KB’s Review: 12 Days of Wrestling Christmas

It’s a week before Christmas and I’m hoping most of you have sent your letters to Santa already. In case you haven’t yet, I thought it was my responsibility as a Christmas and wrestling fanatic to recommend some gifts for you around this time of year. And of course, it has to be in song. I present to you the Twelve Days of Wrestling Christmas. Let’s get to it.

We’ll start at the low end and work our way up.

On the first day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: One WWE World Heavyweight Champion who actually shows up.

This one is a common complaint among fans and they make a good point. WWE World Heavyweight Champion Brock Lesnar hasn’t defended his title in nearly three months (it’s going to be four by “Royal Rumble 2015”) and has only appeared a few times in the same span. At the end of the day, the main event feud is about people fighting for a chance to face someone who never shows up. It’s really hard to care about Rollins and Cena fighting for a chance to face Lesnar, especially when it’s fairly clear he’s a lame duck champion who has no chance of leaving “Wrestlemania XXXI” with the title.

On the second day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Two retirement ceremonies for tall bald guys in their 40s.

I’ve harped on this one for awhile but the renewed pushes for Kane and Big Show are driving me up the wall. I can’t fathom a reason for these two to consistently either win or be saved by interference to force a disqualification. I would assume it’s to build either guy up for a future feud, but does either guy need a push like this?

They’re both former World Champions and easily going to the Hall of Fame, so why bother building up someone like Rowan to just feed him to both guys? You could accomplish the same thing by having them destroy some low level guy and have the announcers talk about how big of a deal they are right now. It just seems unnecessary to me.

On the third day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Three Count’s Greatest Hits Album.

I would listen to that all day long.

On the fourth day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Four NXT darlings staying down there for as long as they can.

At the moment, we have Kevin Owens, Hideo Itami, Finn Balor and Sami Zayn tearing up Thursdays with the most entertaining wrestling television show around. They’re doing logical stories with good vs. evil and solid blow offs to the stories they’re telling. However, I have a terrible feeling about what we’re going to be sitting through once they come to WWE. The problem is they get to the main roster and the writers have to “fix” their problems while the announcers tell their stupid jokes and rip everyone to pieces. Please let them stay down in NXT where they can show off and continue to entertain us.

On the fifth day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: FIVE! FIVE! FIVE! FIVE! FIVE!

The New Day is a fresh start for Big E. and Kofi Kingston, who have been around for awhile but have lost their way in WWE. While the group might not be anything special, at least they could be something new for them. The guys have talent and can talk (check out Big E.’s Twitter if you want to get some good chuckles) but they haven’t had anything to do. Now they have the proverbial foot in the door to getting back to prominence, which is something that the entire group could use. The power/speed/intelligence is a good idea and they could be entertaining if given the chance.

On the sixth day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Six degrees of separation from TNA’s mistakes.

As I’m typing this, I’m watching tonight’s “Impact Wrestling” which is a countdown of the top twenty moments in the company’s history. It amazes me how much better this company used to be before they went insane with the repetitive ideas and the same stupid booking over and over. For years now I’ve wanted to see TNA succeed but they keep launching bazookas at their own feet to stop them.

I’d love to see this roster rewarded for all their hard work, but time after time we keep seeing stuff like Dixie Carter come on screen to mess things up. Keep the woman off screen and hopefully let her hand the company over to someone who knows what they’re doing. TNA’s poor decisions and constantly trying to use nostalgia have put an anchor around their feet and it’s very frustrating. Let something fresh get in there and see where the hard work can take it.

On the seventh day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Seven lucky rabbits feet for Dean Ambrose.

The guy has lost PPV main events to a TV monitor and a hologram. I’m not saying he’s going to be the next face of the company, but it would be nice to see him get a big sustained push instead of losing over and over again. At least he’s in PPV main events though instead of jerking the curtain, which is a big step in the right direction.

On the eighth day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Eight more promotions to watch.

As a wrestling fan, I can always use more stuff to watch. The rise of new promotions has been great this year and it’s awesome to see these guys get a chance to showcase their talents. At the moment there’s WWE, TNA, ROH, Lucha Underground, PWG, Chikara, AAA and NJPW. You couple those with various indies and regional promotions plus whatever Global Force Wrestling is going to be, meaning there is a LOT of wrestling out there to watch, which is never a bad thing.

On the ninth day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: A 9pm start time for “Monday Night Raw”.

As in make the show two hours again. When you factor in “NXT”, “Main Event”, “Superstars” and the two major shows, you currently have eight hours of WWE programming a week. To put that in perspective, 1985 and 1986 had nine hours of pay per view content total. At the end of the day, it’s just WAY too much content every week and especially far too much in one night. I’ve come up with the term The Raw Special for a three hour show that would have been so much better if they cut an hour out. That’s the case far more often than not anymore and it really needs to stop.

On the tenth day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Ten minutes max for opening segments.

Speaking of things that need to stop, this one has come up again lately and they really need to end. The Authority was really bad about having twenty minute interview segments to open the show while saying something that should have taken all of ten minutes. That’s a lot of time that could be used anywhere else but instead we’re sitting there watching Triple H speaking all slowly and Stephanie repeating her buzzwords about WWE and trying to get things trending on Twitter.

So much of these segments could be cut down and replaced with Cole saying later in the night “Due to what was said earlier tonight, John Cena has demanded a match later tonight with Luke Harper and Harper has accepted. That’s coming your way later tonight so stay tuned.” That took about eight seconds to say as opposed to the eight minutes it would take to present on television. Again, stop talking for so long and just let the show move forward.

On the eleventh day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Eleven years before another corrupt GM.

Or any GM character for that matter. Going back to what I said in the previous part, we don’t need everything set up for us. It’s fine to just have the commentators announce a match and move on. We don’t need everything on camera and a corrput authority figure to fight the show’s hero. Look back at Jack Tunney. He showed up every few months, made one announcement, and was done. For a more modern example, look at the NXT boss. He might show up once every month and a half, announce a major match, and then he’s gone. The show runs on its own and doesn’t need someone walking us through the whole thing.

On the twelfth day of Christmas a true wrestling fan gave to me: Twelve months of the WWE Network.

It’s only $9.99 a month! Seriously, that’s insane and would be a great Christmas gift.

Merry Christmas to you all and I hope you have a great time doing whatever you enjoy doing, which may include watching some good wrestling.