WWE Raw Discussion III

[Dominator83]

Dont know about you guys, but I loved that ending

[tugs]

Dont know about you guys, but I loved that ending

Same here brother

[improper]

Seth Rollins is definitely not the best worker in WWE. Saw that posted on the previous page and I just don't see it. He's not better than Styles, or Ricochet, or Cesaro, or half a dozen other guys, if not more.

If you include NXT Rollins might not even make the top fifteen. He's nowhere near as good as Gargano or Ciampa. He doesn't have the presence of Dream or Cole. He's not as technically sound as the rest of Undisputed Era. I would take Riddle over him too, and probably several other guys too.

I'm not even sure Seth is the best worker in his personal relationship at this point.

[WRau1]

Yeah, Rollins definitely isn't the best worker in the company.

[iMoreland]

So glad they're putting Bray in the title picture

[Stanford]

I'm not even sure Seth is the best worker in his personal relationship at this point.

I am sure of that.

[improper]

Yeah, Rollins definitely isn't the best worker in the company.

Moreover, I'm not sure you could make a compelling argument that he has ever been at any point in his career. Pre-injury he was probably top five, although to be fair a lot of super talented wrestlers have signed with WWE since then.

[Dominator83]

Seth Rollins is definitely not the best worker in WWE. Saw that posted on the previous page and I just don't see it. He's not better than Styles, or Ricochet, or Cesaro, or half a dozen other guys, if not more.

If you include NXT Rollins might not even make the top fifteen. He's nowhere near as good as Gargano or Ciampa. He doesn't have the presence of Dream or Cole. He's not as technically sound as the rest of Undisputed Era. I would take Riddle over him too, and probably several other guys too.

I'm not even sure Seth is the best worker in his personal relationship at this point.

When you combine in-ring with on the Mic, hes better than a lot of guys you listed.

[LLJ]

Seth Rollins is definitely not the best worker in WWE. Saw that posted on the previous page and I just don't see it. He's not better than Styles, or Ricochet, or Cesaro, or half a dozen other guys, if not more.

If you include NXT Rollins might not even make the top fifteen. He's nowhere near as good as Gargano or Ciampa. He doesn't have the presence of Dream or Cole. He's not as technically sound as the rest of Undisputed Era. I would take Riddle over him too, and probably several other guys too.

I'm not even sure Seth is the best worker in his personal relationship at this point.

When you combine in-ring with on the Mic, hes better than a lot of guys you listed.

Seth is athletic but his psychology is behind a bunch of other people in the company still. His selling is kind of strange. He tends to go for big moves before he builds up to them. Like he would do some big awesome looking move and it would be a 1.5 count in the middle of the match before it even starts moving to its climax.

Anyway, the WWE is so overproduced that I don't even know if I can blame him for it. All I know is that his big matches don't always pan out as you'd hope.

On the mic he's not great, but adequate. Better as a heel, maybe much better. His nerdy thin voice does make him sound less cool than he should.

[Scott Hall]

I don't know if you were a fan in the 80's or 90's but did you have a problem with Sting and Flair basically being in
every main event for WCW? until the nWo got there they were altering main events. Did you have a problem with
Hogan maineventing this first 8 of 9 WM's? Did you have a problem with Bret Hart basically being the main event guy
from late 1992 to 1997?

There's a difference between being a "main event guy" and being in a title match in every PPV. Bret Hart spent LONG periods feuding with the likes of Doink, Owen, Bob Backlund, Issac Yankem, etc during this period. He was also out for a large part of 1996, almost half a year.

With Charlotte, pretty much every PPV she appears in, with few exceptions, is a title match or the biggest women's match on the card. That's oversaturation.

I disagree somewhat with Austin's contention that he could have main evented with Hogan. I mean, yes, he still could have, I agree with that. But if you watched '02 you could tell that they were moving off Austin and his star was already on the decline at the time. They were downgrading him at this point, and if you listen to a lot of Austin's regrets, the majority of it came when his star was on the decline with Vince.

What was Charlottes reign of terror 2016-2018? outside of WM this year has she been in any tittle matches?

To me I never got to that point where I was sick of her when you get older a year seems to fly by so quickly so
2 years is nothing. She was the MVP of the Womens Revolution having better matches then a lot of men and
getting the job done at the biggest PPVs. I don't know how else you book her you have a prime Charlotte Flair
carrying the division putting on great matches but lets take her off the card and have her in catering to push
some lackluster talent for more variety.

