Target Practice

<p>Seeing as it's all a bit quiet at the moment with WWE's bookers seemingly acting in a vaguely sensible manner and no signs of CM Punk on the horizon, I figured this might be an interesting discussion to have - it's one me and a couple of buddies were having a few nights ago:</p><p> </p><p> If you could give one, and <em>only</em> one wrestler a guaranteed main-event push for a good period of time (let's say six months), who would it be?</p><p> </p><p> When making your answer, take into consideration the current state of the roster (ie faces/heels, viable feuds etc), as well as how likely that wrestler would be to make the most of that push and establish themselves as a mainstay at the top.</p><p> </p><p> (As an added debate-stirrer, we agreed to ban guys who are currently already being pushed reasonably well, eg: Reigns, Rollins, Wyatt, Bryan, Cesaro)</p><p> </p><p> For my pick, I took the easy option - Dolph Ziggler. The guy just has something about him - he's very rarely in bad matches, he's passionate about what he does, he can work a mic, and the crowd love him. I'd love to see him given a proper heel run against someone like Cena (obviously the game implies that Ziggler would be getting pushed, so Cena can't bury him), because on the rare occasions he's had a chance to dial up the intensity, he's been very good. Even now, when he's just aimlessly darting from opponent to opponent in the midcard, he just seems like he's only a couple of lucky breaks away from really breaking out.</p>

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="brashleyholland" data-cite="brashleyholland" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="26660" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div><p> </p><p> What I find amusing (depressing, really) is that the people who moan about paying for Fight Pass/UFC cards are usually the same group that moan about things like 'quality of cards' and fighter pay. They want both to be better, yet balk at contributing. </p><p> </p></div></blockquote><p> </p><p> I think it's a certain amount of chicken/egg. I don't have any particular aversion to paying (the UFC is 70% of the reason I pay for BT Sport), but I want to be sure that I'm getting my money's worth before I start handing over cash. Obviously with a sport like MMA, you can't guarantee that matches are going to be entertaining or will result in exciting finishes, but there should at least be a certain level of potential quality if you're going to ask people to pay for something.</p><p> </p><p> This is doubly true in cases where that market was previously getting that same thing for free. Whilst I understand that the UFC are there to make money, and that in the European market, we're quite lucky that the PPV model isn't really an established option here, we've <em>seen</em> the quality of the recent Fox/Fox Sports/Macau cards, and to be honest, sometimes they're a tough watch even when you're paying <em>nothing</em>.</p><p> </p><p> Perhaps I'm taking a naive or selfish attitude to it, but if the UFC hypothetically wanted me to start paying to see their cards, they're going to have to start putting on matches between fighters I care about. I'm not suggesting every card needs to be a UFC 100, but I also don't want to see co-main events where I've never even <em>heard</em> of one of the guys.</p>

<p>Yeah, I actually really like Sheamus - he's one of those guys who can put on a decent match with pretty much anyone, and occasionally a great match with someone you'd never expect. His match with Big Show last year (I forget the PPV) was outstanding - way better than I was expecting. As for his run with Christian, I think it's been a bit over-exposed in the past few weeks, particularly as it's not really all that hot a feud. I think last night was maybe a bit of a bad timing - it wasn't a bad match, but the crowd were in a bad mood, and presumably they just weren't interested in seeing those two go at it again, particularly as it's pretty much a lock for Mania.</p><p> </p><p> As for Sandow, I can only assume he's done something backstage to mark his card - he lost his MiTB match to Cena and has pretty much been completely buried ever since. A shame, as he's a serviceable wrestler and a pretty good talker - he could be a great little feud for someone like Cesaro, who's an excellent worker but maybe not the greatest talker in the world just yet.</p>

<p>Just gonna take a second here to give creative a rare pat on the back - last night went about as well as it could possibly have done bearing in mind that not only was Punk not there, pretty much <em>everyone</em> thought he would be. I imagine there's probably a lot of WWE insiders pissed at Meltzer right now. <img alt="" data-src="//content.invisioncic.com/g322608/emoticons/tongue.png.ceb643b2956793497cef30b0e944be28.png" src="<___base_url___>/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" /></p><p> </p><p> Either way, they did a decent job of keeping the crowd entertained with (mostly) good matches, and they did an excellent job of working the crowd into the show and using that heat in some pretty good segments (Heyman and Bryan/HHH).</p><p> </p><p> The only thing I'm thinking is that they perhaps had to show a few more cards than they really wanted to - Bryan vs Batista, the Usos winning the tag title, the Real Americans AND the Shield now showing huge cracks, all on one Raw? Heck, the only thing missing was Undertaker, although I'm pretty sure he was advertised at one point?</p><p> </p><p> But yeah, overall, that could have been a lot messier - the only match that got crapped on that perhaps shouldn't have been was Sheamus/Christian, but to be honest, we've seen that a lot in the past few weeks.</p>

