411 Fact or Fiction Wrestling: Would Steve Austin’s Return Disappoint?

1. If reports are true and Brock Lesnar is not appearing again for the rest of 2014, the company did en extremely poor job of writing him off of TV at Night of Champions.

Wyatt Beougher: FACT – Of course, to play devil’s advocate here, I doubt that WWE even knew at Hell in a Cell that they weren’t planning on using Brock for the rest of the year, as the rumors going around lately are that Vince is rewriting a vast majority of content more or less on the fly. If that ends up being the truth, there’s a very good chance that they had intended to either give Brock something to do for the rest of the year (which I’m inclined to believe, in conjunction with the report that they restructured Brock’s contract to allow pay-per-appearance for any additional dates the WWE wanted to use him on) or at least give him a proper write-off. It’s too bad the whole Rock appearance was a last-minute thing, or they could’ve had Rocky be the reason Brock decided to take his ball and go home, since he’s one of the rumored opponents for Lesnar at WrestleMania and they do have an established history that Heyman could easily play off of. With both Reigns and Bryan injured though, and Lesnar and Heyman loosely aligned with the Authority, who really could’ve taken Brock out? Cena? That’s the easiest, most predictable option, which is why I’m surprised that the WWE didn’t go through with it, but that really benefits no one in the long run.

Sean Garmer: FACT – Lord, if what we saw at Night of Champions is the last we see of Brock Lesnar in 2014, I am saddened to the core. So, Brock Lesnar is off TV after losing by disqualification to John Cena? How much weaker could he look right now? Had Brock went out strong with another win over Cena, you could easily say he left because there is no one left out there to challenge him. Not to mention, the only thing we have even heard about Lesnar is that he had a problem with Rollins interfering and that’s it. At least make a video with Lesnar explaining why he won’t be on TV or something. I don’t have an issue per se’ with Lesnar not defending the belt the rest of this year, because it gives WWE time to build up a credible challenger for Lesnar. Whether it is Ambrose, Reigns, or someone else, WWE should use this time wisely and put the focus on their other belts. However, I don’t trust that WWE will do that. Instead, we will probably just get Ambrose vs. Rollins vs. Cena (maybe Orton or Reigns are inserted to change things up,) but that’s pretty much your main event scene right now. And with Roman Reigns hurt, it is probably going to be the same four guys involved all the way until Royal Rumble. I know there are a lot of people that don’t like the idea of the WWE Champion being off TV for that long, but honestly who’s ready right now to face Brock Lesnar? Other than a heel Randy Orton, Big Show, Mark Henry, or John Cena, I guess maybe you could throw Sheamus in there too, but that’s it. Do we really want to see one of those match-ups for the WWE Championship? Come on now, be honest, you know you don’t. And that’s the truth of the matter here, WWE knows it would be a waste of money just to have matches that either they already did last year, have another rematch with Cena, or wrestle two guys in Orton or Sheamus that the Universe doesn’t care about. I know I went off on a tangent, but I think the only way to judge whether Lesnar being gone is a good idea or not, will be to see if the WWE climate has changed once he does return.

Wyatt Beougher: FACT – Yeah, why not? I love the lucha libre style, and while I’m not wild about such a blatant “evil owner” gimmick that doesn’t involve Steph and Trips, that was a pretty decent little promo video. It introduced the major players, gave you a little bit of background about them, and while Morrison/Mundo namedropping WWE guys was pointless and stupid, everything else looked pretty good. As long as the match quality is decent, I’ll certainly give this show a chance.

Sean Garmer: FACT – I’m excited to see John Morrison on my screen again and check out some of the Luchadors I don’t know. I am not too into the “authority figure” storyline that it seems they are going with for this because it has been sooooo played out at this point. However, I enjoy having more wrestling on my TV and I hope this turns out to be good and interesting. The wrestling world needs more variety and if this takes off, it brings another player into the sports-entertainment realm to at least make WWE pay attention. And why the hell couldn’t WWE do something like this for The Network? But in order for that to even happen, Lucha Underground needs to be a success.

3. While many fans have been anticipating it for years, and he continues to tease it, a Steve Austin in ring return would end up a disappointment.

