Hard Times

 

 So, WrestleMania 39 has come and gone. I, like many, was disappointed that Cody Rhodes did not win the WWE Championship at WrestleMania from our Tribal Chief, Roman Reigns. Unlike some fans that act like petulant children when they don’t get what they want, I was just slightly bummed and not remotely angry. The feeling lasted no longer than an hour tops because I realized the big picture. It’s not over yet!

Cody Rhodes is his own man and shouldn’t always be compared to his father Dusty Rhodes, but it all makes sense. Now, any American Dream fan worth their salt knows about Dusty’s famous “hard times” promo. Some can even recite it word for word. Now it’s all clicking in my head. Cody needs to go through some hard times himself. This could lead to Cody coming out better on the other side for having gone through what’s to come, and will finally be the one to dethrone Roman Reigns, and do it at WrestleMania 40 next year.

When some friends and colleagues brought this up not long after WrestleMania ended, I thought that he did go through hard times, what with his gruesome injury not long after his return and subsequently nine months on the shelf. It was elaborated to me further that although these events were definitely difficult, it just wasn’t enough to drive the storyline along to the ultimate climax that awaits us wrestling fans. He made a huge return after being gone for several years, making a much bigger name for himself, along with being one of the cofounders of AEW. He returned at last year’s WrestleMania and defeated Seth Rollins, continuing a bitter feud with him, along with their last encounter inside Hell In a Cell during which his injury was fully on display. He came back again to win the Royal Rumble at the cushy number 30 spot to secure his ticket to the main event at WrestleMania. To some, this doesn’t sound like he’s been through enough adversity. It took me a minute but now I understand.

Now that this story has presented itself, I am fully on board. I am ready for him to go through hard times. One such thing is Brock Lesnar, who turned on Cody the night after WrestleMania and viciously attacked the American Nightmare. This will come to a head in their upcoming match at Backlash in a few weeks. What a great place to start in a journey of hard times then to go through the Beast Incarnate himself! The question is, who wins? Some say Cody needs the win but at the same time, doesn’t that go against the entire concept of hard times? I have a compromise of sorts. When Brock Lesnar returned after an eight year absence to confront John Cena and fought him at that year’s Backlash only to lose, fans were infuriated! However, people need to remember the circumstance. Cena may have been the technical victor, but did he look like one after Brock annihilated him for most of the match? Cena could barely stand. Cena won the battle but Brock clearly won the war. I suggest that same scenario with Cody. Cody can squeak out a win, but would not look like or even feel like the winner after the match. However, this also depends on Brock’s schedule and we could see Cody flat out lose, only to eventually defeat Brock at another event, bringing to a conclusion one of several “hard times” to come. Even if it’s a one-off and Cody loses, again it’s part of the overall story arch. 

One thing keeps bugging me, though. Maybe it’s paranoia or maybe I’ve seen fans do this too many times, but some fans do tend to turn on the very person they were supporting on a dime. Fans are quite fickle. I bring this up because to get back to the main event of WrestleMania next year, he’d likely have to win the Royal Rumble again. He’s not going to be number 30 again and number one is too predictable. Therein lies the problem! Would fans like this or hate it? Some claim they hate things being too predictable but sometimes it’s okay. Sometimes it makes sense. Like the old line in the Full House theme says, “whatever happened to predictability?” 

I asked some friends about this, worrying about the fans turning on Cody. They assured me and based on seeing the crowds so far, that this won’t necessarily happen and people will still support him. That being said, there are other ways to get to WrestleMania’s main event. Also, at this point, especially if Cody reaches that brass ring again, who in their right mind thinks Roman Reigns won’t still be Champion by then? Back to the point here, there are other ways. There is Money In the Bank, but that also does the opposite of hard times. They could go the Daniel Bryan route and insert him in, but I feel like it needs to focus on just Roman and Cody. Another possibility is that the unified championship will be split again. However, in my opinion, this diminishes the whole thing. Although my opinion is that the Universal Title doesn’t count as a World Title and that the only true one is the WWE Title, I feel like Cody needs to win the Unified Titles. Having him win just one, even if it’s the only one I think matters, is not the right call. Because WWE sees both Championships as legit and equal, it would not be beneficial for Cody, or for Roman for that matter. When someone does finally dethrone the Tribal Chief, it needs to mean something. If you defeat Roman but only did it for one belt instead of both, did you really win? Plus it diminishes the point of having had the Championships unified, especially on the scale it was when it was Roman and Brock making it happen! Many people told Cody to finish his story. Triple H recently said that the story isn’t over yet. Perhaps the story finishes next year!

Similar to the idea of Dusty’s “hard times” promo is another story and perhaps it’s just a coincidence that next year WrestleMania will go down in Philadelphia. Some have claimed they are going the route of Rocky II. In the first Rocky movie, many were surprised that Rocky Balboa lost to Apollo Creed. However, Rocky ultimate gets his win against Apollo in the sequel. It does have similarities to Roman and Cody. Also, since Philadelphia is the City of Brotherly Love, how fitting would it be if Dustin Rhodes was able to celebrate the moment with his brother?

Going back to how Cody gets there, if WWE is apprehensive about Cody winning back to back Rumbles, the winner could go the route of John Cena years ago when he decided to use his Title shot earlier than WrestleMania. This could be a way in for Cody, only the Rumble winner doesn’t get added to make it a Triple Threat, as this is Cody’s story alone. At this point, they could then go with a KofiMania scenario where more obstacles get in his way and it takes him winning the Elimination Chamber to get his Title shot and main event glory. This I believe is the best way to go to get Cody to WrestleMania again with the Chamber win as his last form of hard times before facing Roman Reigns once again.

