Road to Blandness - Wrestlemania 31 Predictions & Raw Thoughts

So here we are, finally Wrestlemania is here and it's time to get excited...? I would, but I have a hard time doing just that. When it comes to the event, for the first time in a long time, I really don't know who will win in any of the matches and that's not a good thing. But wait, you'd ask, Joe... Isn't this what you've been bitching and moaning and whining and crying and ranting about for the past 5 years or so in different outlets? For wrestling to not be so predictable? And you'd be right, I have been talking a lot about that, but it's not that simple as you think.

You could have Vincent Kennedy McMahon come out to the ring, take his pants off and dip his penis in cow urine for an hour while humming the "Four Seasons". Would you expect that? No, no you wouldn't expect that to happen. I'm sure there would be some people that would find that entertaining, but most of us would not. Just because something is unexpected and unpredictable, does not mean it's good and doesn't really mean that anything of quality can come from it.
Wrestling is a very specific form of art, it needs the heroes, it needs antagonists, it needs to have people that the crowd can get behind and cheer, there is a need for favorites. And that is the problem right there, the story build ups for the line up sucked balls. You need to give people a clear hero of the story and a clear villain, a probable winner and a most likely loser, that is how wrestling works since the very beginning. People need that to care about what is going on, if they don't have a favorite to win, they won't get invested in the story and won't care about the match. And I am not talking about a clear jobber fighting a monster-beast. You achieve that through logic and intelligent storytelling. You need to think what impact certain things will have on the progression of your characters and at the end of the day, you need to make people care one way or the other. That is where the builds failed badly this year. None of the match-ups produced what I am talking about here, what's worse, none were even build to make someone look strong.

Everyone is so anal about Roman Reigns being booked to look strong, but seriously look what did they do to him. While he won the Rumble, but the ring was cleared mostly by Kane and Big Show and in the end even the Rock was helping him. He lost matches on RAW, he got beat up a couple times and while there were a few times when he got the upper hand, there was never really a moment when he was booked to "look strong", cause "just" winning matches doesn't do that. Brock Lesnar on the other hand has been booked way too strong, maybe rightfully so, but when you write a character to be basically indestructible, you create a problem, a huge problem for the future. Who is going to beat the monster-beast that chewed through everyone along it's path? Starting to get it? In wrestling there are only two types of characters that could do it and it would be done the right way. Someone equal or the ultimate underdog, problem is Roman Reigns is neither. He isn't even that big of a guy honestly and yet, he is still booked as the powerhouse, here's a hint, he's not. There was a few way to book Roman the right way and WWE went the way of doing it wrong. I'm not a hater, Roman could be great in the position he currently is, but not as the character he currently portraits. That being said, with the news of Lesnar staying with WWE, anything could happen in this match, with this match and after this match.

The match internet fans seem to be most excited for is the ladder match for the Intercontinental championship. Why? Because it has in it the biggest amount of internet darlings in wrestling world today. But the build for this one was just plain stupid. I am not going to go into details about that after Fast Lane there is no room in this for Dean Ambrose, who lost the first match for the title, therefore doesn't even deserve a rematch for it - that already is up in my review from that event. Like I already wrote before, the story here was utterly garbage and just pointless. For weeks we had Wade Barrett lose matches with current participants and for weeks we had the Intercontinental title being stolen and being passed out like in a game of hot potato. That was dumb. Apparently, because everyone wasted Barrett ass, they gained the status of number one contenders to the title. After that the belt itself was just a marker for the crowd, "oh, he holds the title, he is in the match". Why it was dumb? Because it didn't change anything. At the end of the day you could give the belt to a million people in a row and still the champion will be Wade Barrett. It's not like a few years ago with the Hardcore Championship, where there was a 24/7 rule, and the champion was constantly defending the title. No, here only the hands holding the strap changed, which ultimately still belonged to Barrett. Quality-wise, this match most likely will be the match of the night, simply because there will be enough people to provide a good amount of fast paced action, but it feels rushed and sloppily slapped together.

Something a lot of fans was waiting for, including myself, was the debut of Sting. He was one of my top five in the '90s and his "Crow" character to this day is my favorite gimmick of all time. I can only speak for myself, I was excited to finally see Sting in WWE. And then reality started to kick me in the testicles, crushing one dream after another, giving back the regular mush that is known as the "WWE treatment". Everyone wanted to see Undertaker face Sting, even if they wouldn't be fighting each other, even if it would only mean that they will stand in the ring, one time, first time for the last time. We will not get that, instead the egomaniac himself, Big Nose Triple H had to make it once again, all about himself. For weeks we had Triple H come out and talk how he destroyed WCW, how Sting was afraid to come to WWE due to HHH being there. He made it all about himself and about WCW vs. WWE. That was the worst way to push this story. Instead of focusing on what Sting did since appearing at Survivor Series, they made it about the past, 14 years back to the past. And now, we are to believe and get excited about a match that doesn't have any bearing on the present whatsoever. The could make it a power struggle, they could make it as Sting vs. Authority and even push it through till Summerslam, they could make Sting the General Manager of RAW, they could make Sting a guardian for a young star that fights against Authority, they could have done so many things differently and so much better with Sting... But no, the aging, egocentrical asshole that only got to where he is, because he fucked the boss's daughter gets the spotlight once again, from fear of getting irrelevant, again. This match is only about what Triple H did to WCW and Sting is - as he said - taking HHH down. Bull. Shit.

