WWE Roster Breakdown

[cabbageboy 0]

I was just looking at wwe.com at the Raw, SD, and ECW roster pages and I couldn't help but note the guys who are being pushed on the shows, and the guys who are being buried. There are also a few people that are on the fence, as in they may win occasionally but overall are either new, injured, on TV a lot but losing high profile matches with few wins, or treading water. Let's have a look. Note I am considering Matt Hardy as SD since that's where he is listed on their website.

 

Raw:

 

Pushed (8): Jeff Hardy, John Cena, Santino Marella, Shawn Michaels, The Great Khali, HHH (injured but will obviously be pushed), Umaga, Melina.

 

Buried (17): Carlito, Charlie Haas, Chris Masters, Eugene, Jim Duggan, Johnny Nitro, Cryme Tyme, Kenny Dykstra, Ric Flair, The Highlanders, Shelton Benjamin, Super Crazy, Val Venis, Victoria, Viscera.

 

On the Fence (5): Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch (as in tag challengers but mostly buried), Randy Orton (alleged top tier guy but mostly loses...status dubious), Micki James (former women's champ, but mostly losing now), and Candice (hasn't wrestled enough to be a serious contender yet).

 

Smackdown:

 

Pushed (14): Batista, Chris Benoit, Deuce and Domino, Paul London and Brian Kendrick (could be considered on the fence, but they held the belts way too long to be anything but pushed), Edge (new world champ), Finlay, Mark Henry, Matt Hardy, MVP, Ken Kennedy (hurt but was being seriously pushed), Rey Mysterio (hurt too but will be pushed upon return most likely), and Undertaker (hurt but was world champ).

 

Buried (7): Daivari, Funaki, Gregory Helms, Jamie Noble, Scotty 2 Hotty, Shannon Moore, Mike Mizanin. Note that most of these guys are the barely existent cruiser division.

 

On the Fence (10): Ashley (women's challenger but now injured, status iffy), Boogeyman and Kane (treading water vs. Regal/Taylor, no real direction), Regal and Taylor (see previous), Chavo Guerrero (cruiser champ but never on TV, never defends), Jimmy Wang Yang (possible cruiser challenger but who knows), Jillian (on TV but doing a goofy gimmick), Michelle McCool (just returned, iffy right now), Booker T. (hurt right now but it's iffy how much he'll be pushed when he returns).

 

ECW:

 

Pushed (6): Vince (dear god), Bobby Lashley, CM Punk, Elijah Burke, Marcus Cor Von, Gene Snitsky.

 

Buried (9): Balls Mahoney, Hardcore Holly (injured but was essentially buried), Little Guido, Mike Knox (he is still there?), Stevie Richards, ROB VAN DAM, SABU, THE SANDMAN, TOMMY DREAMER (caps lock for extreme cases of burial).

 

On the Fence (4): Kevin Thorn (what does he do from here?), Matt Striker (on TV, loses more than he wins, but not quite buried), Major Bros. (too new to say yet).

 

Is it any wonder that Smackdown is easily the best WWE show at the moment? They actually have talent that is pushed, few people are outright buried and the ones who are fall mostly in the cruiser category (which is unfortunate but that's life in WWE). Right now they have a new world champ with a top challenger, tag champs with a top challenger, US champ with a top challenger, injured guys waiting in the wings that can come back to make the show better than it is now, and so on. I didn't know what to consider the Blue Bloods and Kane/Boogeyman, since that feud is getting TV time but doesn't really seem to be amounting to much.

 

ECW has a list of guys being pushed that's damn near as big as Raw, which is sad if you think about it. Since the ECW Originals aren't likely to be around much longer they are the uber buried guys on the entire list.

 

The really disturbing part of this is the insane level of which guys have been buried on Raw. Of the various guys mentioned only Carlito and Flair could even possibly be considered on the fence, but they lost seemingly every tag match and maybe the winner of their feud could be considered on the fence but as of right now both are seriously buried. Micki and Candice are iffy and thus on the fence, since I can't see either unseating Melina but they are de facto challengers right now. Orton is the curious case since he's all over TV and gets high profile matches, but hardly ever wins and is often made to be a fool.

 

Thoughts?

[UseTheSledgehammerUh 0]

What the hell is your point?

 

Wreslting is pre-determined. Some win and some lose. The losers lose so the guys deemed as winners can make more money.

 

Most of, if not all, the "buried" guys aren't draws or suck, or both.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

"Buried" goes beyond wins and losses. Is the wrestler actively involved in a program or does he just appear in non-advertised matches? Does his character have direction? I think if you were to consider this, time on screen would be the crucial component.

[Scroby 0]

No one is being "buried" on the WWE roster. People use that term to much, espically when they have no clue what it actually means.

[randomguy 0]

Masters has been buried.

[cabbageboy 0]

The main point is to illustrate that Smackdown and even ECW to some degree either have better rosters or are utilizing people better than Raw. For all the talk of Raw being the "A" show, there are a disturbing amount of guys there that have zero direction, have been depushed big time, or really aren't in any sort of compelling storyline.

 

Al, what you mention is in fact what I considered. Most of those Raw guys have no real point being on TV, no storyline, and some of the ones that do (Carlito/Flair) is seemingly designed to make someone look bad. Carlito was a guy who was at least IC champ and at times borderline main event, and now he jobs in nearly every match (with the backstage reasons to go with it, namely his pre WM interview).

