What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

[PVarck31]

I know they still get solid ratings compared to other cable shows, but what do they need to do to be number 1 again? Is it even possible?

And I don't mean stuff like simply ending the PG era. I believe its more complicated than that.

I'm talking about stuff like, who should be top guys, who needs to go, who needs to be brought in, how do make titles relevant again, who can make the mid card mean something and how is that done?

Should there be a format shift? More wrestling? more stories?

Do you trust Triple H and Stephanie with the future? Do you even see WWE existing in 10 years?

I have my thoughts, but want to hear yours. I honestly think we have some of the best wrestling minds here on OS that I have ever seen.

I hope this ends up being a cool thread. Its just something that was rattling around in my head.

[TheMatrix31]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

I can and probably will get more specific, but for right now, all I can say is.....

Get back to basics.

[TheGenius]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

I am by no means an expert at the current WWE product, I just started tuning in again around Raw 1000 but have been watching every show since then, but I was a huge fan in my younger days from the 1990s up until shortly after the Invasion thing.

I really like some of the current top guys, CM Punk is very good, love Daniel Bryan and Dolph Ziggler as well as some of the up and coming guys (Cesaro, Sandow, etc)

What it seems like is they have very strong heels, and the faces are kind of meh. Cena doesn't do much for me, but I know he is a huge favorite with kids and women and moves tons of merchandise. Sheamus does absolutely nothing for me, neither does Orton. Their characters seem stale and I've only been watching for a few weeks. Cena showed some promise on the Raw before NOC with his promo, but I'm just not a huge fan of his.

There are a couple of things that immediately spring to mind that could be fixed to help the project. 1 is that a lot of the stories don't work, and then when they do they shove it down the audience's throat. For example the AJ thing and Bryan/Kane. Smackdown last week had to have been over half Daniel Bryan/Kane related.

2 is the lack of build up for matches and events. At Night of Champions there were a couple of matches that weren't set or even announced (like the Battle Royal and the fatal 4 way). They have 4ish weeks to build up matches for their big events and don't even have some set until just before the show, why would people be interested in purchasing these events if that was the case?

I realize this was much longer than it needed to be so I apologize for the length and if some of this doesn't even make sense. Those are my general thoughts on the state of things.

[bigbob]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

For me, personally, there's two things that don't including getting rid of the PG-Era that are high priority for me:

1. Get rid of the Brand Split

2. Emphasize other titles

I just don't believe there's enough talent to have a Brand Split, meaning there's not enough talent for two major Championships. Run something similar to whenever Jericho won both titles and became the Undisputed Champion so that we can merge them once again.

[PVarck31]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

I think another issues is that a lot of the faces just don't connect with the majority of the people who watch. Maybe I am off, maybe I am just seeing this from the IWC's POV, but it just seems like Sheamus has stalled and is becoming as corny as Cena.

I think this is a product trying to use too much humor. Don't get me wrong. I enjoy humor. IMO the Bryan/Kane story is one of best going right now. But it seems like Cena always has to be cracking jokes, same with Sheamus. If I hear another damn thing about his uncle back in Ireland I'm gonna puke.

Once positive of note is that they are making the tag team division somewhat relevant again.

[TheGenius]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

That's one other thing I was going to mention. If just about everyone appears on both shows now, why are two world titles necessary? It just waters everything down and makes things too clunky. In the heyday of the attitude era there was: WWF title, Intercontinental, European, Hardcoare, Tag Team. That's 5 total titles (not including women), and they had a clear hierarchy. Now there is WWE, World, Intercontinental, US, and Tag. And there is no hierarchy. Is the WWE or World title superior? Or are they equal? Is the IC better than US? I don't really know.

They should consolidate the two world titles into one to make them seem important, give it some more prestige. Two world titles just makes things strange.

[King_B_Mack]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

Well the first thing that I feel needs to be acknowledged is that the wrestling business is cyclical and it's going to have it's down periods where it's considered nothing but entertainment for trailer trash and people are embarrassed to admit they watch it and it will have it's boom periods like the Attitude Era and the '80s.

That said I can't personally see the business ever seeing a boom like the Attitude Era again. At least, not in our lifetimes unless another company with pockets deep enough to actually make Vince get off his *** and work comes along. Right now, Vince is far too comfortable ignoring compelling stories in favor of making a quick buck. Like for example the John Cena thing. Rather than building guys that are capable of taking his place as top face, they'd rather allow them go heel because Cena moves too many t-shirts to allow a good story turn him heel or not be on tv everyweek when a good storyline has him fired. If the wrestling business worked like the 'E is working right now with competition going, we'd be screwed right now. Imagine if WCW sacrificed the nWo storyline by not turning Hogan heel because he moved too many t-shirts. This isn't the way to book pro wrestling.

