the rankings and stuff are certainly silly... anyone with any attention span can tell they are worth nothing.
a lot of the greatest stuff on the show recently has had nothing to do with rankings and title shots... just story development... feuds... etc....
The parking lot brawl and everything about it was solid. No rankings or belts involved here! Jericho/Cassidy... good! A lot of the Taz/Team Taz stuff, very engaging!
The show is at its best when it's not looking at the belts....
Jasconius on
+1
PwnanObrienHe's right, life sucks.Registered Userregular
Using a more sports like presentation focused on rankings and making wins and losses matter is a tried and tested way to make a better show. CHIKARA's "three wins to challenge for a title" system made every match more dramatic. The G1 is arguably the best example of this every year but you can find similar round robin tournaments as narrative devices in Stardom's 5 STAR GP and even WWE's recent reincarnation of the Cruiserweight Classic.
...they just have to actually do it and right now it's up there with building a better women's division in terms of "surely OP will deliver."
I agree that AEW hasn’t done the best job integrating their ranking system with their storylines, but I don’t agree with the idea that the WWE style of barely caring about the sports framework at all is better.
The problem with the rankings is how they book stuff.
Cody loves old school booking that his dad did and builds stories around that which doesn't really work with records and standings. You could make the rankings work if the records weren't also displayed.
The tag team booking is weird because they keep drawing out the FTR vs Bucks match instead of just doing it already.
I agree that AEW hasn’t done the best job integrating their ranking system with their storylines, but I don’t agree with the idea that the WWE style of barely caring about the sports framework at all is better.
NJPW does a damn good job of it.
Yeah, don't get me wrong - I don't necessarily believe the WWE style is inherently better. But it is internally consistent. NJPW is internally consistent in the opposite direction.
AEW is trying to do both ways at the same time and it comes across poorly. If they stuck with one or the other, it'd work a lot better.
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+4
Andy JoeWe claim the land for the highlord!The AdirondacksRegistered Userregular
If I ever won the lottery and started my own wrestling promotion I would announce at the top of the first show that title matches will be decided based on popularity, with little or no regard for win/loss records.
Kids these days, complaining about successful title defenses...you wanna go back to the Attitude Era, new champions every 1-2 months? Get off my lawn!
I think another problem with this is that the titles they did change quickly are the women’s belt (with no real story) and the TNT belt to give it back to Cody. It makes it feel less natural and focused on defenses and more emphasizing the fakeness and what the bookers care about
Using a more sports like presentation focused on rankings and making wins and losses matter is a tried and tested way to make a better show. CHIKARA's "three wins to challenge for a title" system made every match more dramatic. The G1 is arguably the best example of this every year but you can find similar round robin tournaments as narrative devices in Stardom's 5 STAR GP and even WWE's recent reincarnation of the Cruiserweight Classic.
...they just have to actually do it and right now it's up there with building a better women's division in terms of "surely OP will deliver."
I don't think a lot of people realize how much of their booking NJPW generates from the G1.
Obviously the winner faces the champ at Wrestle Kingdom. Also every loss every champ has is someone who gets a title shot in the shows between the G1 and WK. Its a simple system that provides fresh matches and offers a way to get a popular guy a title shot they might not otherwise deserve.
Mox isn't dropping the world title anytime soon, he is the biggest star in the company and they obviously want him to have a lengthy run. He deserves it, and is exciting, but it is less about the title and more just that Moxley is Moxley.
The Tag Belts are tied up in FTR/Bucks for the foreseeable future, at the expense of the many fantastic tag teams they have. Doubly so following rhe longer than expected Omega/Page run where both men were obviously great in the ring but not A Tag Team like every other team in the division.
The Women's Title basically has no story to it. Shida is just a good wrestler and she wrestles various opponents goodly, thats it. Nor did it really have a story worth mentioning with Riho or Nyla aside from SHE IS LITTLE and SHE IS BIG AND MEAN.
Which leaves the TNT Title which should be swapping hands often. That's the whole appeal of a belt that is defended nearly every episode of Dynamite. A wrestler getting a lengthy run and streak should be treated like A Big Deal. Instead it feels like Cody's vanity belt. The Brodie Lee squash was the most shocking and exciting booking decision they had done in months and to just IMMEDIATELY put it back on Cody shows they really don't get that.
