Wrestling Rumblings #65
April 30, 2010
By: Jose Marrero of Wrestleview.com
Another week has come and gone in professional wrestling and has left us with some things to discuss this week. Normally I try to grab a topic, dissect it and serve it up to you for your viewing pleasure but this week has left me a bit short on wrestling conversation. Usually I try to think up what I want to write about 2 or 3 days ahead and sort of let things play out in my head but I think I have spent more time this week answering emails from all of you than I have actually thinking out my column. One thing that a lot of people keep asking me about is the future of Dave Batista and how I could see things playing out for Big Dave if he did wind up in TNA…you’re reading “Wrestling Rumblings.”
Well first of all to me the guy isn’t gone until he is absolutely gone. One thing I learn everyday with wrestling is that nothings a done deal until it is and anything is possible, but with that being said I think he is leaving. Will he go to TNA? Again, anything is possible but I would like to think no. TNA can’t offer him the money, opportunity or exposure that being in WWE can offer a guy and while TNA is more flexible towards there stars pursuing other opportunities I think if Batista is going to leave WWE he is going to just focus on Hollywood.
I have had people ask me if I thought Batista could be successful in TNA and well the short answer is yes. The first thing I want to say is that I am building here for a Bound for Glory match and I have Batista coming into TNA in June which means I have 5 months to get him ready for Bound for Glory. If I was in charge of TNA and had Batista coming in the first thing I would make sure to do is not to turn him babyface. He is a great heel and my motto is if its working don’t change it and Batista as a heel is working. The second thing I would do is put my title on him immediately, not because I want to push a WWE guy but because this is one of the top WWE guys and it’s my opinion that you can’t just put a big name like Batista to instantly put someone over. By doing that you don’t really help the guy you are trying to get over much and you sort of kill the guy you just bought into the company. What I would do is bring in Batista as believe it or not AJ Styles back up and have him turn on and take out AJ in a way that makes Batista even more hated as a heel. This accomplishes two things, first of which is take AJ Styles off of TV for a while so that when I bring him back he is a bit fresher and second it legitimizes Dave in the eyes of TNA fans right off the bat.
So we got Batista in TNA, he is the new bad ass heel and while he destroyed AJ he did it in cowardly fashion which only gives his heel character more heat and doesn’t do anything to hurt AJ because well he was blindsided. Now every heel needs a babyface foil and I would instantly have that be RVD, why? Well because after wrestling AJ Styles by several times at this point he has developed a bit of a newfound respect for him. I would make sure to reference the promo RVD cut before he won the title where he stated that AJ didn’t impress him and have him mention how that changed after the battles they had but needless to say he didn’t agree with Dave’s actions and he wants at Dave and because RVD has the title Dave wants at him.
Now I am sure this part will maybe tick some people off but when it comes time for the initial match Dave beats RVD clean in the middle of the ring. Why? Well because I want Dave to really come across as this unstoppable Goliath. Some wrestling fans will argue that in big match situations heels shouldn’t win cleanly to those fans I say that’s BS. If done right a heel can win a match from time to time clean and yet still have heat. How I would book the initial match is to have RVD get color early on and have the announcers play on the fact that as the match goes on RVD is well losing strength due to the loss of blood and really build him up as a guy who fought valiantly through the match and put Dave over and well Dave is your new champion.
Of course after winning the title Dave is going to play the part of the super cocky heel, after all he is the big WWE star and you know what now that I think about it I would literally have his whole gimmick being how he is a star because he was in the other company because well TNA doesn’t make any stars. I don’t normally like it when companies bury themselves in angles but it can be done in this case cause unlike some of the guys who have crossed over to TNA who indirectly bury the company in there promos now Dave is a heel and well heels put things down and in this case Dave’s character is an egomaniac who thinks TNA is beneath him but since he is here he will beat people up, win titles, get girls and stuff of that nature. Of course RVD being the valiant babyface is going to want his rematch and after much maneuvering which can play out over the course of a couple of weeks it will be granted for a PPV.
This time Dave goes over but he doesn’t go over clean, after all he is a heel and while with his first match I wanted him to go over strong his second match out I just want to do my part to get RVD out of the way but not kill RVD off as I am going to need him to make money with other guys on my roster. Actually this would be the perfect time to pair Batista with Ric Flair. I hate to backtrack but maybe I can have it that when Batista took out AJ Styles it upset Flair since that was his protégé and initially him and Dave cut promos respecting each other but disagreeing with things and well eventually Flair has everyone convinced that he is finally going to stand up against Dave and well he screws RVD and he is with Dave. It’s a great marriage since they do have history together with Evolution and a way to go back to that without actually attempting to recreate it, plus I always felt Dave and Ric had great chemistry together on camera.
