Just think about the heartwarming scene, the one followers have been clamoring for. It’s 2 within the afternoon, U.S. time, as hundreds of miles away Cody Rhodes caresses the belt that was launched to WWE a month prior, at a present drenched in blood cash that has an unimaginable wrestling historical past of…Goldberg almost killing an aged Undertaker. Cody, with fireworks going off and in some way with a straight face, will look into the ocean of followers in Saudi Arabia and inform us that his “story is completed!” And each WWE fan might be anticipated to simply associate with the truth that Rhodes’s “journey” actually was a few title that had the gestation time of a cockroach and is definitely the junior to the title he didn’t win at Wrestlemania.
For these of us who aren’t precisely Cody followers, it’s a pleasant picture.
WWE invents a brand new ‘top’ title
In case you didn’t see the information, WWE is inventing a brand new “top” title that would be the highest spot on one in every of their reveals after they reorganize their roster between Raw and Smackdown via a “draft.” The new title’s dwelling will nearly definitely be Raw, as a result of it’s extremely unlikely that Fox goes to simply let Roman Reigns stroll over to Raw, even when he solely reveals up 5 occasions a yr.
Of course, having two prime titles devalues each. Triple H got here out on Monday on Raw to unveil the brand new belt, which seems to be prefer it was caught within the microwave for 20 seconds too lengthy, and in his promo in some way managed to run down each the present title that Reigns has and this new one.
Raw and Smackdown had separate titles for years, after the final model break up in 2016. Reigns united them in Vince McMahon’s final try to make a Reigns-Brock Lesnar match really feel like something apart from his personal private self-importance mission (simply missed!) at Mania 38. Because Reigns lords over the corporate to such a level that he was in a position to get himself a part-time schedule — extra energy to him for that — and nearly by no means appeared on Raw, the Monday night time present felt fairly centerless with out the anchor of a champion to fundamental occasion most weeks.
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This could have been avoided
WWE, as it always does, missed a chance to enhance one of its shows and get people excited about whoever was carrying the belt that Reigns wasn’t. Anyone taking one-half of Reigns’s collection of belts would have felt like a huge star and given the new title luster. It would have felt important because of who it was taken off of.
Instead, WWE has been so focused on making sure that Reigns never loses that they’ve smooshed anyone who ever came up against him into an unrecognizable mess. Now whoever claims this new title will be seen as being given some consolation, something lesser, something that Reigns can’t even be bothered to put at risk.
Simultaneously, as HHH pointed out that Reigns is only part-time now, he made his reign seem like something the company has to deal with instead of one it’s banked pretty much its entire present upon. “Roman isn’t here much, so we have invented…this thing!” If it hurts the company so much that the champion isn’t around to defend the title that they felt the need to make up a new one, then here’s an idea…HAVE HIM LOSE!
Booking themselves into a corner
WWE had multiple chances for someone to take the title off Roman, who then could have lost half of it down the road to get to where they are now, just in a lot better shape. Be it Sami or Cody or KO, there were triggers to be pulled. Maybe I’m the only one who still thinks so, but coming out of the 2022 Royal Rumble there was still an excellent story to tell with Seth Rollins.
But because WWE kept taking the safe road, the easy one, the predictable one, they’re left with two titles that seem definitively trinket-like. One make-believe title to make up for the problem of the other one.
This is what WWE does, try and assuage fans and wrestlers after cocking up the big moment. They had Sami and KO come out on top in a post-match beatdown with the rest of the Bloodline after they whiffed on putting the strap on Sami in Montreal as a make-good to the fans who were so disappointed after being so ravenous for a Zayn win. Then they put the tag titles on the two at Mania as another one, and though it was fulfilling to see the 2 get there, it was nonetheless under what might have, and will have, been.
While I’ll not have purchased it, WWE definitely offered Cody Rhodes as a viable hero at Mania and followers have been definitely consuming it up, after which punted him overboard, and any fan’s potential to truly purchase into this sort of story for a very long time. So once more as a comfort, no less than seemingly, they’ll hand this concoction to him and attempt to let you know it’s simply as significant. Reigns will proceed to hold the opposite one, the one they’ve taken down a peg or two as a result of nobody goes to purchase that they’ll really pump a challenger as much as the purpose of believing he’ll beat Roman, or that they’ll ever pull the set off on doing so. It’s not a lot a title Roman carries now, however a weight. No marvel he solely needs to do it a handful of occasions per yr.
But hey, Cody will get these tears going once more, don’t you are worried.
Follow Sam on Twitter @Felsgate to see which wrestler this week is utilizing him to ahead a storyline.