Not only is the division super shallow but they've had a lot of injuries Nikki Bella retired, Tamina is constantly injured,
Alex Bliss having concussion problems, Nia Jax knee surgery, Ruby Riott out with a long term injury, Mickie James
needing surgery, Paige having career ending surgery. Then other factors like Sasha Banks supposedly being a backstage
headcase, Naomi taking time off because of Usos DUI shenanigans, Rousey not being fully committed.

When they had the NXT callups last year with Nikki Cross, Lars Sullivan, EC3 etc I felt Nikki had the best chance to
succeed because of how shallow the womens division is.

The big problem is that there is no midcard in the women's division, and the WWE knows it. If there were an actual midcard. Charlotte would spend more time there than 1 to 2 months (I love how people use Charlotte taking a break for a month or two as proof that she's out of the title picture sometimes). They are so scared to death of Charlotte falling out of relevance for more than 3 months that they even manufacture a match for her at SummerSlam that was hyped and promoted more than the 2 actual women's title matches.

Using Austin as an example again--in '99 he was the top guy in the company. By '02 he was in the midcard of Wrestlemania 18 battling Scott Hall in a barely hyped match while Hogan and Rock were main eventing. Contrast that to Roman main eventing 4 years in a row, or Charlotte in every big women's title match at Wrestlemania for 4 straight years, and you have just oversaturation of the same faces

In some ways with Charlotte she's even more overexposed because Roman didn't always go for the Universal title in every PPV. Since Wrestlemania 34, Charlotte has been in something like 7 or 8 title matches in 12 months, many of them for the same title.

edit: wait, my bad, Triple H main evented Wrestlemania 18, which further proved my original point lol.

Austin was given the option to have the match with Hogan at WM first he turned it down because Hogan was 48.5 years
old and thought it would be a train wreck so they gave it to the Rock and they ended up having one of the most legendary
matches of all-time. Austin has regretted this plenty of times even as recently as last month when he did the podcast
with Hogan and told him his mind wasn't in the right place.

I don't know if you were a fan in the 80's or 90's but did you have a problem with Sting and Flair basically being in
every main event for WCW? until the nWo got there they were altering main events. Did you have a problem with
Hogan maineventing this first 8 of 9 WM's? Did you have a problem with Bret Hart basically being the main event guy
from late 1992 to 1997?

I think a big problem now is just too much oversaturation in general. Like back then pre-nWo, the show's were just 1 hour a week and nobody was featured every single week. Nowadays everybody is featured every single week which shortens their shelf life of freshness. We're about to see this problem with NXT as they're about to lose their "less is more " quality. I noticed that all the marks were even starting to **** on Rollins, and he's the best worker in the company. Fans these days are short attention span and impatient and will get sick of anything, especially when they see everybody 5 times a month instead of 2.

Sometimes I wonder if NXT is doing the less is more approach to much... Like I think Kushida has had like 5 televised
matches since he debuted with NXT. I just saw Kona Reaves has a match this week and I haven't seen him in months.
I was intrigued by the Damian Priest vignettes and then he has a match and disappears for 3 weeks to a month then
has a match then disappears again for 3 weeks. Same thing goes for Keith Lee I forgot he was on the roster for awhile.
Aliyah and Vanessa Borne only show up every 3 or 4 months or so. I'm actually looking forward to more continuity with
NXT now that its gonna be 2 hours.

[jakecronus8]

Funny that besides Styles, I don’t see any future world champions of all those alleged better workers listed.

[tugs]

I'll go out on a limb and say EC3 "could" be better.

[Dominator83]

I'll go out on a limb and say EC3 "could" be better.

Its criminal the way they've buried him. You would think that if Heyman actually does have control of the RAW booking, that he would start giving a guy like that a push. Even Vince you would think would like him. Yea i know he likes to make other companies stars look like dogcrap on WWE tv, but still. TNA was never anywhere near WCWs level as a competitor, plus he has the look and build that Mcmahon wets himself over

[iMoreland]

Raw in MSG tonight, something big has to happen right? Wyatt attacking Austin?

[jakecronus8]

Austin really is the GOAT. Everyone involved in that opening segment plus the War Raiders and Cedric got so much of a rub just from Austin toasting beers with them.

[tugs]

Wondering how Rey got from ripped during RR to flabby in a span of 1 year.

Injuries?

[Scott Hall]

Austin really is the GOAT. Everyone involved in that opening segment plus the War Raiders and Cedric got so much of a rub just from Austin toasting beers with them.

I think the one area that really hurts Austin for GOAT consideration is lack of high quality or famous big money
matches. Guys like Bret, HBK, Hogan, Angle and others have him beat in this area.

[Stanford]

I think the one area that really hurts Austin for GOAT consideration is lack of high quality or famous big money
matches. Guys like Bret, HBK, Hogan, Angle and others have him beat in this area.

