The Teacher's Lounge: Why You Should be Searching through WWE Network's archives.

My name may be DC Matthews, friends, but I'll always be The Teacher.

It's been quite a long time since I've written something for this particular blog... Even longer since my good friend Doc Manson and I have written something together, which is really what brought me to the "writing about wrestling" dance in the first place.

You hear that, Doc?  I'm calling you out.  Let's do this.

Anywho, onto the column proper.

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Ever since WWE Network became, in many ways, the key to my second (albeit unpaid) career, I've been fighting with the proper way to go about viewing the massive archive of content.  Do I just hunt for the things I know I want to see?  Do I throw it all into a spreadsheet, assign each piece a number then randomly pick a number, thereby deciding what I'm watching?

(Note: I've done that.  Multiple times, in fact.)

Over the last couple months, I decided on a challenge that has, for the moment, given me purpose.  I set out to watch the entirety of the WCW PPV catalog (including Clash of the Champions, which were "special events" and thereby, in my opinion, qualified).

At the moment I write this, I am currently in September of 1990, watching Clash of the Champions 12, aka "Fall Brawl '90".  To be even more specific, Michael "PS" Hayes, with his Confederate Flag war-paint and all, has Tracey Smothers in a reverse chinlock.  That is the image paused on my office television right now, one which, were my wife to see it, would almost certainly require her to roll her eyes and again ask me "Why do you watch these crazy men in diapers?"

As silly as we members of the #NAIWC (the New Age Insider Wrestling Community, in case you are not familiar with the latest lingo) may find that query, its really quite the good question.

Why do many of us feel the need to watch wrestling that may have occurred 20+ years ago, especially when there is so much current content to view?

I've seen a few episodes of Lucha Underground, but in no way am caught up, and I've never. . . EEEVVVEEERRR. . . seen a ROH TV episode, despite assurances that its right up my particular alley of wrestling fandom.  I could be spending my time watching wrestling from 2015, yet here I am watching the Freebirds vs. The (Wild Eyed) Southern Boys.   Why is that?

My answer, as you would expect if you're a fan of my work, is multi-faceted and likely long-winded.  Such is life.

1.  We are drawn to the wrestling we grew up with.

Now this specific answer doesn't work for my current quest, but it does explain why I'm only paying for WWE Network instead of New Japan Pro World or the Ring of Honor membership.  As I've explained many times here on the Interwebz, I'm a child of the WWF, and more broadly, of the PPV era.  I am the same age as Wrestlemania (though since they will no longer be divulging their ages, I guess I won't either) and was born just a few short months before the very first wrestling pay-per-view (that I am aware of), NWA's Starrcade 1983.

This is the world I know, the world I was raised in and the world I choose to remain a part of, at least until I can safely say I've seen everything.  When I can safely say I've seen all the NWA / WCW, ECW and WWE content, then I might consider other sources of wrestling.  Though by then, I hope there's AWA, UWF and other promotions for me to sink my teeth into.

Note:  I'm not saying that I won't be watching other wrestling as it catches my interest, I just likely won't be paying for the privilege to do so.  The $9.99 I fork over to Vince McMahon a month is all you'll get from me.  Now, if someone else wants to pay for my subscriptions. . .

2.  History offers myriad lessons for wrestling fans to learn.

There's a reason one of the many attempts I've had to document these Network journeys was called "Lessons from the Network" - I truly believe that the more wrestling you watch, especially the "old stuff", the deeper appreciation you'll have for the current content.

Case in point - Let's look at the WWE tag division.  I think we can all safely agree that up to the point that Cesaro and Tyson Kidd started revolutionizing things again, tandem wrestling in WWE was abysmal for quite a while.  There's only so many ways we can see the Usos wrestle the Dust Brothers, and I say this as an unabashed uber-fan of Goldust.

Without going too far off on this tangent, here are a couple things the NWA / WCW PPV's have taught me regarding tag team wrestling.