They have a ton of talent and, between Dark and Dynamite, a good amount of air time
They just refuse to have actually exciting stories for these belts.
+8
astrobstrdSo full of mercy...Registered Userregular
Using a more sports like presentation focused on rankings and making wins and losses matter is a tried and tested way to make a better show. CHIKARA's "three wins to challenge for a title" system made every match more dramatic. The G1 is arguably the best example of this every year but you can find similar round robin tournaments as narrative devices in Stardom's 5 STAR GP and even WWE's recent reincarnation of the Cruiserweight Classic.
...they just have to actually do it and right now it's up there with building a better women's division in terms of "surely OP will deliver."
I don't think a lot of people realize how much of their booking NJPW generates from the G1.
Obviously the winner faces the champ at Wrestle Kingdom. Also every loss every champ has is someone who gets a title shot in the shows between the G1 and WK. Its a simple system that provides fresh matches and offers a way to get a popular guy a title shot they might not otherwise deserve.
This is also supposed to be the purpose of The Royal Rumble but WWE seems to think it's meant to anoint the guy they've been pushing for months to have a world title shot. So the whole thing just turns into an hour long groan of "oh for fuck sake stop pretending you're going to do something cool and just give it to the guy all those backstage leaks have said you're going with." I think the last time a new feud was created out of "you eliminated me from the Royal Rumble" Clinton was in office.
I agree that AEW hasn’t done the best job integrating their ranking system with their storylines, but I don’t agree with the idea that the WWE style of barely caring about the sports framework at all is better.
NJPW does a damn good job of it.
New Japan does focus in on a sports framework in the context of its various tournaments, but let's not forget that it was just earlier this year that Hiromu got a shot at the double belts just because he was super upset about EVIL's betrayal.
IMHO the sports-centric-style-for-AEW ship sailed a long time ago when newcomer after newcomer got AEW world title shots right-a-fucking-way. And they keep spitting on it by saying, "Well okay this new guy doesn't have a record yet, so he can't challenge yet. Let's have him punch a jobber really hard. Okay now he's good."
It's basically only ever been used as a crutch to remove The Elite from title contention time and time again, because putting the belts on them would be wrong, apparently.
The worst thing Cody ever did was come back and finish his feud with Brodie Lee like that. He could have handled that literally any other way and it would have been better. Taking back the belt is also a loss, sure, but it's pretty secondary to The Nightmare Family vs Dark Order feud we had cooking, getting kicked over.
I think the biggest problem AEW has going for it now is that they said "Yes" to so many fucking people that they're going to have to start saying "No" and pissing off people who think they're the next big thing or currently are the big thing and nah they suck. But nobody has the heart to do it.
Their women's division needs something and I dunno if it's the booking or the coaching or the talent but I imagine that fixing it starts with firing people.
having only ever seen AEW I don't know enough about wrestling to contextualize it...
but to me Cody retaking the belt from Brodie so quickly is actually fucking mental... it done so tastelessly on every dimension that I thought surely this is Cody doing a joke about himself. But no, not a joke, this is how he is...?
there is definitely a inmates-running-the-asylum feel to it. when you have an unregulated cabal of talented people just hang out in a room and come up with stuff, you're bound to come up with good shit, and they absolutely have... at least 1 in 3 dynamites are *excellent* overall, which seems kinda good to me given real world events
but they could really get to whole next level of excellence. there's a lot of stuff on this show that I crave more of, but it is delivered to me rather inconsistently
0
HawkstoneDon't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things. Somewhere outside of BarstowRegistered Userregular
having only ever seen AEW I don't know enough about wrestling to contextualize it...
but to me Cody retaking the belt from Brodie so quickly is actually fucking mental... it done so tastelessly on every dimension that I thought surely this is Cody doing a joke about himself. But no, not a joke, this is how he is...?
there is definitely a inmates-running-the-asylum feel to it. when you have an unregulated cabal of talented people just hang out in a room and come up with stuff, you're bound to come up with good shit, and they absolutely have... at least 1 in 3 dynamites are *excellent* overall, which seems kinda good to me given real world events
but they could really get to whole next level of excellence. there's a lot of stuff on this show that I crave more of, but it is delivered to me rather inconsistently
I would heartily recommend seeking out context...Tasteless and Mental are corner stones of the wrestling business.