The refusal to push cruiserweight wrestling. The downfall of tag team wrestling. Things like this are why I can't see WWE or wrestling in general reaching Attitude Era levels again with things the way they currently are. I think the WWE will survive, of course, but I just don't see how they're going to get back to what they once were with the way they do business right now.

[rdnk]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

Nothing, because there is no reason to do so. They have no serious competition.

It is true. Other than John Cena, there are no true faces anymore that are any good. Maybe it is because it's much easier to be a bad guy. Although, if they unified the world titles, this problem would be mitigated.

[goh]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

The ratings are now consistantly under 3.0. Competition or not...and you could say other forms of entertainment are competition...there's still money they have to make and investors/advertisers they have to please.

Problem starts at the top...

Cena: Stale,predictable.
Sheamus: Stale,predictable.
ADR: Boring and unintresting.
Orton: Boring,stale,unintresting and predictable.
Punk: Still good.

Then the titles...

WWE Title: Only one that comes off being worth anything.
World Title: Worthless since Sheamus won it.
IC Title: Meh. Cody's reign brought it up a bit but who knows?
US Title: Worthless.
Tag Titles: Currently worthless,at least they've started to try.
Women's Title: Worthless.

The other being they missed the last change over then went it came it hit pretty hard because they didn't do anything to prepare for it and the effects are still being felt. Worse yet it's on the verge of happening again.

Seems pretty obvious to me.
Shake up at the top.
Make the titles mean something again.
Actually use all that talent they have,put them over so they're believable contenders and stop pushing bums.

[Cubfan]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

Start at the top Vince needs to retire he doesn't have a freaking clue whats good and whats not. I don't have any faith in Stephine because she is just like Vince. Create stories for adults stop insulting our intelligence every week with this booking for people under 10! Cut down to 3 titles. World Title IC Title and Tag Team Title. Mold the baby faces and heels more. Not every heel needs to be a chick**** guy who runs away. Give me some badass characters to enjoy.

[55]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

Just off the top of my head...

1- Build up a super babyface that EVERYONE pops for. As much as I enjoy Cena and how irreplaceable he truly is as an unintentional "tweener" he just isn't on the level of 80s Hogan, Attitude Austin or Franchise Sting in terms of being that guy. WWE hasn't had one of those guys in over a decade now and it shows. They tried to turn Cena into that guy and it hasn't worked. Sure, he sells a lot of t-shirts, puts a good amount of butts in the seats and is great at his job in terms of most people caring about his matches one way or another (let's go Cena... Cena sucks...) he doesn't have EVERYONE behind him like others have.

2- Follow through with your ******* storylines. If you are going to have elaborate storylines, have an end game in mind. What was the Nexus' bigger picture? I know for a fact the Anonymous GM was NOT supposed to be the troll until they just decided to sweep it under the rug. Who was the chick in heels that they teased the night that The Rock came back? AJ Lee was one of the main "characters" on Raw and was thrust into the GM role based on her "overness" at the time but now there isn't really anything for her to do.

3- Bring back managers. A lot of fantastic in-ring competitors in the old days could still get heat even if they weren't the best talkers due to having a great manager. Pretty much ANYONE you sent Heenan out there with in the 80s was getting major heat. Imagine a guy with the talent of Swagger, or Kidd, or Morrison as a cocky heel that is awesome in the ring and had a top notch heel manager to help them get over. They would have a lot more new and interesting options to pit against the top faces.

4- Switch up to a babyface PBP guy and a heel color commentator for ALL shows. It seems like they are trying to do that with Cole/JBL since Lawler's heart attack but what about when he comes back? A heel PBP guy does NOT work since they focus too much on getting heat and not calling the matches. Monsoon/Heenan, McMahon/Ventura and even Ross/Lawler were all perfect examples of babyface PBP guys and heel color commentators. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

5- Get the WWE Network on the ****ing air already. That will up their exposure tenfold. Also, if the rumors were true about airing all PPV events (besides the "Big Four") for free to subscribing members on the network it will make people want to tune in more and motivate more people to spend the 50 bucks on the other events every 3 months or so. But then again, if they don't make the programming more compelling, nobody will care anyway. Double-edged sword.

[ExtremeGamer]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

First and foremost, make the titles mean something again. Right now, they are a prop. You think back in the dominant era of the 80's/90's, that the WWE Champion wouldn't main event for 9 straight pay-per-views?

Back then, the champions dominated the shows, now they are hardly even on it other than the 2 "world" champions. The brand split hurt that long ago, but the WCW purchase gave a gluttony of talent on the roster. Vince is more about the entertainment and money than a quality product at times, so that also hurts it. They really need to kill off all these other shows, rely on one 3 hour Raw a week and push story's that way. Now Raw feels like it has 1-2 good segments with many other time fillers. If you didn't have the benefit of knowing there's another 2 hour show on Friday's, then you could have far better and more solid writing.

