RAW 13-4-15

the groutch

Tugboats wrote: »

Do we know who Bray is waffling on about yet? Looks like he will show up at Extreme Rules and cost someone a match?. Orton, Bryan, Ziggler or Reigns?

Braden Walker.

mrkiscool2

Tugboats wrote: »

Do we know who Bray is talking about yet? Looks like he will show up at Extreme Rules and cost someone a match?. Orton, Bryan, Ziggler or Reigns?

FYP

I'm enjoying the whole cryptic messages from Bray. It's a lot more fun than what he used to do (AKA the same promo just worded differently at whoever he was against). And it's nowhere near as obvious as last time. I'm thinking it may be Orton.

Ridley

A Primal Nut wrote: »

Why does everyone want a US-IC unification so bad? That would leave WWE with just two male singles belts on the main roster. When used correctly (as they are right now) they can really help get people over; even the challenger when they lose.

I get it's useful for touring shows but without the brand split, I just want the US title to go away. The world titles merged so the same should happen for the mid-card titles which are presented as having equal worth.

Ideally, having one mid-card title would bring more storylines in rather than the recent trend of having the belt be enough. I do like what They're doing with Cena and Bryan at the minute.

Plus you have Money in the Bank as the next WWE champion title as well. And bring back the King of the Ring tournament!

I'd rather that another belt was brought in with something different about it instead of two fulfilling the same function. Hell, #GiveDivasAChance. I'm not saying bring back the Hardcore title (my favourite belt) but back when the ECW title was supposed to be a third world title I thought They should have always defended it under no DQ rules so it could be presented as requiring a different skillset to attain. The WWE/WH championship could have been all about who's the best wrestler while the ECW belt highlighted endurance or sutin. It wouldn't be a weaponsfest. And it's a shame morewasn;t made out of the 'rule' that only the tag champions could be on different shows during the brand split.

Even with NXT title I can pretend that whenever lower roster WWE guys are competing for it's because they want first crack at the up-and-comers with unpredictable movesets.

So yeah, remove the US championship plz.

A Primal Nut

Tugboats wrote: »

Do we know who Bray is waffling on about yet? Looks like he will show up at Extreme Rules and cost someone a match?. Orton, Bryan, Ziggler or Reigns?

Balor maybe? :P

I know all the Balor speculation is getting out of hand now.

briany

Ridley wrote: »

I get it's useful for touring shows but without the brand split, I just want the US title to go away. The world titles merged so the same should happen for the mid-card titles which are presented as having equal worth.

Ideally, having one mid-card title would bring more storylines in rather than the recent trend of having the belt be enough. I do like what They're doing with Cena and Bryan at the minute.

Plus you have Money in the Bank as the next WWE champion title as well. And bring back the King of the Ring tournament!

I'd rather that another belt was brought in with something different about it instead of two fulfilling the same function. Hell, #GiveDivasAChance. I'm not saying bring back the Hardcore title (my favourite belt) but back when the ECW title was supposed to be a third world title I thought They should have always defended it under no DQ rules so it could be presented as requiring a different skillset to attain. The WWE/WH championship could have been all about who's the best wrestler while the ECW belt highlighted endurance or sutin. It wouldn't be a weaponsfest. And it's a shame morewasn;t made out of the 'rule' that only the tag champions could be on different shows during the brand split.

Even with NXT title I can pretend that whenever lower roster WWE guys are competing for it's because they want first crack at the up-and-comers with unpredictable movesets.

So yeah, remove the US championship plz.

Agreed. One belt needs to go away if they're going to be on both shows. Ideally, you'd have a brand split that the undisputed champion goes back and forth between as no.1 contenders emerge and keep the US and Intercontinental titles as belts committed to either show. That would give real practical meaning to both belts as secondary or primary titles whereas they're both just diluting each other's importance right now.

Also, John Cena's spiel about the US title is hokey. It was created by the NWA at a time when the champion could often be out of the country and they needed a belt that was guaranteed to stay within the States for added interest to cards there. It's nothing to do with standing for the ideals of America. If you're going to have a belt based on ideals, you might as well have the Million Dollar belt. Arguably closer to the ideals of America anyway....

A Primal Nut

The concept of two secondary belts was not created so they could be defended on separate brands. They existed long before the brand split. In 2000 they had 5 men's singles titles and it was great.

Maybe it's just me; but a belt on the line adds something to any match.

If these titles were weak in recent years it wasn't because they were diluting each other; it was because of the booking; the US title was rarely defended and the IC champion lost all the time.

In this current run they aren't diluting each other at all.
Would Cena-Rusev and Barrett-Bryan at Extreme Rules mean as much if there was no belt on the line? Would either one mean more if the one didn't exist? I really don't see how.

Without the US title, Cena's recent run of matches; pretty much the highlight of all the recent RAWs; would have meant nothing.

briany

A Primal Nut wrote: »

The concept of two secondary belts was not created so they could be defended on separate brands. They existed long before the brand split. In 2000 they had 5 men's singles titles and it was great.

Maybe it's just me; but a belt on the line adds something to any match.

If these titles were weak in recent years it wasn't because they were diluting each other; it was because of the booking; the US title was rarely defended and the IC champion lost all the time.

In this current run they aren't diluting each other at all.
Would Cena-Rusev and Barrett-Bryan at Extreme Rules mean as much if there was no belt on the line? Would either one mean more if the one didn't exist? I really don't see how.

Without the US title, Cena's recent run of matches; pretty much the highlight of all the recent RAWs; would have meant nothing.

I always thought that the introduction of the European Title was the beginning of the IC Title's decline, myself. Once that got introduced, the IC Title didn't seem as big of a deal, and slowly but surely it's importance went from regularly being the penultimate match of the PPV to being a prop. The IC champ went from being 'the best of the rest' to another guy in the mix, and that was further exacerbated by the introduction of more titles like the US belt from WCW, the HC belt, the ECW belt and the Light Heavyweight belt.

Another thing I think hurts the importance of secondary belts is their names don't really mean anything. Like, take the US belt - does it mean you're the champion of the US? Well surely the US is part of the world and the World Champion is champion of the world, therefore he's also champion of the US, making the US title redundant. IC belt - same thing. The IC belt used to mean you were the second best guy/second biggest draw on the card, top of the midcard, gatekeeper to the main event for a lot of guys. Outside of that, it's meaning is, again, flimsy at best. Mind you, I always thought Paul Burchill's pirate gimmick would have been great for the IC title, claiming to be the champ of the bit in between continents, i.e. the seven seas.

Maybe the WWE should scrap both and introduce a belt that is more relevant to its actual function and clear statement of what it actually means. It would mean scrapping a lot of history, but sometimes you have to move on.

That said, Cena is doing a good job with the US title, but he's not really elevating it as such. The belt works well with his gimmick of being a sincere all-American, much like the Million Dollar belt worked for Dibiase being a rich scumbag. The belt had no real life beyond Dibiase, though, and it's unlikely that the US title will beyond Cena, either, unless you continuously base all the feuds around it off of some dispute of America or Americanness which would become progressively more cringeworthy as time went on.

Ridley

European title was always tertiary for me (and treated as such when I started watching in 1999). The Hardcore and Light Heavyweight belts were gimmick championships but that isn't a complaint. It's not like I think there are too many championships, just the US belt's days as Smackdown's IC title are long gone and given the choice I'm going to pick a championship with a WWE legacy rather than a WCW one.

I like Cena's open challenges but it's going to end eventually and I think a unification match between US Cena vs IC Bryan at Night of Champions or Summerslam or whatever would be great.