- The deeper the division, the better.   For a long time in the late 80's, there were 2 tag team titles in the NWA.  Yes, that's right, I said 2.   There were the World Tag Team Champions and then you had the United States Champions.  That means the roster was deep enough, duo wise, for there to be multiple contenders for 2 titles.

I'm not saying that's something WWE should do - far from it.  But it pays to have decent depth.  Sorry, Los Matadores, but you don't count.

-  High quality, well-thought out tag team wrestling is a thing of beauty.  Whether it was the Minnesota Wrecking Crew (Arn and Ole Anderson), the aforementioned Freebirds or my good friend MagnumNAI's favorite the Midnight Express, there's nothing quite like watching a well-oiled (don't make it dirty, folks) pair in the ring.

Tag team wrestling can be formulaic at times, but it sure is fun.  Cutting the ring in half so the opponent can't tag their partner, the huge variety of double team moves possible, both legally and illegally, the hot (or sometimes lukewarm) tag to the fresh man on the face team...  When all four men know what they're doing between the ropes, its a sight to see as a wrestling fan.

- Too much of anything is no good.  I've written about BattleBowl before and won't do so again, other than this. . .  We might resent WWE for its lack of tag team development, but at least we're not seeing it shoved down our throats.  Any more than 3 tag matches in a card and I start getting bored, no matter how good the talents are.

Speaking of talents, lets get back to the list.

3.  Discovering (or re-discovering) the talented. . . And the un-talented.

Again, let's use an example from my journey; more specifically, let's look at some of the last cards I've watched, stretching through the summer of 1990.

Tracey Smothers (that guy in the reverse chinlock on my TV screen) is probably best known by. . . Actually, I can't even say that.  I imagine he's essentially unknown to the majority of wrestling fans.  Maybe some guys will remember him as Freddie Joe Floyd from the "Horrible Gimmick Era" of WWF in the early-to-mid 90's, and the ECW faithful will remember him as a Full Blooded Italian for some reason, but Smothers, I've discovered, was an incredibly good wrestling talent.  He and his partner Steve Armstrong, those Southern Boys, have been one of the more exciting teams (or talents, really), I've seen during this expedition.  Armstrong could flat-out fly (I don't know if I've seen a flying bodypress get quite THAT high in the air) and Smothers pretty much had it all.  Seriously, he's a guy that could have been a singles champion in either WCW or WWF, if the gimmick and the stars were aligned just right.

Moving to the other side of the spectrum, let's look at El Gigante, better known as the half-naked Bigfoot, Giant Gonzalez.  I was pleasantly surprised to see how charismatic he was, especially since he seemingly didn't speak English in the few WCW days I've seen, and because his gimmick in WWF was so blatantly terrible.  Now look, he still can't wrestle. . . I mean he REALLY can't wrestle. . . But seeing him smiling and interacting with fans was fun to see.

Brian Pillman in his "Flying Brian" days. . . 'The Z-Man' Tom Zenk. . .Even just enjoying Barry Windham and Tully Blanchard in their primes is worth going back through the archives.  Most of us know the Triple H high knee that is often attributed to Harley Race - You can watch the Great American Bash from 1990 and see a 47 year old Harley Race hit it, and it looks just as good (if not better) than Triple H did in his prime.  Awesome stuff.

OK, last one. . .

4.  Seeing the stars before they were stars.

There was a Clash of Champions. . .Probably number 10. . . That featured the PPV debut of both Cactus Jack and "Mean" Mark Callous, soon to be known as the Undertaker.  25 years ago, yet I still marked out. I just know Steve Austin is going to show up one of these days, and I've been told that this Clash I'm watching will feature the Master Blasters, which will be the debut of Kevin Nash.  I'm literally giddy with anticipation.

Don't even get me started on when Vinnie Vegas shows up.