HawkstoneDon't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things. Somewhere outside of BarstowRegistered Userregular
Huh, so all of the New Day is on Smackdown. With the Raw belts and have a match? No mention of a break up. Maybe they are going to try to have their cake and eat it to?
PwnanObrienHe's right, life sucks.Registered Userregular
Man I've got like five hours of G1 content to catch up on before the final so of course I'm going to do that and then fail to keep up with BOTSJ the same way.
Yeah I've got like 4 days of them to catch up on and I may or may not. The matches are really good but it's seriously exhausting to watch that much wrestling at this pace. I may just skip to the rest of Yano's matches and call it good.
I think I'm starting to get why American promotions don't try to emulate this.
I fell behind because of the lack of English commentary.
I just can’t get into the shows as well without it. So having to wait 2 or 3 days to watch each show ended up with me getting spoiled half the time, and losing my enthusiasm.
Falling behind on shows and then being forced to either cherry pick matches, or binge watch an unhealthy amount like a complete cellar goblin is a time honoured tradition of G1 viewing tbh.
For AEW, would it help if they had a promoter/commissioner/CEO character?
Like, you’ve got Nyla/Vickie saying “we want a title shot” and Shida saying “I’ll take on anybody” but nobody in between to say why those 2 aren’t fighting. Might it help if somebody was there to say “Your ranking fell. Get a couple wins and we’ll talk.”
Posts
a lot of the greatest stuff on the show recently has had nothing to do with rankings and title shots... just story development... feuds... etc....
The parking lot brawl and everything about it was solid. No rankings or belts involved here! Jericho/Cassidy... good! A lot of the Taz/Team Taz stuff, very engaging!
The show is at its best when it's not looking at the belts....
...they just have to actually do it and right now it's up there with building a better women's division in terms of "surely OP will deliver."
NJPW does a damn good job of it.
My Let's Play Channel: https://youtube.com/channel/UC2go70QLfwGq-hW4nvUqmog
Cody loves old school booking that his dad did and builds stories around that which doesn't really work with records and standings. You could make the rankings work if the records weren't also displayed.
The tag team booking is weird because they keep drawing out the FTR vs Bucks match instead of just doing it already.
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
Yeah, don't get me wrong - I don't necessarily believe the WWE style is inherently better. But it is internally consistent. NJPW is internally consistent in the opposite direction.
AEW is trying to do both ways at the same time and it comes across poorly. If they stuck with one or the other, it'd work a lot better.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
I’ve heard it works for UFC!
I think another problem with this is that the titles they did change quickly are the women’s belt (with no real story) and the TNT belt to give it back to Cody. It makes it feel less natural and focused on defenses and more emphasizing the fakeness and what the bookers care about
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I don't think a lot of people realize how much of their booking NJPW generates from the G1.
Obviously the winner faces the champ at Wrestle Kingdom. Also every loss every champ has is someone who gets a title shot in the shows between the G1 and WK. Its a simple system that provides fresh matches and offers a way to get a popular guy a title shot they might not otherwise deserve.
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
They have 4 belts
Mox isn't dropping the world title anytime soon, he is the biggest star in the company and they obviously want him to have a lengthy run. He deserves it, and is exciting, but it is less about the title and more just that Moxley is Moxley.
The Tag Belts are tied up in FTR/Bucks for the foreseeable future, at the expense of the many fantastic tag teams they have. Doubly so following rhe longer than expected Omega/Page run where both men were obviously great in the ring but not A Tag Team like every other team in the division.
The Women's Title basically has no story to it. Shida is just a good wrestler and she wrestles various opponents goodly, thats it. Nor did it really have a story worth mentioning with Riho or Nyla aside from SHE IS LITTLE and SHE IS BIG AND MEAN.