 

Raw is a show that's in quite a bit of trouble at the moment. Take a look at that current roster and how unover the vast majority of it is, whether due to guys being actively buried or guys who really aren't any good to begin with, or maybe just stale as hell.

 

I'll admit to being a bit liberal with the usage of buried. To be buried a wrestler has to at least be successful to begin with. Here's the Wikipedia definition of buried in wrestling terms:

 

" In professional wrestling, to bury refers to the worked lowering (relegation) of a popular wrestler's status in the eyes of the fans. The wrestler is set up by the booker to lose popularity, usually by having the wrestler lose one match after another, until he/she is seen by the fans as someone who belonged to the undercard. A wrestler must have attained a significant level of success before having a sudden losing streak to be considered 'buried.'"

 

Personally I'd say that guys like Carlito, Shelton, Nitro...those guys have to some degree been buried. As in they had a certain amount of success but got jobbed repeatedly until they are lucky to make TV. Of course, it's hard to differentiate between being buried and depushed, but that's arguing semantics. I think depushed is more like a guy who sucked but was pushed hard, but at some point the booker realizes he sucks and stops pushing him (Chris Masters).

[AntiLeaf33 0]

Masters has been buried.

 

He WAS being buried. He'll probably be IC champ in a few weeks if the reports are correct.

[MarvinisaLunatic 0]

RVD is the only one thats getting burried for obvious reasons.

[UseTheSledgehammerUh 0]

A true burial happens maybe once or twice a year.

 

Like Ole Anderson burying Tom Zenk, reportedly.

 

Or Jim Herd trying to fuck with Flair.

 

Or Dean Douglas fucked with because of his attitude/Kliq in Vince's ear, reportedly.

 

Or someone (1-2-3 Kid, Razor) on their way to WCW/leaving WWF, so you make them look like a loser to your new stars.

 

Or Kevin Sullivan booking Benoit in endless Dungeon of Doom feuds.

 

You "bury" someone because you hate them and want their career to DIE and hence, have a burial.

 

Just because they say "You know, Greg Helms isn't really making waves on TV with his title reign, let's have him lose most of the time now and try to use his title reign success to make fans think "Hey, Scotty 2 Hotty beat Helms! Scotty's kinda good again!" doesn't mean they're burying Helms. He has just been given a different role, as an "elevator".

[cabbageboy 0]

I wouldn't call the whole Herd/Flair deal a burial of Flair considering he was never really made to look all that bad on TV and in fact never even jobbed the title on his way out.

 

The whole idea of burials in wrestling is more complex than it sounds. Yes, the notion that the booker has to hate a certain wrestler and then jobs him out is the textbook case of burying someone. But how about someone who is basically just languishing on the show and could be doing more? Someone like Johnny Nitro for instance, who as far as we know isn't in bad with the bookers but went from IC champ and involved in a major program (Federline/Cena) to barely making TV and being a jobber. I'd call what is happening to him a burial of sorts, but it goes more along the lines of "We don't have anything for you" rather than "Fuck you, I'm jobbing you out." It's the Innocent Burial.

 

Some guys like RVD...it's so bizarre that it goes beyond a typical burial. We know Johnny Ace hates him now, yet until recently they wanted to sign RVD. So he'd get a fair amount of TV wins, even a WM win, and actually won the blowoff with the New Breed. Yet they won't truly push him or put the ECW title back on him, and whenever facing someone of importance he's inevitably jobbing. Van Dam playing cat and mouse with WWE management has actually kept him from getting totally buried, but they have a few weeks left to do it.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

Serious business!

[randomguy 0]

I said Masters for a couple of reasons. Someone broke the Masterlock, he started losing to everyone, and in skits his character was made to look like a fool. Compare that to 18 months ago where he and Carlito were breaking into the ME scene. It seemed pretty clear that there was a deliberate attempt to make him look bad.

[Kahran Ramsus 0]

Everybody's getting too worked up over the term burial. Regardless of what you think warrants a true burial or not, the point of cabbageboy's post is that Smackdown is making better use of its roster than the other two brands, which quite frankly I agree with and think has been true for some time.

[Hasbeen1 0]

I think underused or in some cases, misused would be better terms, but I think he makes some good points. I still think Cryme Time and the highlanders could be decent heel teams, even if they'd be compared to the Gangstas and Sheepherders, so what. Wait, I forgot, they're teams not singles. Raw is getting unwatchable to me, I didn't even turn it on tonight and I nearly always tape Smackdown and watch it later so I still enjoy wrestling. Just not Raw.

[claydude14 0]

I started a Smackdown! drinking game with some drinking friends a month ago, and now everybody is hooked on the Smackdown! brand. I've tried watching RAW with the same group, and it just doesn't get over the same.

[UseTheSledgehammerUh 0]

Getting drunk on a Friday Night is generally more acceptable than a Monday, which typically has work the next morning.

 

j/k, Raw's batshit awful. Smackdown! is so fun.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

The problem with RAW is that so many guys are just "there" and aren't doing anything, and have had the same character without any change in direction for a long time.

 

Look at Eugene. Aside from the recent head shaving, he's been the same heatless retard for over two years now. He comes out, basically doesn't get any reaction, and loses. But I guess we're supposed to still care about him because he used to team with Jim Duggan, or something.

 

You can make the same case for pretty much everyone in cabbageboy's "Buried" list on RAW.