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OK, so maybe you need to have a certain level of wrestling nerd-dom in order to properly appreciate the WWE Network archive, but I don't care.   If you really and truly are a wrestling fan, there is something for you in the previous PPV's and video vault.

Just explore; you don't have to be as OCD as I am and have a specific mission in mind.  Just close your eyes and click on something - I guarantee something in that show you randomly watch will catch your eye.

Class dismissed.

The Mad Scientist: Daniel Bryan v. Roman Reigns

There can be no surer sign that Daniel Bryan is truly considered a B+ player than his treatment since his return from injury. Although his return to the ring was announced and advertised, the match was scheduled for Smackdown. This begs the question; why would the return of Daniel Bryan, the former World Heavyweight Champion, the champion that never lost his title, the champion that won that honor after beating Triple H, Batista, and Randy Orton all in one night at Wrestlemania XXX - why would the return of the crowd favorite be relegated to the B-show?

The Mad Scientist: Why Everyone is Mad that Roman Reigns Won the 2015 Royal Rumble

I'll be the first to admit that I lack any and all practical experience within the sports entertainment industry. Perhaps then, taking my business acumen into account, it is not a surprise that I find myself baffled by the current state of the WWE. I'm speaking, of course, regarding the creative decisions that resulted in the booking for the 2015 Royal Rumble match. The Road to Wrestlemania is before us, and the main event seems set; Brock Lesnar will defend his WWE World Heavyweight championship against the destined face of the WWE, Roman Reigns.

A lot of wrestling fans were put off by Roman Reigns winning the Royal Rumble, as evidenced by the worldwide #CancelWWENetwork trend that appeared on Twitter. Since the Shield imploded in June 2014, Roman has had only a limited run as a singles wrestler. This was compounded by his emergency hernia surgery on September 20th, which saw him out of in-ring action until December 16th - nearly three months. All told, Roman has had 4 months experience as an active roster singles competitor. I won't downplay his impressive physique and athletic ability, but I suspect that his meteoric rise has done little to prepare him for a title match on the grandest stage of them all.

Royal Rumble 2015 - The Results are In! Your winner...

Survivor Series Preview: Promoting Positivity for a card few are looking forward to...

Much like pimping, limping or shrimping (if you haven’t read the story behind that from one of Mick Foley’s books, you should), promoting positivity isn’t always easy.  Especially in today’s WWE.  When I’m trying to find the bright side in Grumpy Cat, you know its going to be a long week.  

(For the record, I thought The Miz did an excellent job acting alongside a cat.  He made it seem like a bad movie, which is what that was.  Plus, the stunt cat?  Priceless.   #SandowPower)

Looking at this Sunday’s Survivor Series card is also a tricky one to be uber-optimistic about - in fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if many casual fans didn’t even realize that one of WWE’s “Big 4” PPV’s was right around the corner.  I’ll save my thoughts on Survivor Series’ place in history for a later date, but suffice to say, WWE hasn’t done an amazing job building the card.

That doesn’t mean it isn’t without its excitement.  I’m rather looking forward to Sunday night, and in my efforts to Promote Positivity until your stomach hurts, I’ll share my reasons why.

Musing on Survivor Series (Why we won't see any title matches and then card predictions)

wwe.com

This month’s Survivor Series is shaping up to be historic for a variety of ways;  the most important of which has absolutely nothing to do with the potential disappearance of The Authority or any supposed heel or face turns that may or may not occur.

For the first time in almost 10 years, we are likely to have a Pay Per View with absolutely zero title matches.

Using the wonder of ProFightDB, I went back through the last 128 PPV events, searching for the last one that didn’t feature one championship contest.  I had to go back all the way to One Night Stand from 2005 until I found one, and that’s even debatable to use since, as an ECW reunion show, there wouldn’t be any title matches anyway.  I could go back further. . . but that sounds like hard work to me.