Can someone tell me why is WWE ruining everything good they have and making it as mediocre as possible? I already ranted about the Rusev-Cena situation, so I won't go into that too deeply again. This could've been a very good build to most likely a decent match. There was a chance for Rusev to finally move on to bigger, better things with the feud involving John Cena. It didn't start as some guy coming to the rescue of USA and we actually saw the human side of Cena as well, with his age and credo being questioned as he was put in a situation where his being even on Wrestlemania wasn't certain. There was actual potential. And then someone decided to pull the plug and to run the back up "USA vs. Russia" usual menu. The resolve for the uncertainty was solved in two weeks and the focus switched entirely to the great, american hero fighting against the big, bad russian. There is just nothing more I could add. They had an unpolished gem that needed some work and instead they decided to play around with turds.

Going down the card, you could maybe notice that I almost always skipped over Bray Wyatt segments. No it's not because I didn't notice them. It's because there wasn't exactly too much to say about them. Bray Wyatt, with the absence of the Undertaker, had to carry the whole feud for weeks and he did a good job doing so. Problem is, we didn't see the Undertaker even once the whole time. Which means that however he looks like and in whatever shape he currently is, we are going to have to make out our minds about it when we see it. I didn't exactly see anything wrong on Bray's part, just when his opponent was nowhere to be seen, he couldn't exactly build upon him, react to him, so the promos were kind of the same, the Bray Wyatt-ish mumbo-jumbo as always. If this is the last match for the Undertaker, which is entirely possible, I really don't have any feelings about it, one way or the other.

Randy vs. Seth, another one with the potential for a slow build and great payoff, again, wasted for the immediate gratification and polarization. Randy Orton should have slowly shown signs that he doesn't want to be in Authority, get angry at people messing him up and eventually explode at everyone. But not after a week or in one episode, but gradually. And what was the point of the beat down all around the arena? That is something you save to blow off a feud, that is what you do when you want a heel to get over at the start of an angle or a face to end one. Both Randy and Seth are good in-ring performers and we could get a very nice match. The problem is that there is no point really. They won't top the beat down Seth got and they won't erase the fact Orton already made Rollins his bitch. Plus with Seth being the poster boy of Authority, we all know this is not going to be a clean match, which for me personally, sucks on a whole different level.

So them tag teams, ain't a whole lot of them, aren't there? Yeah... I don't want to dwell on either tag team match nor the Diva match, because it makes me sad. The tag match will be a 4 tag team match for the championship and that is almost all the active tag teams in WWE, currently. With the Divas championship match it's going to be the another variation of Bella Twins vs. AJ Lee/Paige, AGAIN. I really enjoy tag team wrestling and women wrestling, it can be done so truly great, just... not in WWE. The tag match while entertaining won't really matter, cause every team involved will get a shot sooner than later - due to the limited amount of possible contenders and the Diva match regardless of the result will still mean we will get a Nikki Bella vs. AJ/Paige for the title later. It's so hard to really care, it honestly makes me sad to think about it.

And lastly the battle Royal with everyone we couldn't fit in the main card or the ladder match, because on Wrestlemania everyone gets a paycheck. I have bad memories after the Battle Royal last year, when we had Cesaro win it, get over, and then crash and burn. I certainly don't want that to repeat.


Like I wrote above, I really don't have a clear "in my mind this guy is winning/losing" candidates. For every question "who?" and "why?" I could give an answer opposite to the one given here and still believe in what I'd say.

Predictions: 

WWE World Heavyweight Championship: Brock Lesnar vs. Roman Reigns
Winner: Roman Reigns
Why? Because WWE needs to create new main eventers for the long haul and they have to start somewhere. Plus Rollins cashing in on Roman - regardless if it's going to work or not - is a better choice than doing that on Lesnar. And let's face it, Roman needs this more than Brock.

United States Championship: Rusev vs. John Cena
Winner: John Cena
Why? Everyone has to lose someday and Rusev is not an exception. If he doesn't lose this, there is no one else to face at his level. He needs to lose this belt to move up to the main event. And what better place to do it if not at Wrestlemania? If Rusev won't lose this, he will be stuck in mid card, that he already grown out of for a long time. Plus this gives both men something to do on the next PPV with a rematch for Rusev.