Wyatt Beougher: FACT – Honestly, I doubt Austin is ever going to wrestle again. It feels like this is his annual tease to get people talking about him possibly coming back for a WrestleMania match and while it’s great for his podcast to keep people talking about, let’s just assume this is actually true and Austin is going to return to the ring. How good will he actually be? He hasn’t actively competed in over a dozen years and, if we’re being honest, he was a shell of his former self even then. I know I’m salivating at the prospect of seeing a fifty-year-old man slooooowwwwwlllly punch someone two dozen times, followed by slooooowwwwwlllly kicking them in the stomach so that he can slooooowwwwwlllly Stunner them. /sarcasm But hey, if they are going to bring Austin back, let him be the guy who wrestles Sting. And if Undertaker can take time off from fun runs and Brazilian jiu jitsu lessons, make it a Triple Threat! That way, they’re not ruining anything with people that I actually want to see in 2014.

Sean Garmer: FICTION – I think it depends on your expectations. If you are expecting that this will be the exact same Stone Cold that left in 2003, you just might be disappointed. If you understand that this will be 2014 or 2015 Steve Austin, and that the storyline leading up to it may not be as epic as those from the Attitude Era then I think him returning will be just fine. Even The Rock, especially in his second match with Cena, was not The Rock we remember. I will want to be surprised and hoping that Austin will be in top form heading into one last match, but I’m not expecting pure greatness either. As long as the build up is interesting and Austin has a good match, while also not breaking anything by the end, I will be happy. Returns are all about how much hype is put behind it and how much of the hype you buy into, it will be the same thing if Austin returns.

SWITCH!

4. The WWE NXT show on the WWE Network is consistently WWE’s best TV product.

Sean Garmer: FACT – I review RAW, TNA, and NXT every week with Gary Vaughan and Paul Leazar on our Wrestling 2 the MAX podcast. And even though TNA hasn’t really had a bad show since May, it still doesn’t trump NXT. And if we are only talking about WWE’s TV product, the question asked is completely correct. Even though it is only one hour a week, you are guaranteed at least one good match, character development, actually good Divas matches, interesting yet simple storylines, and announcers that pay attention to the match that happens in the ring every week on NXT. Sometimes you can’t even get one good match on RAW these days, much less characters that you care about all throughout the three hours that run on Monday nights. It mainly comes down to who is running the shows and the mindset behind them. It is rather evident that a wrestler (HHH) is running NXT because the storylines don’t really get too crazy, the wrestlers are usually battling for a title or the contendership of a title, and everything on the show has a purpose. Just like it is evident a promoter (Vince) runs RAW because he is obsessed with having celebrities, comedy matches, and wasteful segments on TV. If you are really down on the WWE’s TV product, do yourself a favor and go check out NXT. It will completely change your outlook on the future of the company.

Wyatt Beougher: FACT – This is the easiest FACT in my history of participation in Fact or Fiction in any Zone. NXT has everything I want in a wrestling show – characters that I can get invested in who act like real people, storylines that draw from classic wrestling tropes while still feeling fresh, comedy that’s actually funny, and, most of all, good wrestling! Basically, aside from occasionally that last one, NXT is everything that RAW and Smackdown are not. The biggest knock that I’ve seen against NXT in all of the columns that I’ve written about it (and seriously, there have been quite a few) is that sometimes it’s hard to follow, because the same people might not be on the show for two or three weeks at a time. As someone who is utterly burnt out on seeing the same match used eight times in a row to build to a PPV that will featured THE EXACT SAME MATCH, only seeing the Vaudevillains wrestle twice a month is refreshing and actually prevents any act in NXT from getting stale. I’ve said it before, and I’ll reiterate it now – WWE gets my $9.99 a month for NXT and their quarterly Live Specials. The fact that I get the main roster PPVs/Live Specials is just a bonus.

5. WWE is making the right call by adding John Cena into the Seth Rollins vs. Dean Ambrose feud.

Sean Garmer: FICTION – Normally, I am the sort of person that looks at things from a casual fans perspective, but this is one of those instances that I think even the casual fan can tell that Cena sticks out like a sore thumb in this storyline. Some will say, “but Cena is out there giving Ambrose a rub,” yes maybe he is in some instances, but we all know that Cena is out there to get a “cool factor” from being around Dean Ambrose. All that’s left is for Cena to start rapping at Ambrose honestly. The reason people like Ambrose is because he adds an unpredictability to the program, he’s fresh, he’s anti-authority, and he doesn’t care what people think of him in a bad ass sort of way, not in the John Cena way. He has a perfect foil in Rollins, plus they have history with each other from The Shield. I get that John Cena is pissed at Rollins because he cost him the WWE Title, but Ambrose has been battling Rollins for much longer. Having Cena and Ambrose constantly going after Rollins seems almost like I should feel sympathy for Rollins instead of hating him, because once again, no one cares about Randy Orton and Kane at this point. This whole thing reeks of “we don’t know what to do with John Cena, so let’s put him in the hottest storyline we have so that it will be even more popular.”