How odd is this phenomenon?  There have only been 2 PPV’s in that same time period to only feature a single title defense.  Now, to be fair, the majority of these last 10 years have featured at least 2 (and sometimes 3) brands, so title matches are an expected occurrence for culmination events, as most PPV’s are.  But still, 128 events is a loooooong time.

“Now, DC,” you might be saying to yourselves, “we don’t know for sure that Survivor Series won’t feature a title match.  What makes you think it’s going to happen?”  And as always, dear reader, I’m glad you asked.  I humbly submit my two (yes, only two) reasons for believing we will see no title matches at Survivor Series.

The Teacher's Book: 9 New Tag Teams to save the Division

Let’s face it, folks. . . Tag team wrestling, at least in the WWE, stinks.  As I blogged about in my HIAC recap, there have been 3 sets of tag champs in the last 12 months… Two of those teams are the ones we saw on Sunday (Dust Brothers and Usos) and the other is Mr. Ass and Road Dogg, the New Age Outlaws, who were 50 and 44 years old during their reign.

Let that sink in for a second; Billy Gunn is 50 years old.

We’ve seen a lot of Rhodes and Usos in 2014, mainly because they are really the only teams going.  You can’t (and I won’t) count Slater-Gator and Los Matadores, at least not until they show me they are more than comedy duos, and that’s it.

It’s a shame - tag team wrestling can be some of the most entertaining - the psychology involved with cutting the ring off, isolating a single opponent; the struggle leading up to the hot tag, then the fresh man coming in like a house of fire - just the fact that 4 wrestlers allows for more combinations and ideally more intrigue.

So this is a problem in today’s WWE.  You know what another problem is?  A seemingly non-existent direction for many superstars, particularly the ones on the lower tier, though many established talents are suffering as well.

Putting on my fantasy booker hat, I am setting out to fix both problems at the same time.  I submit to you, dear reader, 9 tag-team possibilities that would revitalize a barren division and flailing gimmicks.  I’ll even go as far as to recommend a tag finisher, since I seem to have match-ending moves on the brain lately.

Raw Response (10/28) - A Standing RKO-vation

The best part of Monday Night RAW took place in the unlikeliest of settings - the opening segment.  Usually reserved for booking main events or “Weekly Authority Parade”, last night’s opener was about as unexpectedly un-WWE as possible, and the cause came from the most unbelievable of sources. . .  One Randall Keith Orton.

This is, if memory serves, the first time I’ll speak about Randy Orton for more than just a few sentences, mainly because over the last decade no single talent has irritated me more, both on a personal and professional level, than The Viper.  Be it the uber-frat boy looks or the seemingly pointless tattoos, the completely juvenile backstage antics or the reportedly disdainful ways he treats fans and the media, Orton has never done anything for me as a wrestler.  In fact, up until a few weeks ago, I never even gave him the credit he may have deserved for being such a naturally gifted in-ring talent - I couldn’t see past the person to appreciate the persona, as it were.

What changed, you may ask?  The introduction of Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose into the main event picture.  While I would normally fast-forward through any Authority promo or Orton match (for instance, I chose to ignore his entire mini-feud with Roman Reigns), with Seth and Dean in the mix, I suddenly had a reason to pay attention.  And I liked what I saw.

This Orton was different from the one I remembered.  This one seemed. . . grown up, even if he was involved in a “sibling rivalry” type feud with Rollins over who was the Authority’s golden boy.  Instead of being the young kid punting legends in order to make a name for himself, Randy now stood as the grizzled veteran, irritated at the new stud taking his spotlight.  But that wasn’t all that was different.   I couldn’t really put my finger on it until recently.  Somebody said something on Twitter that struck me.

Orton cared.

The Teacher Tells About Hell in a Cell.

wwe.com

Hell in a Cell has come and gone, my friends, and while I did not get to see the live Twitter-verse reactions, I can tell that the overall impressions are positive.  As they should be, it was a quality show, which as many who don’t #PromotePositivity as much as I do would say, is a rare thing.  