Make a heel a heel again. Have them do heel things, and stick to it. CM Punk beat up The Rock...was cheered the next week because you didn't follow through with pushing his heel turn. It's working better now but mainly because he got a heel manager. But I really don't care about Punk/Cena...again. Feels like this feud has been going on for 2 years now (oh yeah, it has).

Time to push some younger talent, give them a shot. Give Ziggler a shot at the title. Heel champions work better, he's a legit heel so give him the title. Sheamus is about as boring a champion as you can have.

Make the matches mean something as well. Far too many screw job endings on Raw/Smackdown/PPV's to get sucked in. We shouldn't have a "draw" on a PPV, we shouldn't have a DQ on a PPV, this is stuff that shouldn't be happening. Want to create a controverisal ending, fine, I can handle that, but it seems like every PPV has some screwjob ending just not to hurt the other wrestler..err, sorry, entertainer's current storyline. Then why book the match to begin with!? Stuff like that drives me insane. It's too many cooks in the kitchen with this stuff, far too many writing storylines and never following through with them.

It's early and I rambled, but I hope WWE can get an even better product on my TV set on a week in and out basis. I still love it, and will always love it, just want to see it be focused on wrestling again.

[georgiafan]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

Good topic as someone who was a major wrestling fan my whole life (im 30) and was in high school/college during the peak of the attitude era. Like alot of people I quit watching after stone cold/rock went away. I recently started getting back into it after I bought the video game for christmas and one of the things that helps me watch it is having a DVR to skip through the stuff I don't wanna watch.

* More Tag Teams/Stables. - The reason why tag teams are important is because you can make guys sucessful that don't have the ability to be a big player as a singles wrestler. Tag a look at someone like the road dog who was never gonna be a main event guy. But was on a great tag team my favorite of all time.

* Less titles - Like everyone else said do away with some of the titles. As someone that recently started watching Im confused about what they mean and the whole smackdown/raw brand.

* Find a mega star - I know this is much easier said then done but you need a mega star to get all the people watching that quit watching a decade ago. This can't be something thats forced down you it just has to happen but you need a new hogan,rock, stone cold and that guy isnt on the roster now

Roster - Sheamus has to go he just does nothing for me and everyone else i've read on the internet and he never ever loses a match. CM Punk on that note never loses either why would I buy the ppv this month when you know he is going to keep the the title so he can face a healthy cena? Ryback has potential to be a big player but don't rush him even if he is a goldberg clone.

[TheGenius]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

We shouldn't have a "draw" on a PPV, we shouldn't have a DQ on a PPV, this is stuff that shouldn't be happening.

When watching NOC I really thought for a second that Punk would raise one shoulder off the mat at 2 1/2 and Cena would pin himself. They could have written it the same way, Cena starts to celebrate, they inadvertently play his music and there is some confusion until the ref hands Punk the title back, and it is revealed that he actually pinned himself for the three count. I realize the event was in Boston and it was his first night wearing the cancer gear and all that stuff so hard to have him lose, but for a split second I thought that would be the ending and I thought that would have been so much better than a "tie"

[rangerrick012]

Re: What does WWE need to do to be dominant again?

I don't think it's possible for wrestling to be as big as it was in the 90s. Too many options for people on TV, and WWE having no competition, which makes them take less calculated risks and bide their time rather than take a chance on storylines.

The ratings will never be as big, but WWE will always be around. It's too ingrained in American society and makes too much money to ever think it'd go belly up.

The interest in wrestling is still there. Wrestlemania is still one of the biggest events of the year in all of entertainment (and yes I know people hate that word, but it is what it is).

From WWE's perspective they don't have to take the chances that they did in the past. Their hardcore fanbase (like us on here) may complain about the product, but by and large they'll more than likely still tune in or DVR every week to keep up with the product. The casual fanbase may come in and out but still peek in around the time of big PPVs or when big names like Rock and Lesnar come back.

The key is finding big names to replace the old ones. Look at the guys that have left WWE the past few years - Edge, Batista, Taker (part timer), HHH (part timer), Jericho (part timer). Those are huge names that are gone on the weekly show now.

You can't just replace those guys overnight, and I think WWE is in a transition phase now and building up new guys like Punk, Bryan, Sheamus, Ziggler, to fill those voids doesn't happen overnight. But they will get there.

Already Punk and Bryan have become pretty big over the past year. Guys on that next tier like Ziggler and Rhodes will likely get a shot eventually, but you can't force it and you can't rush something. Is Ziggler ready? Probably. Is it a big deal that he's not getting a title shot RIGHT NOW? From WWEs perspective, no, which goes back to them not needing to take chances until the time is right. Not that I agree w/ it, but that's their way of thinking.