Wyatt Beougher: FICTION – I honestly can’t understand the logic here – Ambrose vs. Rollins is easily the hottest feud that they have going right now, and it developed based on a classic wrestling trope, something that I just admitted to loving. Rollins turned on Ambrose and Reigns to sell out to the guy they’d been fighting for months, and Ambrose, mentally imbalanced human being that he is, just can’t let that go. He considered Rollins a brother and Rollins’ betrayal set something off inside of him that’s driven him to gain his revenge. When Rollins kayfabe tried to end his life by Curb Stomping him onto some cement blocks, that made an already personal feud all that much more so. Compared to that, what is John Cena’s biggest beef? That Rollins prevented him from possibly, MAYBE winning a title that he’s already held a ridiculous number of times? Yeah, that definitely trumps Ambrose’s issue with Rollins. *eye roll* At least it has given us some good moments, like Ambrose essentially giving Cena the dismissive wanking gesture the past two weeks on RAW (once when Cena was stating his case as to why he deserved to face Rollins more than Ambrose and once when Ambrose pointed out that since Cena left him during a tag match, he was going to Coney Island rather than helping Cena in a handicapped match), or his return with a hot dog cart because he couldn’t just allow Cena a chance to get his hands on Rollins without taking his own opportunity. As I mentioned in this week’s Wrestler of the Week, I’m not quite fully on board the “Ambrose as the next Stone Cold” bandwagon, but I’m getting there, and this would’ve been the equivalent of sticking Hulk Hogan in the Austin/Hart rivalry – it’s just not something that we needed to see. (And yes, I realize that Hogan was in WCW by the time Hart/Austin amped up, but he’s the closest analogue to Cena that I’ve got.)

6. You are looking forward to Sunday’s TNA Bound For Glory PPV.

Sean Garmer: FICTION – Sorry, but I can’t. This feels like a glorified One Night Only special, instead of the biggest PPV of the year for TNA. You only have two titles being defended on the PPV and a lot of the talent that has been a fixture on the shows leading up to BFG aren’t even booked on it. Sure, for the crowd in the arena these Wrestle-1 vs. TNA matches are going to be cool, but for TNA fans and any casuals out there, they won’t care at all. I’ve very much enjoyed TNA since Kurt Angle took over as GM, but I get bored thinking about watching Bound For Glory on Sunday. I like my PPV’s to have matches that mean something and really only two of the matches on the entire card have that. Sure, this could be good from a pure wrestling perspective, but I just don’t have faith that it is going to be anything other than a good PPV with decent to good matches, with maybe the X-Division Title match being the one standout performance.

Wyatt Beougher: FACT – Once I got over my initial disappointment that so much of TNA’s talent was left off of the card (especially guys like the Wolves who could’ve really shone against a Japanese tag team), I took another look at the card (for the 411 Roundtable) and realized that there was still quite a bit to be happy about on it. Sure, it would’ve been nice for more of TNA’s championships to be represented, but if we were only going to get two, I suppose we could do worse than a Havok squash of Velvet and what should be a very good match between Joe, Low Ki, and Kaz Hayashi. Andy Wu/Hijo Del Pantera vs. Kuroshio Jiro/Yusuke Kodama should be a fun little tag match between four young guys to start the show off on a high note, Bobby Lashley’s mouthpiece taking on Lord Tensai’s former sidekick is probably going to be better than the average fan expects going into it, and ECIII’s promotion of his match with Ryoto Hama has been enough to get me excited for the match. I don’t know if he’s going to play up the comedy aspect or be the super-serious ECIII we’ve seen of late in TNA, but either way, I think it’s another match that has the potential to exceed fans’ expectations. I can even understand the ECW nostalgia match, even if it isn’t my cup of tea, as I think it will play tremendously well to the Japanese fans. And while I think that Manik vs. Minoru Tanaka will be a perfectly acceptable wrestling match, I do think it would’ve made sense to make the tag team match a six-man, with Tanaka joining Muta and Tajiri to take on all three members of Storm’s Revolution, but that’s a pretty minor complaint, honestly.