I had a fractured viewing of it (watched the first hour last night and the remainder between 3:45 and 5:15 this morning), so I’m probably not the best person to judge the overall product.  However, while I did enjoy the vast majority of what I saw, I can’t help but feel like I am wanting more.  In some cases, that’s a positive, but in others, not so much.

Maybe its that I have more questions than answers right now, so for today’s review, here’s what’s in store:

• General impressions on each match
• My favorite moment of each match (for some, this will require a re-viewing)
• A lingering question, which will most likely transition into
• What’s next, both for the talents and the feud itself

We start with the pre-show, where besides Paul Heyman’s deliciously disdainful commentary, the best part was

Mizdow TV

Hell in a Cell Predictions

WWE.com

One of the premiere baseball writers of my generation and fellow New Englander Buster Olney always mocks the fact that, every spring, he is asked to make his predictions for the playoff and World Series teams for the following October.   Being asked to project 6+ months ahead when there are so many variables that can change the fate of a franchise is ludicrous.  For proof, go back and look at how many “experts” accurately predicted a Giants / Royals World Series.  I imagine it’s zero, and that includes those writers who live in either San Francisco or Kansas City.

While we have similar problems in the sport of wrestling (Come on WWE and Kurt Angle, I still believe you can make my ‘Mania 31 main event dreams come true!), we have a much easier time when it comes to making PPV predictions.  To that end, it’s time to gaze 50 or so hours into the future and make my guesses as to the winners and losers for Sunday’s Hell in a Cell extravaganza.  Just for fun, I’ll also add who I believe SHOULD win (which often is different from who I predict WILL), and throw in my assumed match order for good measure.

In fact, let’s go even further, and start with the…

Pre-Show

The Teacher's Lounge: Why the best match of Sunday's PPV WON'T be in a Cell.

Quickly, without thinking, who is the best wrestler in WWE?

Right off the top of your head, who you got?

Time is ticking away, hurry up!  Who is it?

. . .

You picked Ziggler or Cesaro, didn’t you?  I’m willing to bet most of you did.  Oh sure, some of you MAY have said Seth Rollins. . . I bet even a small few of you picked Randy Orton.  And we all know that one guy who said “John Cena”, just to be a jackass…

But if we picked a random sampling of 100 fans and asked them who the best wrestler was - not their favorite, per se, but just the most talented between the ropes, Dolph Ziggler or Antonio Cesaro would be the top names mentioned.

Now, while I could spend quite a few lines bemoaning the lack of solid direction or push that Cesaro, Ziggler or the IC belt itself has received over the last 12 months, this is not what this column is about.  Being The Teacher, I’m all about #PromotingPositivity, so if you don’t mind, I’m about to make a very bold statement of optimism.

Ziggler and Cesaro are going to steal the show this Sunday.

Rapid Reflections (a working title) - Thoughts on the week in wrestling.

Ahhh. . .  Nothing like a random stomach virus mixed with a head cold, resulting in a 13 hour sleep session Friday night to totally screw up your grand blogging plans for the weekend.  However, we here at Number Two Contenders are not long swayed.  Fresh off our “restful” few days away from long-form wrestling writing, let’s ease back in with a new segment, in which we take a look at some of the major stories from this world we love so much and break them down in short, poorly thought out paragraphs.

But before we start, a “quick” aside. . .  As previously mentioned, I’m not just called The Teacher; I play one in real life.  In my class last week I was doing an activity with the youngsters I have been charged with educating.  In said activity, I wrote a paragraph with no capital letters or end punctuation on the board and they had to tell me where to put said grammatical notations.

So I wrote, I displayed, I read it to them, and yet they were finding it difficult to do as I had asked.  As I pondered why, a thought overtook me.

“I write ridiculously long sentences.”

