I miss Saturday wrestling programs...

[rising up out of the back seat-nuh 0]

Plus, it'd help to have more of a platform for the cruisers to get iver without anyone gettin their back up.

[Guest justcoz]

Exactly Mr. Slim! The mid card right now blows because of the format. Maybe the FBI vs. Rikishi feud would appeal to someone if we actually saw the FBI leave people laying week in and week out with mic time to promote their upcoming match on Smackdown against Rikishi, Chris Benoit and Rhyno? Let them beat down Dom Denucci or something after their match to the announcers disgustment on Saturday night. Right there, that match on Smackdown, which as it stands right now is just a filler and afterthought to whatever that show's main event is, now the match is more meaningful. The FBI are bullies on Saturday night against the no name guys and an old wwwf guy so people are encouraged to see them get their asses handed to them Thursday night!

 

Sean O'Haire could have been burying opponents weekly right now for 3 months... and still found time to show up on Smackdown to make Dawn Marie flash the audience... he'd be more over right now if he was doing both. And with the present structure, when he does finally wrestle he'll be debuting against someone like John Cena and that isn't to the advantage to either of them at this point. Let's not forget, we have split brand PPV's coming up - intrique for matches is going to have to be built and feuds need to last a bit longer then they currently do.

 

Even guys we can't stand like A Train and Nathan Jones. Look how much better off they'd be if they were in the squash match era? A Train destroying a jobber for 2 minutes is easier on the stomach than that jobber being Tajiri!!! Speaking of Tajiri, a show like this would have allowed something like a Tajiri/Funaki tag team to get some wins and and gain some notoriety before debuting them on Smackdown.

 

Nathan Jones should be tossing around scrubs with the Undertaker keeping a watchful eye on him leading into Wrestlemania when he's in the ring against known talent.

 

I think I've made my point. I could sit here forever booking scenarios. Do I want wrestling to be nothing more than squash matches and expect that to get a 4.0 rating? No. I still think the reason for this last wrestling boom was because old fans, tired of the dumb gimmics and squash matches, heard that all the old guys from the WWF were on the "other" show and there were PPV like main events and undercard matches on free tv every week.

 

However, now I feel that it hurts the business somewhat to give away SO MUCH on their television shows. I think Raw and Smackdown should be 4 or 5 competative matches given decent time. The rest of the 2 hours should be devoted to Confidential-like features (which need to be seen by a larger audience to be effective - right now only wrestling geeks watch the show) and skits/interviews. Why throw Lance Storm vs. RVD on there and give them 3 minutes? With the split PPV's, that's a waste of a potential match.

 

WWE Saturday Night from WWE studios should be the "B" show. It could spotlight the talent which doesn't appear on Smackdown or Raw along with select bigger name talents each week who are there to promote their appearance on the prime time shows - much the way Ric Flair would show up at TBS to promote his main event at The Omni in Atlanta.

 

They are going to need a better B show, not part new material part Raw/Smackdown highlights. And they are going to need to build intrique for certain matches which means keeping names from wrestling each other. So give the indie guys some jobs each week by jobbing them. There is nothing wrong with being a jobber. It didn't damage the development of careers like Mick Foley or Curt Hennig.

 

And people miss studio wrestling!

[Guest El Satanico]

And people miss studio wrestling!

They do? What people?

 

The top midcarders that are worthy of an actual storyline don't NEED a secondary show to shine. WWe has plenty of room on Raw and Smackdown to give the top midcarders storylines if they wanted to. The sad fact is that WWe doesn't care about midcarders enough to give them good storylines that calls for writers thinking up stuff.

 

So even if WWe was perfect and did a good job of using everyone, the secondary shows would be jobber matches featuring low card guys. Yeah that's really something that we'd all rush out to see.

 

Secondary shows or not WWe will still shit on the mid carders and will only give meaningful storylines to a small number of them. The removal of the IC just proofs how little they care about the mid carders.

[Guest justcoz]

Yes, some people miss studio wrestling. Sorry but there are people with opinions on wrestling who don't post on message boards or even log on to the internet. They've never read an Observer or Torch. They work with me and drink at the bar with me. I would personally rather watch guys work in front of a small crowd who is close enough to actually respond to what they are watching in the ring rather than see an arena of 15,000 sit on their hands with piped in crowd noise. Give me a good loud crowd from Center Stage/TBS studios (NWA/WCW), small PA towns (WWF 80's) and Dallas Sportatorium (World Class). Let's not forget the ECW arena. I realize that those days are gone. Raw and Smackdown are consistent good gates for WWE and they want to look like a "sport entertainment phenomenon" from coming from a major sports venue filled to capacity (hey, nobody knows about the black tarp). Still, as far as a B show, I think it would be fitting.

 

El Satanico, I understand what you're saying. The WWE is too screwy right now to even think that they could logically promote the mid carders. That doesn't mean that we can't discuss options as to how they could do it. Those mid carders that are "worth seeing" will still be on Smackdown and Raw in addition to popping up on this proposed Saturday night show to promote their matches on Smackdown or Raw that week. You don't just put low card guys on there - that's pretty much what they do with Velocity and Heat which still pull fair ratings but would benefit from the occassional "name" appearance which is what I'm proposing this show does. The mid carders get extra air time, more opportunites to display what they can do in the ring in matches they dominate where they hit all their signature spots, they get more mic time, etc. And if the storylines for mid carders are just as crappy as they are now then maybe this "show" could compensate? I don't see how it could possibly hurt? It's main purpose is to promote Monday and Thursday night while maintaining it's own entertainment value.

 

And they could always bring the IC Title back...

[Guest tank_abbott]

The mid card won't be helped much if only .6 of the available audience is willing to watch Mid carders battle jobbers

 

Plus mid carders get elevated by beating or nearly beating upper tier talents. No one's going be elevated on the strength of going 174-0 aganist jobbers (Oops that one Gold guy did!)