The Wrestling Framework 04.10.12: Post Mania Framework

Well, as you can see, my column is a few days late. Sorry about that, but Easter weekend was a big deal this year.

Anyhow, this week, I want to go over WrestleMania. I want to talk about what I thought going in to the big show and what I thought afterwards. I just want to get all of my thoughts and feelings out about the show. So, let’s get to it.

I don’t know about you guys, but I was actually excited for this years WrestleMania. To some, the card looked absolutely horrible. And to most, the build for each match really sucked. I honestly just sat back and enjoyed it all. Some of the builds didn’t excite men as much as just the prospect of the match like Cena/Rock, but most of it I was just unbiasedly entertained by.

Want to know what my first thought was when I saw this match? What do you mean you don’t? Well, I’m going to tell you anyhow. My reaction was: FUCK THIS! WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?! followed by drinking about three beers all in a row. Yeah, this “match” just did not set a good precedence for the rest of the show. How do you take two guys who have proven to be able to put on a good wrestling match and give them 18 fucking seconds? First you leave them off the main card last year, now you don’t even let them have a match even though they are scheduled to have a match? I just don’t understand why the hell they thought this was going to be accepted by the fans. Not only did they fail miserably at trying to break a record, but they inadvertently made Daniel Bryan a much bigger star than I’m sure they really wanted to. Apparently, they want those “YES! YES! YES!” chants to stop. But I don’t. You don’t. (maybe) None of us do! (based solely on my opinion) Speaking of which, check out YES! YES! YES! While Daniel Bryan got beat in 18 seconds, the Great White Sheamus to become the NEW world heavyweight champion. Aren’t Sheamus and HHH buddies? Nah, that’s got nothing to do with it. That would just be wild speculation. I wont be one of those backstage politics conspiracy nuts. Honestly, this week will be the turning point in seeing if DB will continue being a success without the title or if he will fade to Miz status. I’m hoping for the former, I really am. I think that DB can become successful as a main event player in the WWE. Anyone who says differently, well, you’re entitled to your own opinion, but tell me who you think is better in the ring. I got off track here, my main point is that fuck this match and I hope DB continues to be a success because it seems WWE are over him and that would just piss off the brass.

This was actually one of the more surprising matches of the night. I had called for Kane to win this one, but I wasn’t 100% sure that he was actually going to win. I thought that Kane’s monster push was going to become another scrapped idea in leeway of Orton getting pushed back up to the moon. Not that I really have anything against Orton being pushed to the moon, but he is kind of becoming a tired act. It was cool for him when he first started doing the whole viper thing and striking from anywhere, but seriously, him as a face just sucks. I hate when people rag on him for being bland and boring because he’s able to entertain people if you just give him a chance. Stop looking at wrestling like a legitimate sport and kind of let your imagination take charge of the situation. While I do laugh at times when people imitate his promo style, you know the one. When he talks REALLY slow. But at the same time, I understand why he does it. His character is supposed to be some methodical, sinister yet friendly guy who will just as soon shake your hand as RKO you in to oblivion. He does come off as a confusing character sometimes, but in the right situation he can be quite entertaining. As far as Kane goes, I’m happy to see him get the win here. One reason is that he had to suffer that loss to John Cena in the amberlamps match at Elimination Chamber. I think Kane REALLY needs this huge monster push. He needs to go out looking like a beast. That’s just my opinion though. I’m not sure what people think of Kane anymore. Like I said, he really needs to be the monster again to go out on top since he said he’s close to retirement. He just needs to go more the route of kicking ass and less the route of talking like he’s a thinker. Just doesn’t work for him.

I seriously thought that they were going to have show lose to continue to legitimize Cody Rhodes. Boy, how I was wrong. Turns out, Show was the man to win the IC title. I’m just wondering where this is going to go. I mean, was this giving something back to Show since they made him lose the title to Bryan and then contniue to lose to him regardless if they were in not so clean ways? Maybe that was it. I just don’t really see show taking the title to new heights. Don’t get me wrong, I hope he makes the title relevant and all, but Show just doesn’t seem like he should be the one to do it. He’s become more of a comedy-esque character. Granted, he has been showing more shades of the big, angry giant. Will he hold on to the title and kill people with his massive fist of doom or will he be a transitional IC champion? Speaking of which, where does this leave Cody Rhodes? Not saying his entire existence in WWE depends solely on being the IC champ, but where does he go from here? Can he be considered legit enough to step up in to the main event? Even so, who would he be pitted against? I would really hope that Rhodes would move on to face off with someone who could really help him take that next step in to the main event. I wouldn’t mind seeing Sheamus and Rhodes to be honest.

Well, for what it’s worth, the match lasted longer than I thought it would. And Menuoneuesousos or whatever her name is did pretty well. Definitely so considering the rumor that she broke her rib(s) during practice for Dancing With the Stars. I didn’t really care for this match just like everyone else. Only thing that really annoys me about the whole ordeal is that Beth took the pin and not Eve. The Divas champion took the pin from the celebrity. I know the title doesn’t actually mean anything, but they should at least try to keep it a little respectable. I do think that it’s possible the reason Beth took the pin is because she’s a lot more talented than Eve and could protect Maria a lot better. Or the fact that Beth was the catalyst behind the heels in the story. Just speculation. Like I said, I really didn’t care for this match. In fact, all the people I watched WrestleMania with didn’t care for it. We started taking shots during the match. Okay, not really, but nobody was really paying attention to it.