Those who have read this board for a while probably know that I reject this argument. I think I've been pretty vocal about Austin's match resume. He's hurt by a couple things, for sure:

- Longevity: from start to finish, he only had a 13 year career as a pro wrestler. In contrast, Bret, HBK, Hogan and Angle all have 20+ years of matches to draw from.
- Era: I agree that Hogan has a lot of famous big money matches (of dubious quality) on his resume, but he had the benefit of having every big show (of which there were fewer) booked around him for a solid 6 years. The Attitude Era moved at a faster pace, with more emphasis on getting people to watch the next week's TV than building around big matches. I argue that Austin has an incredible resume of matches that just fly under the radar because they're weren't seen as historic moments.
-The perception that there were two disparate Austins (true): the wrestler and the brawler. That separation often leads people to believe that Austin was a poor wrestler after the neck injury. I argue that he was a better wrestler after the injury, but think that the two eras should be considered together when thinking about Austin's resume.

[Scott Hall]

I think the one area that really hurts Austin for GOAT consideration is lack of high quality or famous big money
matches. Guys like Bret, HBK, Hogan, Angle and others have him beat in this area.

Those who have read this board for a while probably know that I reject this argument. I think I've been pretty vocal about Austin's match resume. He's hurt by a couple things, for sure:

- Longevity: from start to finish, he only had a 13 year career as a pro wrestler. In contrast, Bret, HBK, Hogan and Angle all have 20+ years of matches to draw from.
- Era: I agree that Hogan has a lot of famous big money matches (of dubious quality) on his resume, but he had the benefit of having every big show (of which there were fewer) booked around him for a solid 6 years. The Attitude Era moved at a faster pace, with more emphasis on getting people to watch the next week's TV than building around big matches. I argue that Austin has an incredible resume of matches that just fly under the radar because they're weren't seen as historic moments.
-The perception that there were two disparate Austins (true): the wrestler and the brawler. That separation often leads people to believe that Austin was a poor wrestler after the neck injury. I argue that he was a better wrestler after the injury, but think that the two eras should be considered together when thinking about Austin's resume.

Yeah I'm not saying Austin is a bad wrestler at all and it's unfortunate that he was a victim of circumstances he
just doesn't have a lot of bangers on his resume. There's probably only a handful of matches he had that I would
go back and watch but with that said he's got a lot of underrated and forgotten matches. When I think of Austin now
it's more about moments like him Stunning somebody or cutting a promo or driving a beer truck.

[Dominator83]

I think the one area that really hurts Austin for GOAT consideration is lack of high quality or famous big money
matches. Guys like Bret, HBK, Hogan, Angle and others have him beat in this area.

Those who have read this board for a while probably know that I reject this argument. I think I've been pretty vocal about Austin's match resume. He's hurt by a couple things, for sure:

- Longevity: from start to finish, he only had a 13 year career as a pro wrestler. In contrast, Bret, HBK, Hogan and Angle all have 20+ years of matches to draw from.
- Era: I agree that Hogan has a lot of famous big money matches (of dubious quality) on his resume, but he had the benefit of having every big show (of which there were fewer) booked around him for a solid 6 years. The Attitude Era moved at a faster pace, with more emphasis on getting people to watch the next week's TV than building around big matches. I argue that Austin has an incredible resume of matches that just fly under the radar because they're weren't seen as historic moments.
-The perception that there were two disparate Austins (true): the wrestler and the brawler. That separation often leads people to believe that Austin was a poor wrestler after the neck injury. I argue that he was a better wrestler after the injury, but think that the two eras should be considered together when thinking about Austin's resume.

Yeah I'm not saying Austin is a bad wrestler at all and it's unfortunate that he was a victim of circumstances he
just doesn't have a lot of bangers on his resume. There's probably only a handful of matches he had that I would
go back and watch but with that said he's got a lot of underrated and forgotten matches. When I think of Austin now
it's more about moments like him Stunning somebody or cutting a promo or driving a beer truck.

Another thing that didn't work in his favor, was when he initailly won his 1st WWF championship, the list of main event contenders was pretty weak at the time. Like, Rock and HHH was a hot feud and they were mid card for the IC belt, Ken Shamrock was mid card, etc. He was limited to Kane, Taker, Foley to feud with. Austin spent most of his time at the top feuding with the boss.

Now, if you would've had Austin at that time on the WCW roster, damn! Austin defending the belt vs Hogan, vs Sting, vs Flair, vs Bret, vs Savage, vs Nash, and of course, MAJOR money v Goldberg. And many more including possible feuds with guys like Benoit and Jericho (though elevating homegrown guys wasn't really WCWs style lol)

Man would that have been great