Wrestling In The Time Of COVID-19: the new thread

[Gurke and Hare]

It's not even as if she's camera shy, she's got a wholesome youtube channel of her doing wacky stuff.

[hummingofevil]

They could at the very least give Shida a promo or backstage interview or video package or something if she's not going to be wrestling. Someone elsewhere put it into context, but imagine they had the World Champion or TNT Champion just waving in the crowd each week? They wouldn't.

I think the problem with that is that Shida's promos are not great. She's obviously really likeable but her promos don't really enhance her character for me. It's strange to me given how many managers they have that they didn't give Shida one. Her English is great to be doing the sign off line if someone else was doing the lifting. Actually Madusa could be a good fit with her history of working in Japan and both being quite serious calm characters.

In hindsight, the open challenge thing would have been good for Shida. Just have her beat the shit out people most weeks then have her put decent matches with any experienced talent they could find.

One final thing. Lance Storm got a load of shit yesterday for suggesting intergender matches should be banned - I don't agree with him but you can tell he thought he was trying to do the right thing and the pile on was a bit lame - but one thing I noticed from the Joey Janela show is Penelope Ford and Allie looked like stars when working against the men. We have seen it with AEW with the couple of intergender matches that they have done. I doubt it is a way forward for them but it got me thinking if they have just been unlucky with the balance of talent they have (do they need some more taller, powerful women like Charlotte who would be better foils for the smaller roster they have); do they need a few more bruisers who can give out and take a decent beating (what is Tessa up to these days - oh to watch the Vincels go apeshit if they brought her in.

[BeardFaceMan]

I understand Shida has been learning English too, which most Japanese wrestlers don't seem to do when wrestling in the US, in an effort to fit in more, there's really no excuse for not hearing more from her. And then you have this AEW Heels stuff and Brandi deleting her Twitter account over it, they're really underutilising the women they have, they're not quite WWE-level bad but they could really be doing better.

[BeardFaceMan]

I think the problem with that is that Shida's promos are not great. She's obviously really likeable but her promos don't really enhance her character for me. It's strange to me given how many managers they have that they didn't give Shida one. Her English is great to be doing the sign off line if someone else was doing the lifting. Actually Madusa could be a good fit with her history of working in Japan and both being quite serious calm characters.

In hindsight, the open challenge thing would have been good for Shida. Just have her beat the shit out people most weeks then have her put decent matches with any experienced talent they could find.

One final thing. Lance Storm got a load of shit yesterday for suggesting intergender matches should be banned - I don't agree with him but you can tell he thought he was trying to do the right thing and the pile on was a bit lame - but one thing I noticed from the Joey Janela show is Penelope Ford and Allie looked like stars when working against the men. We have seen it with AEW with the couple of intergender matches that they have done. I doubt it is a way forward for them but it got me thinking if they have just been unlucky with the balance of talent they have (do they need some more taller, powerful women like Charlotte who would be better foils for the smaller roster they have); do they need a few more bruisers who can give out and take a decent beating (what is Tessa up to these days - oh to watch the Vincels go apeshit if they brought her in.

Yeah, it's a bit odd they give a mouthpiece to people like Brain Cage or Nyla Rose, who doesn't really need one, and not someone like Shida, who could do with a little help.

Intergender matches are a tough one, I'm generally not a fan but it depends on the style of match, really. As you say, when booked right, the women can look great and it can really help them. There's a tradition in japan of the women asking the men to shoot hard on them, to prove how tough they are. Shida has done matches like that, and I saw Asuka doing a match against Minoru Suzuki for an event she put together where she asked Suzuki to stiff her in an intergender tag match because he is one of her heroes. I had to stop watching that match because it was basically domestic violence in a ring, it was horrible, he was literally beating the shit out of her, but the women get a lot of respect over there from doing that. But that type of hardcore or deathmatch intergender style is not for me at all. For me, it's important that the match isn't just punches and strikes but intergender opponents actually doing wrestling moves on each other, that makes it all feel a lot less icky.

[Ja'moke]

It's funny now that women's wrestling is WWE's strong suit. I would argue that Asuka, Sasha, and Bayley have been the stars of the "covid era." Main eventing consistently and putting on great matches.

And then you have NXT with Io as champ, really looking foward to her match against Dakota at TakeOver. Pairing Mercedes Martinez with the Robert Stone brand is a good move. And Shotzi is really growing on me too. Then you still have the likes of Tegan, Candice, Mia Yim, Ripley tearing it up.

I think that's what makes the AEW women's division look worse, when it's up head to head with NXT, which has probably the best women's division outside of Japan.

Yeah, it's a bit odd they give a mouthpiece to people like Brain Cage or Nyla Rose, who doesn't really need one, and not someone like Shida, who could do with a little help.

Apparently Nyla and Vicki really get along and have amazing chemistry backstage, so they wanted to work together and bring that to TV. Sadly, they haven't had much chance to show it yet.

Also, Cage definitely needs a mouthpiece. He's not a good promo. One of those people whose voice doesn't match his look.