<p>POTENTIAL RAW SPOILER IN WHITE BELOW:</p><p> </p><p> <span style="color:#FFFFFF;">So yeah, looks like just about every site out there is running a seemingly pretty solid report that Punk's going to be at Raw tomorrow night.</span></p><p><span style="color:#FFFFFF;"> </span></p><p><span style="color:#FFFFFF;"> That's REALLY going to make the road to Wrestlemania interesting, particularly as it now looks like they're going to pair off Bryan and Trips (not that they're particularly far along that road - it would be pretty easy to gloss over it).</span></p><p><span style="color:#FFFFFF;"> </span></p><p><span style="color:#FFFFFF;"> Also, (assuming it's true!) I'm glad he's back, not just because he's good in the ring and on the mic, but also because I really wouldn't have wanted to see that Chicago crowd just crap all over the whole show for three straight hours. That Green Bay crowd was bad enough.</span></p><p><span style="color:#FFFFFF;"> </span></p><p> </p><p> /SPOILER</p>

<p>It's difficult to read into it too much without knowing the inflection on the words and whether or not that's a direct quote, but the words 'let's just put it that way' indicate to me at least that whatever it is presumably fairly significant.</p><p> </p><p> Think about it - when you say 'let's just put it that way', it usually means 'something's either very good or very bad, but for whatever reason I don't want to/can't go into specifics'. It's not really the kind of thing you say if something's mundane, it's implying a strong positive or negative reaction.</p><p> </p><p> Whether that means it's 'CM Punk was super pissed and wanted to quit but we've talked him round and he's going to return at Wrestlemania' or 'CM Punk doesn't look like coming back - we're not happy, but we don't want to burn that bridge just yet' is anyone's guess.</p><p> </p><p> But yeah, I guess this is just an elaborate way of saying 'we don't really know much more than we did this time last week'. <img alt="" data-src="//content.invisioncic.com/g322608/emoticons/tongue.png.ceb643b2956793497cef30b0e944be28.png" src="<___base_url___>/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" /></p>

<p>Picked up the new Humble Bundle, as there's a few good Indie games in there I've been meaning to look at (namely The Swapper and Guacamelee).</p><p> </p><p> Man, remember those days when we used to pay full price for games? <img alt="" data-src="//content.invisioncic.com/g322608/emoticons/tongue.png.ceb643b2956793497cef30b0e944be28.png" src="<___base_url___>/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" /></p>

<p>Just saw Raw - man, Sheamus doesn't get enough credit for being able to drag a good match out of an absolutely nothing spot on the card. That tag match was the best thing about that show, yet you couldn't have blamed any of the guys (except perhaps Cesaro) for phoning it in a bit. Credit to the other guys as well, but Sheamus seems to do it time and time again - I remember the match he had with Big Show last year that I almost fast forwarded through I was that convinced it was going to stink, and it was brilliant.</p><p> </p><p> Also, was I the only person on the planet that noticed Swagger's face when Cesaro said he was going to be the first Real American to win the championship? None of the reports I read said anything about it, not even the commentators picked up on it, so I figured maybe it wasn't deliberately supposed to tease the tension (which makes Swagger's reaction even funnier) - either that or everyone missed it.</p>

<p>Yeah, that's my only concern - whether they're going to keep him face for the sake of promoting the film. From a strictly wrestling point of view, turning him would be a no-brainer, (he's already got more heat than Orton!) but that movie appearance complicates things.</p><p> </p><p> Agreed that it'll be interesting to see where it all goes from here. I would imagine the CM Punk situation will factor in there somewhere as well - if he comes back (or if this has all been one giant work), that's going to change the whole picture rather dramatically.</p>

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="Arrows" data-cite="Arrows" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>If anything, I'm seeing the belt go to Batista, then to Bryan at SummerSlam.</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> If I was coming into the WWE creative team after the Royal Rumble, that'd be exactly how I'd play it.</p><p> </p><p> Do my very best to keep Batista as a face until Mania, get the match with Orton out of the way, then turn him heel and give him a run with Bryan - Batista is a much better heel, and he's good enough to use the natural heat he already has and turn that up a notch. As for Bryan, he could adopt a 'naked Mideon' style gimmick and still be massively over right now. It'd also be a nice natural conclusion to the whole arc - Bryan winning the belt from the guy who 'stole' his opportunity in the first place.</p><p> </p><p> Orton-Bryan has been done too much recently for me to be excited about that match - I honestly don't know what they're going to do with Orton post-mania, because he's utterly stalled right now - the character has been so inconsistently written and booked, we don't know whether he's playing his 'viper' role, the 'corporate champion' role, or the 'snivelling, cowardly champion' role, and it's impossible to invest any kind of emotional reaction in him, and for once, it's not entirely his fault.</p>