Seriously, go look at that first paragraph I just wrote.  Three sentences, but two of them are mighty lengthy.  In fact, one might easily find a home inside a Faulkner novel.  (Note: I have no idea what Faulkner is credited with penning, except that he wrote very long sentences.)

Anyway, the next day I retaught the lesson with shorter sentences and lo, the children had a much easier time with their task.

Why do I mention this, dear readers?  Well, I’m curious if you have the same troubles or frustrations that my 7 year olds do.  Dost my sentences of depth dismay ye?  Let me know.

Alright, on to the rapid reflections. . . Hey, that’s a good title. . . I might stick with that.

Math Lesson: When it comes to RAW, it's all about Time. . .

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…

Photo from wwe.com

That famous literary phrase does a good job of describing the last two weeks of RAW, doesn’t it? While the October 6th edition of the longest running episodic . . . whatever Michael Cole keeps calling it. . . will likely be remembered for the time Kathie Lee and Hoda made a mockery of our beloved sport, last night’s RAW seemed to make up for it in spades.

In fact, it was easily one of the most popular RAW’s in recent memory . . . If not THE best. . .

So why is that?  What made last night’s show so good?  What, besides the obvious, made the week before’s so bad?  Well, I think I know the answer, and its as simple as 1, 2. . . a 1, 2, 3 ,4!

Last night’s RAW was special for 4 basic and mathematically driven reasons.

I did a little research thanks to the good folks at profightdb.com. I looked at the match times for RAWs for the past 3 months. (before that, some match times are missing. . . Plus, I got tired.)  Here’s what I found...

The Teacher plays a game. "Heel or Not Heel?"

 www.barbershopwindow.com

Gather ‘round, children.  I want to tell you a story.

You see, back in my day, which was called “the early 90’s” by us crazy chilluns, things were different.  I’m not saying they were better. . . I’m just saying they were different.  It was a time before you had all these new-fangled “smart phones”, back when a “tweet” was only a sound that a bird made, you see?   

This was a time where you could buy a gallon of gas for less than two dollars and could go to the movies for $4 or $5, and I’m talking about an evening show!  These were the days when Family Matters, you walked Step by Step to a Full House, and other random 90’s television show references as well!

This was a time when you knew the difference between a face and a heel.

And here you thought we weren’t going to be talking about wrestling.

When I began watching the then-WWF in 1993, you could draw a definite line between the good guys and the bad guys.  It was plain as day.  Bret Hart? The ultimate good guy, always battling the odds and fighting for what was right.  Jerry Lawler?  Totally a villain, what with his insults to the crowd and his demeaning looks.   Now, maybe it was because I was a kid and believe what my elders told me (even if my elders were Bobby Heenan and Randy Savage), but I never had a question in my mind as to who the faces and the heels were.

Flash forward to today.  Look around the WWE - can you really tell the difference anymore?

The Teacher's Lounge: Why WWE really needs Brock Lesnar.

Brock Lesnar is most likely not going to wrestle again until January’s Royal Rumble. In fact, from all reports, he and his advocate Paul Heyman might not even appear on WWE programming until around the holiday season.  Now, depending on who you ask and what time you ask them, this is viewed as both a positive and a negative for the company.  I can see both sides of the argument here, but I lean more towards the Barrett side (Bad News, get it?), though it’s not for the same reason everyone else does.

Truth be told, I don’t think Brock Lesnar is as big of a sales pitch as many other people do.  I don’t think people are tuning into RAW or watching PPV’s to see Lesnar compete.  Right now there are only two reasons people are really watching WWE these days.

But that’s another column.

The #NXT Day: October 9

NXT is in the books for October 9th, and here on The #NXT Day, we have our usual 3 big topics to talk about, which for this week, we’ve made as memes, since let’s face it, memes are in right now, gang.  Let’s get to it.

Oh, Lance Storm, how little we appreciated you when you were on television each week, and how much we miss you now that you’re not.  You have, however, trained some quality wrestlers, and the biggest star of them all (so far) seems to be taking your favorite tag line to heart.