This right here is easily the subject of both sides of the spectrum. There are people that absolutely loved this match and everything about it. On the other side, there are people that thought is was the biggest piece of shit they have seen since last year. Me? I thought this match was pretty good, but not as good as last year. Last year, they really had something special in what they did. There was a lot of back and forth and times where I really thought HHH was going to win. This year, while it was pretty fun as far as all the drama in the ring goes, I just didn’t feel it like I did last year. The addition of Shawn and watching him act torn between the two men he respects most in the business was absolutely fantastic. Triple H telling Shawn to end it or he will was cool, but it seemed a little over the top. I think it transitioned from wrestling match to HHH trying to kill Taker a little too fast. There wasn’t really a smooth transition it just seemed to go from a balanced back and forth to a very one sided beat down. Sure there were a lot of elements thrown in that made up for some of the craziness and it made it unique from last year, but it just didn’t elicit the emotions in me like their bout from the year prior. And yes, I did pick HHH to win this year. I know, I know, that’s just insane, right? Well, when you think like I do, which is creative and outside the box, you tend to NOT stick to the norm of things. I had my ideas behind why H would win. If you can’t accept that, tough. Don’t be a dick, just know that some people have a different opinion than you. And I do have to say that the end to all of that was fantastic. Seeing them all embrace up top the ramp was pretty damn cool to see.

You know, this match was just really, really fun. I knew it would be. There was just no other reason anyone could really be in to this match unless they really cared whether Teddy or Johnny’s respective teams actually won. Which that would just be asinine. We’re all smart fans, we don’t care who’s going to be the fake GM of both shows, right? …. Where’s that Chandler face I stole from Sforcina? Anyways, I think that the match itself was filled with all the guys that WWE wanted to give a spot to and showcase at WrestleMania but just couldn’t come up with a good way to implement them all in to the show. So, we got this mess. But it was a fun mess, like I said. Huge Santino and Ryder fan, so seeing them get their time to shine was awesome for me. And I have to say watching the faces jump to the outside was a cool little spot. Seeing Miz pick up the victory for Team Johnny was pretty cool. Can’t hate on that too much, the guy has been working hard but I’m starting to wonder if his upward mobility might hit a wall soon. He’s evolved since last years WrestleMania, whether you see it as good or bad I see it as good, but he hasn’t evolved much. He has the potential to break out of this weird little shell that he seems to be trapped in. He’s made very little improvement since last year, but the little he has is evident to me, that’s for sure. Hopefully, this will help him work the kinks out. Anyhow, the lead up to the ending and the shenanigans afterwards was interesting to say the least. Eve just proved that women often just get in the way. Oh god, if my wife reads this she’s going to hit me. Oh well, so worth it. And watching her show her true colors by kicking Zack in the jibblets was kind of what I was hoping would happen. Hey, maybe this is the catalyst that Zack has been needing to become a more serious contender. Now people can take him seriously if he were to go on and challenge for the world title. He’s not so much a goof after this, right?

This one was supposed to be the wrestling spectacle of the night, but it was barely even there. This match is proof that this WrestleMania was just hugely underwhelming. I expected better out of Punk and Jericho. They just didn’t wow me like I thought they would and I wanted them to. Not saying they didn’t have a good match because they did. But it wasn’t a WrestleMania good match. Does that make any sense? I really don’t have much to say about this match besides the fact that even though it was a little disappointing I still enjoyed it. And even though I picked Jericho to win because I want to see him as champion again, I knew he wouldn’t.

Ha. Wow. Just didn’t know what to expect from this one. To be honest, this was really what I wanted to see most. Just because there was so much that could happen during this match that it made it exciting. Anything from Rock losing and passing the torch to Brock returning and destroying Cena to help Rock win. There was just so much possibility with this match. Granted, the match itself fell flat as shit. It just wasn’t that great. I had expected better wrestling from the two, but then again they have both been bred in to main event stars whom work a VERY specific style. You have to admit that when someone hits the WWE main event, they tend to limit their move sets. Rock and Cena are prime examples. They have their key moves that tell you something big is coming. Regardless of this, I thought they would both move out of their comfort zones to make things a little more interesting. And was it just me or did Rocky look like shit here? He looked pretty good at Survivor Series, but here he just looked terrible. If I were the usual Cena hater, I’d be blaming Cena for that. But lets be honest here, both people just didn’t bring it like they should have. It’s been mentioned that Rock winning here has a lot more future possibilities than if Cena won, and that has actually changed the way that I thought about it going in to the match. I thought if Cena won, Rock would pursue Cena for another win, but Cena could work with other people while Rock cried like a bitch. But now, Cena loses, he shrugs it off and….wait…either way we were kinda screwed. Cena is going to stay the same guy and nothing really changes. Well, except Brock coming in and giving it to Cena. Well, we shall see what happens in the future.

And that does it for me. WrestleMania this year was fun to watch, but after the fact it really felt underwhelming. Next week I’ll be back ON TIME with the usual column. I’ll take some suggestions for matches in the mean time, by the way.