<p>Yeah, I imagine the last thing he would want right now would be for every single tweet he makes to be completely swamped with replies along the lines of 'OMFG WUT HAPPEN?!?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!'</p><p> </p><p> Like just about everything else in this situation, there's solid arguments to be made for it being genuine or for it being part of the work.</p><p> </p><p> Plus, he's a passionate guy, but he also seems to be a fairly astute one when it comes to negotiations, and it wouldn't be a smart move to burn all your bridges with the only show in town, particularly if it seems there's a chance they might give you what you want in order to get you to come back.</p>

<p>I agree with JR re: Punk - I can't see him wrestling regularly anywhere but in the 'E. I also think he's one of those guys who peaks and troughs. When he's down on something, he goes <em>way</em> down, and I don't think anyone can blame him for being down on what's happened in the WWE over the past 12 months.</p><p> </p><p> If this isn't a work (and it's starting to look less and less likely), I don't doubt that we'll see CM Punk back in the WWE at some point - he's a wrestler through and through, and once those niggling injuries have healed and he's caught a few Hockey games and he's realising that he doesn't quite know what to do with all his free time, he'll start to miss it.</p><p> </p><p> Then when the WWE inevitably wave a nice big paycheck in his direction to come back and do a hot feud with a top guy... It's going to be mighty hard to resist, I imagine.</p>

<p>I think that's probably more indicative of the types of people who play those games though - they tend to be the folks who will get into a game and just HAMMER it for months on end, and they love deep, deep games like that.</p><p> </p><p> I'm currently caught in gaming limbo - I'm looking for work at the moment, so I have pretty much all day sat around not doing much with my time, and <em>can I find anything I want to play?!</em></p><p> </p><p> Nothing AAA particularly interests me at the moment (I'm sniffing around Assassin's Creed IV, but I'm waiting until it drops in price before buying it), and all the indie games I'm currently interested in playing are early access, and I'm trying to avoid buying them for fear of burning out on them before the full game's released.</p><p> </p><p> I know exactly what'll happen - I get a new job, and then they finish a bunch of games I've been waiting for, so I'll have no time to play them! <img alt="" data-src="//content.invisioncic.com/g322608/emoticons/tongue.png.ceb643b2956793497cef30b0e944be28.png" src="<___base_url___>/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" /></p><p> </p><p> I picked up TEW 2013 to try and fill the time void, as I've been following WWE again for a while now, but I probably made a bad pick with my starting promotion (21CW), and it's taking me a long time to get any momentum together, so it's a bit of a chore at the moment. I could just start again with another promotion, but then that would feel like a waste of all the time I've spent on this one!</p>

<p>As I understand it right now, all that we really know is that apparently at some point on Monday night, Punk walked into Vince's office, mentioned something about going home and then went home.</p><p> </p><p> From what I can tell, that is the absolute <em>extent</em> of what we know right now. Anything else is supposition. Sure, there's educated guesses we can make based on what's happened before, but for now all we know is that we shouldn't go to any shows expecting to see Punk any time soon.</p><p> </p><p> Where's the next Raw at? If it's a smarky crowd (or even if it's not - I never had Cleveland pegged for a smark crowd before this week's Raw) you can bet your house there's going to be a whole bunch of 'CM Punk' chants. The WWE might do some dumb stuff on occasions, but I can't think of too many reasons why they'd let one of their top draws (and top merch sellers!) just tear up his contract and walk off right in the runup to Wrestlemania.</p>

<p>Yeah, I'm leaning towards 'work' as well.</p><p> </p><p> WWE has a history of occasionally toying with smarks for sh*ts and giggles, and if you wanted to wind up the smarks, there's not too many better ways than 'leaking' to the dirtsheets that Punk's quit, only to have him coming roaring back.</p><p> </p><p> The alternative is that this is all being blown WAY out of proportion. Punk's raised the issue of burnout a fair bit recently, and not without good reason. It's entirely possible he's gone to Vince after Raw and said 'hey, I'm exhausted, have a ton of niggling injuries and I want to be fresh for 'mania and beyond. Can I take the next 4-6 weeks off? I'm not really involved in anything major at the moment anyway.', and Vince agrees to it, knowing Punk's contract is coming up and wanting to keep him sweet.</p><p> </p><p> I dunno - it all seems too vague at the moment. If Punk had something to say, he doesn't strike me as the kind of guy who'd hold back to the point where he'd just suddenly go 'screw it, I quit'. If he was going to do that, why not hold on a few months and see out his contract?</p><p> I certainly can't blame WWE for not wanting to push him too hard right now bearing in mind what happened last time.</p>