to have won the King of the Ring than to have won a World title, the event has huge significance when it comes around. While you’d never choose to be King over champion, it’s still a big award to be bestowed. The fact that it only comes around, at most, once every year also means that whoever wins the thing is guaranteed a minimum of fifty-two weeks in which he must be referred to as King, which definitely adds to its luster. So although Owen, in my opinion, should have won a World title one day and surely would have had he not been killed, spending what turned out to be 371 days as the official King of the WWF had a great deal of importance at the time.

There have inevitably been flops, most notably Mabel in 1995 and Billy Gunn in 1999. But, then again, there have been several ‘worthless’ wrestling World champions down the line as well, such as Stan Stasiak, Ron Garvin, and of course David Arquette and Vince Russo. And that’s just in the heavyweight category – how about ‘Oklahoma’, WCW World Cruiserweight Champion? Or ‘Lazer-Tron’ (Poor Hector Guerrero, in only his second-worst gimmick), NWA World Junior Heavyweight Champion? And, most recently, Ron Killings and Pacman Jones, TNA World Tag Team Champions. So the King of the Ring is hardly the only big trophy in the business’s history to have elected some major dud winners in the past. That doesn’t mean it’s not a huge feather in your cap.

In some cases, the KotR has been won by future or past legends of OTHER companies, and therefore acts as the only real major career link between the WWE and some of the greats. Harley Race is the biggest example of this, as he won eight NWA World titles between ’73 and ’84, and was the inaugural United States Champion in 1975. But he didn’t have the same success in the WWF, and winning King of the Ring in 1986 was his best result there. In the case of Don Muraco, Tito Santana, and Ken Shamrock, they would each win World titles AFTER their stays in Stamford – Don and Tito in ECW, and Ken in NWA-TNA. That adds a sort of ‘stepping stone’ feel to being the King, which is necessary so it doesn’t feel immaterial.

And that’s not even mentioning the amount of huge WWE superstars that got their big breaks (or, at least, maintained them) by becoming King. Bret Hart had already been WWF Champion when he won the tournament in 1993, but it was and is still considered a major moment for him. Steve Austin, Triple H, Kurt Angle, and Edge were given massive rubs by winning the tournament, and since then Brock Lesnar and Booker T were given the wins in order to maximise their heat and segue to World championship victories a few months later. With all of these factors in its favour, there can be little question that the King of the Ring is of huge significance.

And yet, it IS questioned. The validity and the value of the contest is often deemed relatively mundane these days. It’s not unusual for this to happen with championship belts, such as the once highly-celebrated WWE Intercontinental title that now requires Jericho as its champion just to remind us it exists. Or the TNA X-Division Championship which, although still in a featured role, is a far cry from the days of closing out pay-per-views and taking sporadic precedence over the World title. But it does strike me as sad that the KotR, a tournament that once meant so much, can now consider itself lucky to be an afterthought. I’ve wondered why this is the case, whether it’s due to its now infrequent rate or whether people just don’t really care about ‘Kings’ anymore since we’re no longer pretending it’s real. Sadly, I think it’s more to do with the way the current generation of fan thinks about titles.

Whether it has been caused by the bookers influencing the viewers, or the viewers influencing the bookers, the tragic reality is that only ‘the big one’ – i.e. the World Heavyweight title of a promotion or company – is regarded as being of any merit these days. That’s why the WWE Cruiserweight title had to be retired and the tag titles are constantly ignored, because we’ve all now judged to have become desensitised to anything that doesn’t close the big shows. It’s also partly why Edge/Undertaker at Wrestlemania was for the World title, when ‘Streak vs. Streak’ would have been a respectable draw on its own (not that I have any problem with those two opposing each other for a World title).

The fact that the last non-title match to end a PPV event was the ‘RAW Champion/Challenger vs. Smackdown Champion/Challenger’ tag match at No Way Out last year **NOTE: I temporarily forgot about Undertaker/Mark Henry and the Elimination Chamber. Mistakes happen, I’m only human, and the point still stands.** tells its own story – that it’s becoming harder and harder to generate believable show-closers based on hatred alone. Obviously the annual Royal Rumble, a showcase that has thankfully managed to mostly remain relevant over time, is an exception to the rule. But even then, the objective is to become Number One Contender for Wrestlemania, and usually the Rumble winner tends to win his chosen title, so it’s not completely free of these chains.

I’m not really complaining. I do believe that the vast majority of events should be closed by a company’s foremost championship being defended. But it’s just such a shame that the other titles are often completely overlooked, and therefore damaged, in order to push a belt that we KNOW is the most momentous of the lot. Sometimes, it’s perfectly fine for the World title to take a backseat, and the King of the Ring should hold such a distinction. Even if the tournament isn’t thought to be substantial enough to be held on pay-per-view, it damn well should have been the dominating force of the one episode of Raw in which it was held this time around. Instead, it was given barely half an hour of accumulated air-time on a three-hour show, which is unforgivable. The Clinton/Obama crap was funny but had no place taking up so much time on a show that had already shown video footage of the REAL candidates, and the show ended with a rushed-together mixed tag match in order to shill the WWE Championship four-way elimination match that most buyers are probably basing their decision on anyway. It just doesn’t make any sense, to me. What a waste of what could have been a fantastic, history-making moment.

