Tradition, respect, integrity, legacy – opportunity. One would think that all of these words go hand in hand and all have a similar, proactive connection. I suggest otherwise. I suggest that wrestling has a dirty secret that they mask with the words that are listed prior to opportunity. As most of my previous articles have done, this one will also look at the problem in wrestling – however, in my view, this is not a problem of the current state of wrestling, it is a perpetual problem that might be too big and too deep to stop.
This is not an issue that can be simply stated, although the basis is something that I’m sure you can grasp right away. I project that the problem with wrestling is this idea that floats around the older wrestlers that one has to “earn” their spot in the locker room. This idea is widened by the notion that younger, or rather new, wrestlers have no right to big pushes, have no right to respect in the locker room, and are basically shit until they have been around for a while.
Let me explain – you see all new wrestlers to a locker room (basically the new talent that is acquired here and there) are viewed by the older people in the locker room as youngsters with no respect. Granted, that might not be the exact mindset of the backstage area, but you will never hear of someone like Brock Lesnar actually making his own storylines and having a large amount of input in what he does like some of the big names. Why is this? Some might argue that it is because he doesn’t know enough or that he doesn’t have an iota of creative control. I disagree. It has become obvious that there is an aura in wrestling locker rooms around the nation that basically states, “You will do as the older guard tells you. Do not fight against their ideas, do not expect to be treated equally – for you are a youngster and you have no respect.”
Before I jump a little further into the deterioration that this causes the locker rooms and how it is killing wrestling slowly but surely, let me give you some examples of what I am talking about. If you can remember back a year or two ago (I don’t remember the exact date myself), there was a flight with some WWE talent on it. I’m not talking about the Flight from Hell that everyone knows very well by now, but rather a year or two ago when The Big Show was reprimanded for buying a first class ticket on the flight. As the story goes, Show was a little late to the airport and quite tired so he got a first class ticket and relaxed on the flight to the next show. Well, when the superstars who were placed in first class (the top tier guys) saw him, they immediately complained to the management who subsequently scolded The Big Show a few days later.
What did The Big Show do wrong? He went against the tradition (that he didn’t know about) of top-tier guys being the only ones who get to ride first class. Why is this a tradition? Who knows – but I can tell you that it makes no sense other than to placate the egos of the guys who main event. Some might say they “earned” their spot in first class. Shit on that – if a man has enough money to sit in first class and he wants to, why should some egomaniac’s desire to be looked at as a ring general stop him from doing so? It shouldn’t.
I wrote about this in my last column – Brock Lesnar recently got a push that involved him having his matches stopped by the referee due to his overwhelming beating of his opponents. This suddenly stopped and it was revealed that some of the older guys in the locker room didn’t like the fact that Lesnar was being made to look unstoppable. So they complained, got their way, and the knock-outs were stopped. Why would they complain that a fellow wrestler is getting a monster push that the fans were getting behind and was increasing his popularity? The ugly head of jealously and respect come forth once again to appease the older wrestlers who now have a living, breathing reason to feel inadequate in the wrestling world. With Lesnar running wild over his opponents, guys like Bradshaw, Undertaker, and Nash now have to show a more domineering force in the ring to make themselves look as dominant as this young stud. Yeah right. They complain and bitch and moan and get their way – stopping Lesnar’s push so they don’t have to perform at a higher level than what they already do.
One more example and then I’ll get back to the issue – how many of you can remember a certain WCW referee that quit after the company was bought by Vince McMahon? I forget his name, but I do remember something about the man being stripped naked and tied up and left in the showers. This was a big controversy that was kept hushed up, but it did leak to some sites and the ultimate cause of the problem was some of the WWE guys wanting to be seen as “rugged, rowdy cowboys” in humiliating this poor referee. Here we see the mentality of some of these locker room “leaders.”
Now that I’ve given a few examples, let me make some statements. There is a general air in wrestling (that any WWE wrestler will admit) that once a new wrestler joins the company he has to “pay his dues.” Why? Simple – you see back when the current top-tier guys and big names were training, they had to ride 180 miles in a car with 12 people to get to a town to wrestle in front of 8 guys a 2 kids, thus all those who are new to the locker room should respect the sacrifices that this older generation made and be humbled upon their entrance. Isn’t the correlation between being new in the locker room and getting no respect obvious? (Note the sarcasm).
The trials and tribulations of the past generations should not be the yoke to bear of the younger up and coming wrestlers. Wrestler A has been a wrestler for 30 years, he’s been up and down those roads from Memphis to Louisville, been a world champion 10 times, is waning in crowd support, and has this “traditional” respect in the locker room. Wrestler B comes into the organization, is a young guy of 24 years of age, has a storied amateur wrestling past, and most importantly the crowd absolutely LOVES him in the ring. Common sense would tell you to push Wrestler B to the moon and maybe even make Wrestler A job to him. Ah, but common sense does not exist in this wrestling world. You see Wrestler B has to “pay his dues” so he does not “piss on this industry” and get a push right off the bat. How should he pay his dues? Well, in the WWE (for example) this would mean fighting in the undercard and getting involved in go nowhere feuds for a few years, thus killing his immediate steam upon entry and ruining his crowd support. I don’t think I need to show any more how this twisted version of “respect” can absolutely kill a character and put a dark cloud over a locker room.
To make it short and sweet, there is an inequality in the backstage area. One cannot expect to be treated the same as their contemporaries unless they have suffered.
A few more points before I finish. If you want to see this in a different light, think of the NBA. When Kobe Bryant was drafted, was he told by the management to make the older guys happy and not to defeat older, more established teams? I somehow doubt it. Was he told that when Michael Jordan made his return, he was supposed to immediately take a backseat in the NBA and not try as hard because Jordan is an “established name?” No again. But when a young guy comes into a wrestling locker room and he has all the steam of a 2002 locomotive pushing him forward, the tracks are taken out from beneath him. He is told to pay the dues, sit third or fourth or fifth string in the line-up, to give respect to those who were there before him. Not once is he told to go out there and give it his all and let the fans continue to rally behind him. And why is he not told this? Simple – wrestling’s dirty secret of “respect and tradition” far outweigh the necessity to act on ability joined with opportunity.
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