One thing that I always try to imply in my articles is that there are certain truths in the business world, social world, and financial world that even permeate the seemingly intangible walls of World Wrestling Entertainment. For an internet journalist this is a hard proposition to sell the masses on because in this online world, the “masses” are generally preteens and teenagers while those who may actually have experience with the ideas I try to convey are rare to find online.
That being said, one of my major focuses over the last few years has been how Jean Paul Levesque (Triple H) is absolutely destroying the future of World Wrestling Entertainment. Not to sound like a fortune-teller, but you can tell by the way he acts during “real” moments on the show, the way he conducts himself during backstage and non-WWE interviews, his comments about other wrestlers – there is something about this guy that many of us in the working world can recognize as bad for business. You know the guy who is like this in your office and you know what a detriment he is to your company’s future…
Of course up until now I’ve really only had anecdotal evidence for my younger readers. I hope to change that now. The other day Rob Van Dam gave an interview to Tim Baines, former Editor of the WCW Magazine and current sportswriter for the Baltimore Sun. I’ve included an excerpt from that interview below in hopes that some of the younger fans will be able to understand Rob Van Dam’s statement of how Levesque is a negative, selfish player in the company. Whether you agree with my assessment or not, I highly suggest reading the interview as there are some great insights into how Vince McMahon viewed the old ECW as well as how Jim Ross tried to hold down some of the high-flyers in the past.
Baines: You just mentioned Triple H. To me, the title program that you had with him in 2002 was sort of a turning point in your WWE career. He said in his promos that you weren’t in his league and the way the program was designed seemed to indicate that as well. What was working with Triple H like for you? Was it contentious at all in the back when you were going over your matches?
Rob Van Dam: It was ingenuine. Just like when he pretends that he cares when he says, “Hey, how’s it going today? OK, good, good.” And he just has that smugness about him where you know when he’s walking away from you that he’s rolling his eyes or something. There’s something about that kind of guy that vibrates at such a different speed than me, that I don’t enjoy being around someone like that. I’m genuine. I don’t say anything about anybody that I won’t say to their face, and somebody that’s the opposite and puts up a big front – basically, that’s how they do it there. That is how you get to the top there. Traditionally, that seems to be the way to go – to stab people in the back, to hold them down after you can’t go up any higher yourself. I was never going to go that way, so I was always happy just making it as far as I could and just looking at it professionally. Going over a match – that’s professionalism, too. When you’re out there in the ring with somebody, you bring what you bring to the table and so do they, and it’s all business beforehand. Now, once you’re out there in the ring, then anything can go, and that’s when it helps to know that you can handle yourself and defend yourself.
To be honest, there’s a lot of matches where you’re so on the edge, you’re just hoping that they catch you really stiff so you can receipt them and nail them one back. I had a lot of matches with Chris Jericho like that. They were great matches, but those were some of the matches when I was adjusting coming in in 2001. Jericho, his politics frustrated me so much that when I’d be in the ring with him, I was pretty sure I was going be busting him open and it was going be a receipt. He was going to give it to me and I was going give it back to him. That’s one way to do business.
Now, will this do anything to change the minds of those who think that they know everything about the backstage world of WWE? Of course not. I only hope that the ingenuine aura that Levesque gives off – and that Rob Van Dam certainly noticed – makes an imprint in some of my younger readers’ minds.
As I said in a previous article, Triple H will kill this “industry.”
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