Still, I won’t be too downbeat. And I’ll be upbeat in fact, for one reason – that what is likely to be William Regal’s finest hour has just taken place. We all known Regal’s a great worker and a pretty hilarious promo, but he’s never had what it took to become a wrestling franchise, even a traditional one. But he’s been loyal to the company for years, and I’m pleased to see that he has been rewarded by becoming the first British man to win the King of the Ring, and only the eighteenth winner in total since its debut in 1985.

And therefore, in a weird sort of way, has brought me back full-circle. Whether or not it ends up meaning anything in the immediate and foreseeable future (I suspect strongly it will), Regal can now be safe in the knowledge that his efforts shall now be set in stone for all time. And while he won’t be thinking about that while he’s still competing at a top level, when he’s retired he can look back and say “I did something positive that few others managed”.

And really, that’s what a lot of us want from life.

Rubbish Youtube Quote of the Week~!

This time, instead of just one line, I want to nominate an entire conversation that took place that quite frankly I wouldn’t believe was possible if I hadn’t seen it with my own blue eyes. Enjoy this one.

From ‘Dreamer & Kelly Kelly vs Layla & Mike Knox’.

wwesuperfan10
mike knox is the worst wrestler in wwe

aghng
u know that mike knox is played of the same guy that plays undertaker?

wwesuperfan10
what played as the same guys how u mean

aghng
undertaker and mike knox is the same person

wwesuperfan10
no way they look nothing like each other

aghng
well its true go to wikipedia and see for yourself

metaldolls
You are talking shit, undertaker is mark calloway and mike knox is Michael Hettinga lol idiot

wwesuperfan10
i know i just looked aghng your a dickhead

wwesuperfan10
i did takers names mark calloway and knox names Michael Hettinga fool

matthewp76
are you taking the piss or are you actually that stupid

DeathWishofAnna
You are the reason ppl say WWE fans are stupid. No offense

Oh, my. I don’t know what I want to think. Did ‘aghng’ honestly believe that the Undertaker and Mike Knox were the same person (my guess is “no”, but nothing surprises me anymore), or was he just tricking ‘wwesuperfan10′? One thing’s for sure – in admitting he was so lacking in confidence over what should have been a non-issue to even the most uncultured of minds that HE NEEDED TO CHECK WIKIPEDIA to make sure…‘wwesuperfan10′ looks like the world’s biggest tool right now.

Honourable mention goes to the user (I couldn’t find the original comment, so I don’t know what the guy’s name is) who stated that “it’s a shame the King of the Ring is the reason Booker T went to TNA”. If it wasn’t for the above discussion regarding Knox and Undertaker, this little shit-nugget would have won every medal AND the wooden spoon. What a dunce.

On One Hand, With Mike Adamle

Huge improvement from Adamle over last week. Here are the highlights of his work.

5) “And Chavo Guerrero in the ring right now…you know something’s always up his sleeve!” – This is only here because it was at this time I noticed Chavo’s swank shirt.
4) “This lovely lady who will do battle with Kelly Kelly…Layla!” – There’s ‘shades of grey’, and then there’s just not knowing the face/heel alliances.
3) “(Mark Henry pinning Nunzio) should be mercy…euthanasia…Mark Henry did the right thing. Just get it over with quick.” – I agree. He’s a heel with a heart.
2) “Mike Knox wants to put his imprimatur on this match, and leave Dreamer with something to…well, dream about!” – Say what you want about him, but he’s certainly not samey.
1) This is from a dialogue between Adamle (A), Tazz (T), and Mike Mizanin (M).

M: (Morrison) is a smart guy, isn’t he Tazz?
T: Yes he IS, Miz. The Miz.
A: (Talking over the top of the other two) How about ‘The Tazz’?
*Two-second silence*
T: Yeah, how about that? Anyway…

No further comment needed. Just enjoy the awesome. Thanks, Mike!

Bye.

I wanted to comment on how legacies aren’t always established by how many (if any) World titles you win but how you’re remembered – for instance, Adrian Adonis, Roddy Piper and Eddie Guerrero will probably be recalled more endearingly than Lex Luger, Kevin Nash or Jeff Jarrett – but I never really got around to doing so. Instead, I just spoke about King of the Ring, which is fine. Some other time, maybe? (No.)

But anyway, that’s the end of another week inside my body. Will Backlash produce something noteworthy enough to discuss next week? I sure hope so!

It ends.

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