Thanks to all of you who have started the dilligent task of making this blog become "worldwide"....your efforts will not be forgotten!
BIG NEWS: JOHN CENA INJURED LAST NIGHT! Reports have come from last night RAW event in Wilkes-Barre,Pa that, during his cage match against Wade Barrett, Cena's knee (not sure left or right) was injured, to the point that, after the bout, while speaking on the house mic,he mentioned something to the effect of " I may be taking some time off now, after tonight", and was helped to the dressing room by EMTs.
The effect of this, if the injury is fact serious, could be far reaching, possibly to Wrestlemania & beyond, and doesn't bode particularly well for a company that a) has a serious depth problem on top & b) has few interesting prospects for its biggest show of the year.
There is an inherent problem with injuries in a physical business such as wrestling, but, if the promotion properly pushes & elavates new talent, the issues doesn't need to effect overall business. Example: In 2000, Steve Austin had a variety of serious injuries that took him out of commission for practically the entire year-YET, WWE had its most successful finanical year EVER, riding the coattails of an overall stronger creative process, and building its business around several well groomed & protected talents ( Mick Foley,Undertaker, Triple H, & The Rock most notably)
Fast forward to 2010: Are there 4 top talents who can fill the void created by a long term Cena injury? And lets face it, like him or not, Cena is the face of WWE & is, by a wide margin, its biggest star. Certainly Randy Orton to a certain extent can carry some of the load, but he is prone to injury himself- what if he goes down as well?
The biggest issue, that historically almost every promotion ignores, is that this business is driven by fresh new faces, who, get over to the audience as the "hot new thing", which drives business upward....and the best time to get these future players ready is when your current crop is still drawing- yet, it almost never happens.
The easy fix, of course, is already waiting in the wings: a imminent Triple H return. But, putting the load on HHH is akin to putting a bandaid on a knife wound- staying with the older stars too long only re-enforces the idea that "we have seen all this before"....which is true, of course. And nostalgia only has a certain shelf life...
Wrestling is essentially the same/similiar scenerios being played over & over- the idea is that, if you rotate your top talent every few years, you play out the same or similiar matches & so forth with fresh guys, it draws for you over again..and again.
Think about it- wrestling has been doing lumberjack matches, strap matches, cage matches, etc for years- and, if you examine them somewhat closely, what do you find? Thats right- they are all pretty much the same as the last such match you watched. But what the difference? How hot your talent is when they are put in such matches- THATS what sells tickets, PPV's, and so on.
But when you take the approach that your group is just the pro wrestling equivalent of Ice Capades, and that you basically maintain the same guys as the "Stars", when one of those stars falls injured, you're only kidding yourself to believe that business won't be effected.
WWE has alot of very talented young guys who are the budding future superstars- but, by holding them down & making them look foolish or weak, you not only hurt their chances to break out, but you hurt the promotions chances of them rising to the occasion when the guys above them fall injured.
Just my thoughts.....please share yours!
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