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.

Number Two Contenders Summer Slam Preview!

Summer Slam is less than 24 hours away, and the Number Two Contenders have you covered.  Doc Manson and The Teacher are here to discuss matches, angles, predictions and more!

The Teacher:  Doc, does it feel to you like this PPV has taken forever to get here?  It seems like these feuds have been building (or in some cases, not building) for months!

Doc Manson: Yeah, the build has been pretty slow for almost the entire card. I’m starting to feel like a broken record, always talking about the same stories and wrestlers. Although, a few of those wrestlers I talk about aren’t even on the SummerSlam card.

T:  I assume you are referring to one of our favorites, Mr. Cesaro, who will be kicking off the card by not wrestling on it.  He and RVD are scheduled to face off in the Pre-Show.  I’d like to say that having two of the better wrestlers in the company going at it before the PPV means that Summer Slam will be stacked with epic encounters top to bottom, but I just think this is more indicative of some of the lack of quality booking for certain talents.

Cesaro has to win, right?  Even if he’s going nowhere.

DM: They can pull the trigger on Cesaro at any time and he will deliver. I don’t think a win or a loss against RVD on the SummerSlam pre-show is going to make much difference in Cesaro’s career.

Guesses on the first match of the night?

The Teacher's Lounge: Fantasy Booking Plan C-Na

In yesterday’s Teacher’s Lounge, I tried to answer the question “Why do we hate John Cena?”  Today, I have a little fun playing booker and come up with a way that instantly makes John Cena more popular with the older WWE crowd, or at the very least, more interesting.

Summer Slam

John Cena and Brock Lesnar are in the middle of an epic battle for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.  Triple H is, as usual, seated at ringside.  Paul Heyman stalks around outside, making faces that rival only William Regal and Vince McMahon for their storytelling ability.

As the match reaches its climax, we see Lesnar kick out of the Attitude Adjustment, while Cena barely manages to escape the F-5.  Michael Cole has let us know we have seen “the turning point” in the match 319 times, JBL continues to laud the skills of these athletes, while Lawler says this is the best match he’s ever seen over and over again.

Lessons from the Network: No Way Out 2003

Historical Context

When WWE acquired both ECW and WCW in the early 2000’s, they were flush with talent from all 3 of the major companies, though in some cases, “talent” is a word I use relatively loosely.  As time went on, the invasion angle faded away and only a handful of stars from Atlanta or Philadelphia remained, having been fully incorporated into WWE storylines.
No Way Out 2003 was the table-setter leading up to Wrestlemania XIX, famous for McMahon vs. Hogan and infamous for the botched shooting star press from Brock Lesnar.

Rather than give you the traditional 5 lessons today, we will instead focus on a single one from this era, using No Way Out 2003 as an example.

Lesson: The Post-Invasion WWE had the greatest collection of wrestling talent ever.