Brock Does What to Cena?
So Brock Lesnar will face John Cena at Night of Champions but I don’t see the outcome of their SummerSlam redux as any different. Why should it? What could John Cena learn in a month that could somehow result in a different outcome?
That’s why I think the same thing happens… Brock over Cena in dominating fashion. It almost feels like a new twist on Tommy Rich and Abdullah the Butcher in Atlanta, Barry Windham and Dick Murdoch in Florida. Cena gets slaughtered again at NOC but shows a little bit of life. Slowly crawls but gets beat down again the next time they meet. Won’t stay down and finally stands up and fights back. Eventually, he has learned enough to carry the fight to Brock and earns the respect of the crowd as well. It’s a wonderful story that keeps the monster strong but remakes Cena as well.
Of course, none of this works because of Brock’s schedule. But Brock destroys Cena at Night of Champions and Cena has to go back to square one. But what I would suggest is Cena takes some time off to get healthy and then heads to NXT for some refocus. For a short time, having Cena on the WWE Network property, NXT, will certainly help the Network.
Show highlights of what Cena’s doing in NXT for October and promo his return to Raw for November (Sweeps Month for ratings).
Bring Cena back to Raw and have him bring some new people to the main roster with him. Doesn’t matter who it is… the Cena stamp of approval can’t hurt. Cena can live vicariously through those new stars and make matches that he’s involved in special again.
Cena needs to take a step back to make one more run. But will they let it happen? Ratings and houses aren’t going to improve until the company takes a step back. But will they let it happen?
Who Are We?
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Listening to “Lithium” on SiriusXM during Labor Day Weekend brought back a lot of memories of my time in the WWE. 90’s Grunge and modern rock echoed through the halls of the TV Studio during the Attitude Era and in my opinion, it helped shape the product that we put on TV. David Sahadi and Chris Chambers came up with the idea of “Raw is War”. Russo gets a lot of credit for the Attitude Era but inside the TV Studio, a lot of talented people drove the runaway train that led to such a ratings success.
Grunge music was all “Attitude” but what is today all about? Selfies? Social Media? No wonder why today’s wrestling lacks an emotional connection to the larger, casual audience. That audience is too busy posing for pictures on their phones to pay attention.
But why is some gaining popularity in an overall time of decline? Wrestling producers need to allow those in tune with today’s society have a voice that isn’t “company controlled”. Social media leaders like Matt Hardy grow their audience and add to their coffers with a genuine point of view. No one tells Matt Hardy what to say. Wrestlers today need to realize that every tweet they send out is either a withdrawal or deposit into their bank accounts.
Post about your dog or your wife? Withdrawal. Engage your audience with creativity and a consistent message? Deposit.
See the point? Many wrestlers today are marks who fall down way too often for no reason. And for less and less pay. Wrestlers today should stop losing money through Social Media. This is the era we are in… not as cool as the Attitude Era for sure. But wrestling survived disco too…
Thoughts? @RealKevinKelly on Twitter.