At this point I have to get RVD out of the way and I can do that by feuding him with another up and comer on the TNA roster Desmond Wolfe, so not only have I given the belt to Batista but I also now have RVD in a feud where he can give the rub to another “TNA Guy” (I know people are going to say he is an ROH guy but let’s face it people know him nationally through TNA). Since I am sort of doing this as I go along I am going to backtrack and say that while this is going on I have Jeff Hardy in a feud with Ken Anderson which will keep him busy for awhile. He is not going to get a run with Dave yet but I want to keep him on ice for one. No Dave’s next victim would be Kurt Angle which would probably be a great program for him to have. Angle would be coming back after taking some time off and be healthy and motivated and well if you can’t have a good match with Kurt Angle you should just retire. Dave would go over on Kurt Angle via interference of Shelton Benjamin. Shelton would have been on my roster for about a month now and would have been cutting the typical white meat babyface promos about just being h ere for the competition because this is the place to be and I might even have him and Angle team up on Impact a week before this match to establish their history and would turn him on Angle at the PPV to start a program with Shelton and Angle.
OK Dave has went through RVD, he has went through Angle by this point Jeff Hardy will have finished his program with Ken Anderson and even though I will probably book Anderson to win the PPV blowoff I will still have Jeff Hardy emerge as a top contender to challenge Batista which would be the first time ever matching of these two. Depending on my mood going into this I might let Anderson in and make it a three way match up but at the moment I am tempted to just keep it a straight up one on one match up. Somehow Dave screws Jeff and comes out with the belt but at the end of the PPV comes the returning babyface AJ Styles. AJ is back for revenge off of the guy who took him out for the past 4 months and he wants to get his title back too. The last image of the PPV should be chickenshit Dave showing fear of the pissed off AJ Styles.
Now this would be the match that I want to give my fans for Bound for Glory and I am hoping that with the past few months with Dave in the company I have had good TV. If that is the case I want to have AJ Styles win a fatal fourway match up with Hardy, Anderson and I’m thinking Desmond Wolfe to really make him look strong and have him earn the match with Dave. Throughout the buildup Dave can cut great promos with Ric Flair about how easily he has dominated TNA, how beneath him the company is, etc. I want to point out that while I have had Dave as the champion and have put him over on 4 straight PPVs at this point I have yet to put him over on PPV against a homegrown TNA star. Why? Because I want Dave to give a TNA guy a rub and well RVD, Jeff Hardy and Kurt Angle are all over and will remain over even after their programs with Dave and will still be in a position to put other homegrown TNA guys over. If Dave comes in and decimates the TNA guys it makes those guys look inferior and well I want those guys to be on equal if not higher footing than the WWE guys. If I bring Dave in and just job him to a TNA guy I just blew an opportunity to make money. This is the best scenario I can think of at this time.
I always hate when TNA or for that matter any company uses real life issues that played out over the internet in storylines and just assumes that most fans are aware of the issues. In this case I am going to tap into some of the comments Dave has made in the past about TNA and AJ Styles without really going into their shoot history. I am going to do this as an acknowledgement to the internet fans that will go gaga for the stuff and also to build more heat than Dave. At this point if you are a TNA fan you should be dying to see Dave get his comeuppance since he has stormed into TNA from enemy territory (WWE) and taken the title and basically had his way with the competition thus far. He’ll call AJ Styles a stuntman and say how he isn’t a star and mention how much he enjoyed taking him out months ago and how much he will enjoy taking him out for good, typical heel stuff. AJ will be the guy who comes in and says how he sat on the couch while this outsider came into TNA a company he helped build and tried to tear down the foundation and not only put the TNA wrestlers down but the TNA fans down as well and come Bound for Glory he is going to show Batista that he is more than a stuntman.
Of course the finish of Bound for Glory has to be AJ Styles playing the part of David overcoming Batista playing the part of Goliath clean in the middle of the ring. I’m really not sure how much of a draw a main event AJ Styles could be but at the same time I have always felt that none of his title runs has the proper build up that you would expect for a babyface champion that is expected to carry the company I feel that with 5 months to build up to a Bound for Glory match this might do the trick. If not I have other options I can go to in the future as while all of this was going on I have done some character work with other stars but at least I got AJ off to a good start and hopefully I can get an extended run out of him that will have fans interested.
Now before readers start roasting me with questions about other wrestlers that I haven’t mentioned in this scenario such as the Pope, Samoa Joe, and others I want people to understand this is a skeleton program at the moment and if I really had the book in TNA I would have plans and ideas for all of those guys which would probably culminate or come close to culminating at Bound for Glory. What are those plans? Well seeing as how this column is nearly at 4 pages and TNA is not paying me to book or come up with ideas for them I will keep those to myself for now. After all if you have something of value you should never give it away for free and I have given enough.
I am going to wrap this column up for this week, if anyone wants to get in touch to ask questions, make comments or if anyone in TNA is reading this and wants to offer me a job (just kidding…maybe) I can be reached at wrestlingrumblings@hotmail.com and well that’s it, next week I will try to do better and until then I am out.