In fact, if last night’s show had a theme, it would be seriousness - we saw a number of top talents competing with a bit more intensity and a bit less frivolity.  

UnInformed Predictions: Looking Ahead at Possible Royal Rumble Participants

For my money, there is no better single PPV concept than the Royal Rumble.  It’s the perfect event for a culture with short attention spans.  Every 60-120 seconds (depending on the year) another superstar enters the mix, leaving a seemingly endless number of possibilities.  There’s always some surprise returns (at least there have been these last few years), some feuds continue while others begin and inevitably Kofi Kingston does something ridiculous, thereby leaving him free to languish in glorified jobber squalor for the next 364 days. . .

Sorry, was I really bitter just then?

Recently it was “officially” announced that this year’s Rumble would feature 40 participants, which I believe is only the second time in history that has happened.  This has only added to the Twit-splosion of predictions, conjectures and fantasy booking as to what’s going to happen, even though we have 3 more PPV’s to go before we get to the ‘start of Wrestlemania season’.

This decision, along with some other nuggets of info I’ve gleaned in the past 24 hours or so, has set my own creative juices flowing.  Therefore, let’s take a look into our collective Crystal Ballz Mahoney and see what the future may hold for our Rumble experience.

By my calculations and creations, there are about 75 possible wrestlers who could be a part of the Royal Rumble.  Let’s break them into groups for easier viewing.

Current WWE Superstars

Musing on the Guy we all Love to Hate. . .

I’m about to type the most polarizing sentence ever. . .

This sentence is going to cause a primal response in a lot of people, and that response is more than likely going to be a negative one.  Now, if you’ve been a follower of my work in the past, this is not necessarily a new thing.  I’ve defended The Miz and Bo Dallas before, and I might just be the biggest Bull Dempsey fan who isn’t a blood relative, so I’m used to people disagreeing with me.  Violently.

However, this sentence is about to take the proverbial cake.

I respect John Cena, and you should, too.

Guest blog: What You're Missing on Thursday Nights.

The Number Two Contenders called, and Josh Petrie answered.  Josh, the owner of a separate and arguably far superior blog in his own right (realworldchamp.com) engages in some cross-promotion, cluing you in on 15 of the most entertaining minutes of wrestling you're likely not watching each week. 

Thanks for joining us, Josh.  Everybody go check out his amazing work.

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Let me guess: RAW has you down. Cena nuff of this, Cena nuff of that. Seen enough of the

Bellas bickering. Heard enough CM Punk chants to just hit mute — if Michael Cole and JBL

weren’t the last straw already. Not to mention the fact that SmackDown’s even worse most of

the time.

Well, here with Number 2 Contenders, it’s all about #PromotingPositivity. So let’s eliminate the

negative and find a way to accentuate the positive. So how do we do that?

By encouraging you to watch WWE Superstars with me.

*crickets*

“You mean the show with all the RAW replays?”

Bloggers Wanted: Number Two Contenders (May) Want You!

If you’re a fan of Number Two Contenders, and I truly hope you are (otherwise, reading this is very peculiar), you’ve noticed that lately we’ve had a pair of “substitute” contenders join us to share their opinions.  Both Kyle (@RasslinWithLife) and Shannon (@Love2HulkSmash) did an outstanding job with their initial posts here at #2C and I expect that both will be returning to this space sooner rather than later.  In fact, their posts have been so popular and we had such fun having them on board that we’re hungry for more.

To that end. . .

Are you a fan of professional wrestling?  Do you have strong opinions on the subject, both past and present, that you feel needs to be shared with a rather small but growing audience?  Have you ever considered starting a blog but, be it from fear, ignorance or just pure laziness, have never gotten started?  Are you able to throw a few sentences together without your spell-check going haywire?  

If so, The Number Two Contenders might want you!