The top dirtsheets stories in the
past month have no doubt been the 30 day suspension of Chris Jericho and the 60
day suspension of Randy Orton. Both were for completely opposite actions. On
May 24th, at a house show (live event which is not taped for tv) in
Brazil, before a match with CM Punk, Chris Jericho held a Brazilian flag,
crumpled it up and kicked it. In Brazil, this is a crime. During the match the authorities
went backstage and demanded that Jericho apologize or he would be arrested when
he returned backstage after the match. A WWE official went out to the ring and
alerted Jericho and the referee about what had happened and Jericho was forced
to apologize in the middle of a match. A few days later, WWE suspended Jericho
for 30 days. Some of the dirtsheets writers have proclaimed several reasons for
the suspension from the WWE did this is because they didn’t want to lose any tv
deals in Brazil to WWE Chairman Vince McMahon’s wife Linda running for Senate
in Connecticut.
I don’t believe Chris Jericho did anything
wrong. On his days off, I don’t think he spends time catching up on the laws
and ordinances of Brazil. He was just trying to get heat (fan hatred) because
that is his job as a heel. I understand WWE had to make him apologize but the
suspension was harsh. Chris Jericho is one of the greatest wrestlers to set
foot in their ring. Even at the age of 41, he is still one of the best in the
ring and on the mic. WWE needs him more then he needs the WWE. Chris takes
breaks from wrestling from time to time. After 9 years in the business, he
signed on with the WWE in 1999 after stints with ECW and WCW. He had successful
6 year run in the WWE which included a WWE Title reign and even a victory over
The Rock and Stone Cold Steve Austin in a 3 way match. In 2005 he chose not to
re-up with the WWE and focus on other things like his bands, acting, hosting
and etc. Two years later he came back and had one of the most successful runs
as a heel I have ever seen and in 2010 he took another leave from the business.
This past January he returned again and has been continuing to show he is one
the best in the world. The WWE needs him more then he needs the WWE. I hope
this doesn’t push him into not signing on when his deal expire this time. Not
only did the WWE punish Y2J, but they punished the fans by not letting Jericho do
his job of entertaining us.
As for
Randy Orton, there is a very different set of circumstances with him. A few
weeks ago WWE announced that they suspended him for testing positive for a
banned substance which is rumored to be dianabol. This was his second violation
of the policy. Randy Orton is one of the top guys in the company. Before this
suspension, the general consensus backstage was that he was the second largest
money draw behind John Cena. I disagree because I believe CM Punk and John Cena
are the biggest draws and they are neck in neck for the top spot. My opinion
aside, he hurt the company and the fans by testing positive once again. He hurt
his peers and the business because now he can’t have a summer feud with anyone
and Smackdown was without a top guy for their house shows the past few weeks
and were headlined by Sheamus. Sheamus is a hell of a wrestler but he is not a
brand carrier. Smackdown house shows already have taken a decline in attendance
with Randy Orton as the top guy and they had to bring CM Punk over from the Raw
to even things out and to house shows to pick up the slack in the summer. There
are even reports that Randy Orton doesn’t really care about his punishment and
this infuriates Vince McMahon and the WWE brass so much that some in the company
are calling for him to be fired. I love Randy and I don’t want to see him gone
but I do agree with what some are saying. You can’t do a big angle with him
because if he tests positive one more time and gets three strikes, they automatically
have to fire him because that it was the policy they implemented states. I am
just really disappointed because Randy Orton is one of my favorites of all-time.
I was really looking forward to seeing him feud with Ziggler and Sheamus. This
could’ve been a summer of epic matches and feuds but he ruined it.
CM Punk’s
workload has went up because of Randy but I am sure he is being paid quite
handsomely so he is not likely to complain about this. A lot of wrestlers have reportedly
been upset with the work schedule lately. In WWE, there are two different
traveling groups, Raw and Smackdown. A typical Raw schedule used to go like
this. House show on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and a live Raw on Monday.
Smackdown was quite similar with house shows on Saturday and Sunday, Raw on
Monday and a Smackdown taping on Tuesday. Now with a lot more schedules
changing, wrestlers sometime appear both on Raw and Smackdown for TV. So that
means some of the wrestlers are working 4-5 days a week combined with driving
from city to city this makes for a tired roster and when international tours a
occur they are really beat because they wrestle for 10-11 days straight. I hope
this doesn’t lead to more wrestlers quitting or taking breaks but however the
wrestling business is a tough one and only having one or two days off is the
norm throughout the history of the company. The wrestlers know what they were
getting into so they should expect it. There are legit wrestlers on
the indys who work for a couple hundred bucks every weekend when you factor in
all the rental car, gas and hotel money. They should consider themselves lucky
that in most cases they are making good money and doing what they love to do.
I have decided to not write about the new NXT in this blog
post but within the next couple of weeks I plan on writing a blog exclusively
about NXT with a review of the new show’s first episode.
No comments:
Post a Comment