Which leaves the TNT Title which should be swapping hands often. That's the whole appeal of a belt that is defended nearly every episode of Dynamite. A wrestler getting a lengthy run and streak should be treated like A Big Deal. Instead it feels like Cody's vanity belt. The Brodie Lee squash was the most shocking and exciting booking decision they had done in months and to just IMMEDIATELY put it back on Cody shows they really don't get that.
They have a ton of talent and, between Dark and Dynamite, a good amount of air time
They just refuse to have actually exciting stories for these belts.
This is also supposed to be the purpose of The Royal Rumble but WWE seems to think it's meant to anoint the guy they've been pushing for months to have a world title shot. So the whole thing just turns into an hour long groan of "oh for fuck sake stop pretending you're going to do something cool and just give it to the guy all those backstage leaks have said you're going with." I think the last time a new feud was created out of "you eliminated me from the Royal Rumble" Clinton was in office.
New Japan does focus in on a sports framework in the context of its various tournaments, but let's not forget that it was just earlier this year that Hiromu got a shot at the double belts just because he was super upset about EVIL's betrayal.
It's basically only ever been used as a crutch to remove The Elite from title contention time and time again, because putting the belts on them would be wrong, apparently.
The worst thing Cody ever did was come back and finish his feud with Brodie Lee like that. He could have handled that literally any other way and it would have been better. Taking back the belt is also a loss, sure, but it's pretty secondary to The Nightmare Family vs Dark Order feud we had cooking, getting kicked over.
I think the biggest problem AEW has going for it now is that they said "Yes" to so many fucking people that they're going to have to start saying "No" and pissing off people who think they're the next big thing or currently are the big thing and nah they suck. But nobody has the heart to do it.
Their women's division needs something and I dunno if it's the booking or the coaching or the talent but I imagine that fixing it starts with firing people.
but to me Cody retaking the belt from Brodie so quickly is actually fucking mental... it done so tastelessly on every dimension that I thought surely this is Cody doing a joke about himself. But no, not a joke, this is how he is...?
there is definitely a inmates-running-the-asylum feel to it. when you have an unregulated cabal of talented people just hang out in a room and come up with stuff, you're bound to come up with good shit, and they absolutely have... at least 1 in 3 dynamites are *excellent* overall, which seems kinda good to me given real world events
but they could really get to whole next level of excellence. there's a lot of stuff on this show that I crave more of, but it is delivered to me rather inconsistently
I would heartily recommend seeking out context...Tasteless and Mental are corner stones of the wrestling business.
Feels a bit unsurprising that the Collective shows ended up being a hot zone for COVID.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
Recaps also mention breakup on the show
edit: also posting this for the Shaneface
Steam
Oh no I am dead now
Steam
I think I'm starting to get why American promotions don't try to emulate this.
I just can’t get into the shows as well without it. So having to wait 2 or 3 days to watch each show ended up with me getting spoiled half the time, and losing my enthusiasm.
My Let's Play Channel: https://youtube.com/channel/UC2go70QLfwGq-hW4nvUqmog
Emily Pratt does a good a good job recapping the shows and recommending matches.
https://www.fanbyte.com/wrestling/njpw-recap-review-g1-climax-30-nights-9-10/
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
Like, you’ve got Nyla/Vickie saying “we want a title shot” and Shida saying “I’ll take on anybody” but nobody in between to say why those 2 aren’t fighting. Might it help if somebody was there to say “Your ranking fell. Get a couple wins and we’ll talk.”
Somebody to be the face of their Ranking System?
Time to form...Knife Club? Blade Club?
Steam: Chagrin LoL: Bonhomie
How great would it be if they kick EVIL out instead.
He betrayed his friends and changed his gear for nothing
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
Them too, but...
Devitt, Styles, Omega, and White have all been figureheads. The actual leader of Bullet Club is and always has been Bad Luck Fale.
White fits the Bullet Club brand way better. He’s such a scumbag and he’s perfect as a figurehead.
Whereas Evil is a bruiser who’s act has actively been hurt by trying to make him the same kind of cheaty asshole as the rest of the Club.
My Let's Play Channel: https://youtube.com/channel/UC2go70QLfwGq-hW4nvUqmog