Ricky Starks, however, doesn't need a mouthpiece, but I liked that he still got promo time along with Tazz last week.

[BeardFaceMan]

It's funny now that women's wrestling is WWE's strong suit. I would argue that Asuka, Sasha, and Bayley have been the stars of the "covid era." Main eventing consistently and putting on great matches.

When COVID started and AEW were left with a thinned roster, they had no choice but to use a lot of the women (same with WWE, I should imagine). And they really stepped up too, Penelope Ford really impressed, Britt Baker too, and it looked like this was the way forward, AEW were actually doing it, they were putting women on TV every week and proving they could have compelling matches and stories. But as soon as things started to relax again and the guys came back, the women got shunted out and it was back to 1 match a week. My only guess is that they're so obsessed with ratings and demos (Khan especially) that they probably looked at the numbers for women's segments, saw they were lower than the mens's and so did less of them. Can't think why else they'd be dropping the ball like this.

[petril]

Apparently Nyla and Vicki really get along and have amazing chemistry backstage, so they wanted to work together and bring that to TV. Sadly, they haven't had much chance to show it yet.

I think the decision probably ended up coming from the Heel The Punters Like, Add Something That Annoys Them line of thinking

[Deanjam]

It's funny now that women's wrestling is WWE's strong suit. I would argue that Asuka, Sasha, and Bayley have been the stars of the "covid era." Main eventing consistently and putting on great matches.

Performance wise I would definitely agree. Their booking has sucked though which doesn't help.

I'm not a huge fan of the inter gender matches. You have to be careful with them. As mentioned above I also saw the Asuka/Suzuki match and I hated it. Slapping her full force in the face is bullshit, no matter how okay she was with it. To be honest, I'm not a fan of full on headshots in male vs male matches either. Wrestling is supposed to be the unreal made to look real. Stiff body or arm/leg shots is one thing but go easy on the head and neck. I thought the Becky/Ellsworth match was a good guide to booking inter gender in WWE. The size difference wasn't much different and they basically only did wrestling moves on each other. Suplexes and armbars etc don't make me uncomfortable

In all honesty though I think men vs women turns off more viewers than it would attract.

[Gurke and Hare]

I don't mind intergender, but obviously nobody should feel like they're being coerced into doing them if they don't want to. I really like this MJF vs Kris Statlander match though, and not just because he calls her a "dollar store Mork from Ork".

[BeardFaceMan]

Performance wise I would definitely agree. Their booking has sucked though which doesn't help.

I'm not a huge fan of the inter gender matches. You have to be careful with them. As mentioned above I also saw the Asuka/Suzuki match and I hated it. Slapping her full force in the face is bullshit, no matter how okay she was with it. To be honest, I'm not a fan of full on headshots in male vs male matches either. Wrestling is supposed to be the unreal made to look real. Stiff body or arm/leg shots is one thing but go easy on the head and neck. I thought the Becky/Ellsworth match was a good guide to booking inter gender in WWE. The size difference wasn't much different and they basically only did wrestling moves on each other. Suplexes and armbars etc don't make me uncomfortable

In all honesty though I think men vs women turns off more viewers than it would attract.

Yeah Im not a fan of strong style or stiff working in general. If you want to prove how tough you are, go to UFC. Too many wrestlers lose sight of the fact that the art of professional wrestling is making look like it hurts more than it actually does. You want to throw the odd stiff shot in there to ramp things up, it can be helpful in a match to get certain things over. But watching two guys stand there belting the shit out of each other for a whole match? That shit gets old very quickly, I'd  rather watch an actual fight. Watching Bryan and McGuiness stiff each other with unprotected head shots to the ring post isn't awesome, it's fucking idiotic.

But yeah, intergender matches are an oddity, not a draw. Wrestling fans might be mostly ok with them but to a mainstream audience? No fucking way would that attract viewers to a TV show, and with a casual viewer, if they sit down to watch a wrestling show and see that the main even is an inter gender match, I can see them turning off.

[Gulftastic]

Probably covered in the thread already, but very sad to hear that Mark 'Rollerball' Rocco has passed away. He was always a heel in the WoS days, and I was too young to appreciate just how bloody good he was, just wanting to see him beaten. Watching the repeats years later was a revelation. Truly ahead of his time.

[Ja'moke]

AEW has confirmed Rachael Ellering for AEW Dark next week. A nice step in the right direction. She was also on the list I recently wrote of indie women AEW could bring in (https://www.tvinsider.com/gallery/aew-all-elite-wrestling-women-wrestlers-challenge-hikaru-shida/).

[Deanjam]

I guess Dave is suggesting here that AEW might not have as much TV support as they now do going forward.

[peanutbutter]

Why on earth wouldn't they though? They're doing amazing numbers for TNT and the demographics aren't the usual dogshit wrestling provides either.

If anything I'd be more concerned that whoever comes in pushes for more hours, a big part of the appeal is that it's only 2 hours.