Intercontinental Championship: Wade Barrett vs. Dean Ambrose vs. Daniel Bryan vs. R-Truth vs. Dolph Ziggler vs. Stardust vs. Luke Harper
Winner: Daniel Bryan
Why? He is the most popular guy here and with the way WWE antagonized it's fans due to Bryan's booking, they have to give them something back. Plus Daniel has a DVD coming out, so why not use that as a marketing tool.

WWE Tag Team Championships: Tyson Kidd & Cesaro vs. Los Matadores vs. The New Day vs. The Usos
Winners: Kidd & Cesaro
Why? Because it doesn't matter. There are 4-6 tag teams in main roster WWE, depending on how you look at it. And every one of them is going to get their shot, eventually.

Undertaker vs. Bray Wyatt
Winner: Bray Wyatt
Why? Because it's most likely the last match for the Undertaker and in wrestling it's a common thing for the retiring wrestler to lose his last match thus putting over the guy beating him. And honestly, that isn't the match people will remember Undertaker for.

Sting vs. Triple H
Winner: Sting
Why? Because WWE wants to have Sting in their Hall of Fame, and they can't since Sting never worked for them. Plus Sting in the past was very protective of his character, so I doubt he would come to WWE only to lose.

Randy Orton vs. Seth Rollins
Winner: Randy Orton
Why? Because Rollins will get DQ'ed. Not much else to say here really. This story was empty, they didn't have time to set it up and they wasted the time they had.

Bella Twins vs. Aj Lee & Paige
Winners: Aj Lee & Paige
Why? Because like with tag teams, it doesn't matter. We have literally a few active women performers in WWE so no matter who wins this, it doesn't change a thing.

Battle Royal for the "André the Giant Memorial" Trophy
Winner: Damien Sandow
Why? Because give credit where credit is due, he's put up with a huge load of crap in the last year. He should win this, because he deserves to win this.

Monday Night RAW 9th March 2015

I am beginning to lose all hope I ever had in WWE. I admit, I should see that earlier, but sadly, they just can't help themselves from fucking something up. We are in the "Road to Wrestlemania" period of time and excitement and interest should be surrounding us. The storylines should be plentiful and everyone should be waiting in anxiety for the day of the big event. It's not like that, it's not like that at all, and that is entirely WWE's fault.

The match everyone is talking about, the WWEWHC match, for all the wrong reasons isn't even that bad itself. Sure, it may not cater to what the internet fans wanted, but on the other hand - as I stated before - it the first Wrestlemania in a long time where WWE actually invested their time into creating a new main event guy. Some people say Roman is not ready, I say, we will see how ready he is. The worst thing that could happen is WWE will get burned and maybe that will give them something to think, or maybe it won't on the other hand... For me personally this match is annoying for entirely different reason. I hate the build up, I hate the stakes we have here. Do you even care that the match is for the title? WWE certainly doesn't care, since all they do is put constant emphasis on whether or not Lesnar will be beaten, as if Brock himself was the championship.

The next match that for some stupid reason they decided to let all steam out of is Randy Orton vs. Seth Rollins. We KNEW that it will happen, no one had any doubts about it, but was it really necessary to have a beat down now? The match will still happen, there is no question about it, but after that beat-down, is there even a point to it? Seth Rollins had his ass handed to him and stuffed down his throat. That is not the way a feud should start, or is it restart...? Anyways, that is something you leave for a blow off, cause how do you top it? Where do you go from here? Whatever they will do will be overshadowed by what happened on RAW. Randy made Rollins his bitch and fucked him hard, that is what I will remember about this feud.

And going to the only match I am actually interested in, or maybe I should say "was", since they did exactly what I said they shouldn't do with the Cena vs. Rusev story. They decided to make it about "America". They had a nice build up, interesting situation and even despite the fact title was kind of omitted, it was intriguing. But we can't have that, can we now? No, we cannot, we have to suck USA's penis until it blows. So now we get pretty much exactly the same story as with Jack Swagger, as with Mark Henry, as with Big Show, just the player in it is more important then before, cause Cena still matters. In this episode we saw Lana agree to a match with Cena and they could always use that as an argument that it was her and not Rusev who agreed, as was stated by Stephanie. I don't know anymore, I just lost interest.

The Triple H vs. Sting match is simply put, stupid. Are we really making this just about WCW? A long time too late for this to have any kind of bearing on anything. It should have been about the power, about who controls the company, about something that people that were not even a sperm at that time could relate to. This kind of match, with that motivation, with that reasoning and that kind of build up is just stupid.

Have you noticed how most people involved in big matches for Wrestlemania are simply put not there? While I do understand and kind of agree with the decision to hide Undertaker until the last moment, he isn't the only person that is treated like that. We have Lesnar, who comes around when he pleases, Undertaker, who understandably is built up for a return and then we have Sting, who we saw I think 3 times in the entire feud with Triple H. While mute Sting had his charm, they had to ruin it with a bad promo about WCW and a match 14 years in the making. Who are they trying to kid?

Is it sad that in this episode we saw almost the entire tag team division of WWE main roster in 2-3 matches? And is it sad that we had two Diva matches and I can't force myself to care, even though I try very hard. I really do. Oh yeah, and of course let's not forget about the game of hot potato with the IC belt. Is there an actual reason for this? I mean, we had in the history the Hardcore Championship, which was defended on a 24/7 rule, but then you always had a champion holding it. Now that IC belt is just a marker to let know the audience who will be involved in the title match. Just because someone holds the belt doesn't make him a champion, Wade Barrett still holds that title, belt or not. To the match he still will come out as the Intercontinental Champion. So stealing it, is pretty much, say it with me, ENTIRELY POINTLESS.

Overall this episode was a huge let down on so many levels. It failed in almost every aspect and this close to Wrestlemania, that is sad. But I will end on a positive note. The video material for that Connor kid, that was nice, got me a little teary eyed. And Stephanie talking in the video, I smiled and said to myself "Girl, you are such a mom". I'm not heartless, emotionless machine - even if I might seem like it sometimes-  it moved me and that's not a bad thing.

Monday Night RAW 2nd March 2015

The RAW this week showed clearly why we are not on the "Road to Wrestlemania" and instead we found ourselves on the "Road to Nowhere". In theory we do have things going on, a lot of things going on, but in practice that late into the calendar before Wrestlemania, the most interesting part of the show was an appearance from Jon Steward. 

Booker T during the tag team match summed up the situation of tag team wrestling in WWE perfectly "It's not about the titles, it's about if you mess with my wife you mess with me". And I don't have anything against a storyline like that, I really don't. It sucks monkey tits, but when the tag team never do get any attention, some form, any form, of a story is welcomed. The problem is that this is a story between tag team champions, and saying it has nothing to do with the championships? That is just sending the titles on the fast lane (pun intended) to what Madusa did with WWF Women Championship in WCW. They are sending those titles to a dumpster, they already removed almost every tag team from the roaster, so what is the point of the titles if there is no one left to fight for them?

On the other hand we have a weird situation with the Intercontinental Championship, where it seems everyone can have a shot at the title as long as they steal the strap from the actual champion. Seriously. R-Truth, Dean Ambrose, Luke Harper, Daniel Bryan, Dolph Ziggler... Apparently all you needed to do, to get a title shot around here is just take the belt and BAM! You have a shot. Remember when I was writing about Fast Lane? I said that if Wade Barrett wins, Ambrose has absolutely no reason anymore to be anywhere near that title. I was wrong, what was I thinking trying to apply actual logic to WWE booking. And for the champion, Barrett doesn't hold his championship very often, doesn't he? He doesn't win much either. On the side note, did you notice how Luke Harper basically looks like Dean Ambrose's dirty uncle? They both play a crazy character, they both come out in jeans and white-ish/gray-ish shirt, hell, even their theme songs in a way are similar. 

The story I found very interesting, the situation between John Cena and Rusev is still the match I am waiting the most for. The problem with this match is the same problem I have with Brock Lesnar overall. Rusev is the champion, United States champion, right? Then why the whole thing isn't about the title? I get it, Cena wants to win and his focus isn't on the belt, but why shouldn't it be? Either way I actually liked what they did with Stephanie coming out and telling Cena that if he wants Rusev, he has to make Rusev want him and if he doesn't get Rusev to agree to a match, Cena will not be at Mania this year. Now let's not kid ourselves here, the match will happen, but depending on what direction they will take it could lead to some character changes in both of them - and that wouldn't be a bad thing.

Moving on, I have to admit, in this episode I saw Roman Reigns the way I want Roman Reigns to be, sadly it was just at the end of RAW after the match with Rollins ended. His facial expression was pure perfection and his eyes went all crazy. After that it was pure destruction. That is what this character needs to be, not some lovey-dovey good guy who loves everyone, but reall badass, who might lose a match, but will make his opponent remember him for a long time. Keep Reigns like that and it will definitely win fans over, cause that is where he shines, fast paced, high impact moves and ground-pound style of in-ring work. 

Speaking of Rollins, the story between him and Orton seem to be developing slower then anticipated, but that might be for the better, not to have it fired on all cylinders at this point yet, but slowly build it up before it goes down. Honestly it might even be a good idea to keep them apart only hinting at a confrontation until the last moment. 

Did I forget about something? Oh right, AJ's return. She came back to save Paige from Bella Twins and no one cared, at least that is how it seemed, since every moron in the arena was chanting CM Punk. Guess who is going to have tag team matches for the reminder of pre-Mania season?