[hummingofevil]

It's a long shot but if anyone of you is awake and fancies some wrestling then I am watching the Warrior Wrestling show on Fite. Their previous shows have been ace and it seems this "Friday Night Lights" is from a football field (obvious now I think about it). Main event is Bryan Cage vs Jeff Cobb.I'll feedback to you all either way.

[Moribunderast]

I just watched the ending of Smackdown on YouTube. Now I generally don't like to post about WWE because I don't have a good word to say about them and I feel like it's boring for you all to read me bitch about a product I don't even watch BUT...

68 camera cuts. In just over 4 minutes. On average, a jarring, visually unpleasant camera cut every 4 seconds. This is what I mean when I say I can't watch WWE due to their presentation. You could put on Omega/Okada, Moxley/Ishii, Hiromu/Ospreay and I would not be able to watch them in WWE, such is my visceral reaction to the fucking camera cuts. The commentary and buzzwords are the extra layer that make it impossible for me to watch but the camera cuts make me feel queasy and stressed. Forget how creatively terrible the show is and how uniform the matches are, the presentation is LITERALLY unwatchable to me. Christ!

Anyway, with that vent out of the way, I will go back to only posting my giddy post-Dynamite thoughts next week.

[Timothy]

I just watched the ending of Smackdown on YouTube. Now I generally don't like to post about WWE because I don't have a good word to say about them and I feel like it's boring for you all to read me bitch about a product I don't even watch BUT...

68 camera cuts. In just over 4 minutes. On average, a jarring, visually unpleasant camera cut every 4 seconds. This is what I mean when I say I can't watch WWE due to their presentation. You could put on Omega/Okada, Moxley/Ishii, Hiromu/Ospreay and I would not be able to watch them in WWE, such is my visceral reaction to the fucking camera cuts. The commentary and buzzwords are the extra layer that make it impossible for me to watch but the camera cuts make me feel queasy and stressed. Forget how creatively terrible the show is and how uniform the matches are, the presentation is LITERALLY unwatchable to me. Christ!

Anyway, with that vent out of the way, I will go back to only posting my giddy post-Dynamite thoughts next week.

Couldn't agree more. It has become completely unbearable to watch WWE shows due to those camera cuts.

Starting to enjoy Dynamite more and more. Looking forward to each Thursday morning. Also happy that Cardona made his debut.

[Ja'moke]

That ending of Smackdown, I mean, I get what they were going for, and the idea of it probably sounded good on paper. But man the execution was shite.

It did make me laugh though, which I know wasn't the intention, but hey, it's something. When the one dude chainsawed the ring ropes and the rest of the group did a little cheer after each one. Also, spraypainting squiggles on the ring apron.

Someone on reddit described it as a bunch of kids trashing a clubhouse. Very much the vibe.

(I like the Fiend/Alexa stuff though).

[Gurke and Hare]

When they turned the commentary table over I was thinking "Yeah, let's all have a pear!"

[Moribunderast]

So ahead of his big match with Orange Cassidy next Wednesday, Jericho has decided to spent the weekend at Sturgis for the biker festival, playing gigs and walking around taking photos without a mask. We knew he was a bit of an idiot when it came to COVID but this seems incredibly selfish. More than ample time for him to catch the virus (seriously, 250,000 bikers are estimated at the gathering - what a super-spreader event!) but then by the time he's at Dynamite he would still be asymptomatic and unlikely to test positive. Quite frankly, if it were my workplace, I'd say "Either he stays home or I do".

Jericho is my favourite wrestler of all-time and has been unbelievably great as a character in AEW's lifespan but fuck he can be an utter tool.

[up_the_hampipe]

Someone on reddit described it as a bunch of kids trashing a clubhouse. Very much the vibe.

Like if the Nexus invasion happened on Saturday Morning Slam.

[Deanjam]

Yes the gimmick is dodgy, but he played it well.

[Gulftastic]

Whenever I hear his name, Paul Bearer's voice saying 'Oh, Kamala' is in my head. I remember him doing a funny bit with William Regal at WM 17. RIP.

[Deanjam]

Some extra details.

[petril]

Yes the gimmick is dodgy, but he played it well.

aye, I mean it was the late 70s, and it was the south. and he was black and probably without the sort of money or influence where he could be turning much down, so I can see why anyone in that position would've taken a racist gimmick and tried to get something working with it

[up_the_hampipe]

Waiting for anyone at AEW to have the grapefruits to do or say something about the Chris Jericho/Fozzy situation.

[Timothy]

Waiting for anyone at AEW to have the grapefruits to do or say something about the Chris Jericho/Fozzy situation.

[MrMrs]

He deleted that

[Ja'moke]

Very happy they brought Nicole Savoy in for the tag tournament. Should be an instant signing.

[Deanjam]

None of those AEW execs know how to deal with criticism on Twitter. At least the McMahons are smart enough to not reply.

Anyway, as I'm not at work tomorrow I'm gonna live watch Raw for the first time in ages. Pity me.