The Diesel Defense

1995 in the WWF is known as the least profitable year for the company. Therefore, with Diesel the WWF Champion for almost all of that year, he is known as the worst drawing champion in WWF history. However, my opinion is that this is a technicality and that you cannot blame one single person for this. Well, perhaps we can, but it isn’t Diesel, his name is Vince McMahon.

 I always had a problem with the notion that one single wrestler, mainly a World Champion, can be singled out as drawing the most or the least revenue. With the exception of Bruno Sammartino and Hulk Hogan’s runs, I sincerely believe this. So for me, while Diesel’s run may be perceived as the lowest drawing, I’d like to examine why, and I don’t think Dieeel is responsible for any more than 1% of that, and that’s pushing it. As I said, 1995 in general was the least profitable year for the company. So, I wanted to discuss that in more detail as to why this was and why it’s unfair to put this on Diesel’s reign. 

Before I get to things related to this World Title reign, let’s look at the failure that is the year 1995. While Diesel’s reign began in late November, 1994, it wasn’t long after that characters and gimmicks in the company started to get very silly. While you can go back as far as 1993 for the start of this phenomenon, things got exponentially worse and by 1995, it got beyond ridiculous. As for gimmicks, Diesel’s was certainly a shining light among pure crap. Despite not being the best wrestler, he was far from the green performer he was years prior, and you could see his natural charisma really come out, which in a way was a catalyst that led Kevin Nash to his success in WCW. 

Despite this tangent, let me get back to the point. This was truly the time of some of the worst gimmicks and most deserving “WrestleCrap” characters and moments in WWF history. There were a plethora of occupation inspired gimmicks as it seemed everyone had one. We had an evil dentist in Isaac Yankem DDS, a hog farmer in Henry O. Godwinn (get it? Hog?), a garbage man named Duke “The Dumpster” Droese, etc., it was just terrible. Other gimmicks weren’t much better. 

We had the Body Donnas, fitness gurus, which unfortunately overshadowed the in-ring talent of Chris Candido. However, it did lead to a few years of Sunny reaching superstardom. There was Mantaur, a gimmick based on the Greek mythological Minotor, which was already a bad idea on paper, only to be made worse by the fact that the helmet he wore to resemble the creature made it damn near impossible to enter the ring through the ropes. There was a completely uncharismatic “futuristic” tag team called Tekno Team 2000, another team with an awful pun featuring Timothy Well and Steven Dunn as Well Dunn. We had a pirate in Jean-Pierre LaFite, who, much like Chris Candido, overshadowed the talent of one Carl Oulette, who had great success not long before with Jacques Rougaeu as the Quebecers. 

I could go for days naming awful gimmicks so I’ll move on to other idiotic things provided in 1995. There was much more use of these characters over the truly talented and reliable individuals than there should have been. They made Mabel of all people that year’s King of the Ring. There was also the insistence of putting the Undertaker against monster of the month all year. Although, one could look at this as a blessing in disguise as the Undertaker’s injury at the hands of the 500 lb Mabel made management realize that in order for him to get better in the ring, he needed more quality opponents, such as Bret Hart. 

Then of course was making the main event of that year’s WrestleMania, one of it not the worst in history, feature Bam Bam Bigelow with the unenviable task of carrying and putting over NFL legend Lawrence Taylor instead of a World Championship match. While there have been times when a specialty match main eventing over a title match made sense, such as The Rock vs John Cena, for instance, this match was not one of them. 

My next point is made relevant by my statement of too many gimmicks being presented over the truly talented wrestlers on the roster. Diesel was part of the latter. The main players here were Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Owen Hart, the Undertaker, British Bulldog, Razor Ramon, 1-2-3 Kid, and before putting too much weight on, Yokozuna. That’s a fairly elite crew that should have been used more. I’m not going to go into the whole Kliq situation, as although they may have had a lot of influence on Vince McMahon and creative, even they were often overlooked in favor of the ridiculous.

Now we come to the root of this blog, the championship reign of Diesel. After a fantastic 1994, great matches against Razor Ramon, an Intercontinental Title run,  a Tag Team Title run, and a storyline leading to the breakup of Diesel and Shawn Michaels at November’s Survivor Series, Diesel defeated Bob Backlund a few days later to become the WWF Champion. A rocket was strapped to back of Big Daddy Cool and the WWF was now running on Diesel Power. As a boy who turned 15 just days earlier, I was ecstatic. Despite the drawing issue, which kids couldn’t care less about, you have to admit that Diesel was over huge at the time. His first test would be against Bret Hart in January of 1995 at the Royal Rumble. Bret was chosen as the opponent because of the way he lost the WWF Title to Backlund a few nights before Diesel beat Backlund for it, which included an Oscar-level performance by Owen Hart. You’d think we’re off to a good start with an opponent like Bret. On paper yes, but unfortunately this match was marred with interference intended towards both individuals and the match ended in a disqualification. Incidentally, but unrelated, their first encounter 7 months earlier at the 1994 King of the Ring also ended in disqualification. 

The next Title defense came at WrestleMania itself, where he would defend against former friend Shawn Michaels, who had won the Royal Rumble. Again, much like the match with Bret, this looked good on paper, and it was beneficial to put Diesel against skilled workers like Hart and Michaels. This match didn’t do as well as it should have. I think a big part of why is because it didn’t main event the show. As I mentioned earlier, the main event was Bam Bam Bigelow vs Lawrence Taylor. I think this upset the championship match duo and rightfully so. To be overshadowed by a celebrity appearance was a travesty, thus Diesel and Michaels probably didn’t put as much effort into their match. I would have done the same. A majority of that WrestleMania was awful and I think if the Championship match was the main event and ended the show, it might have been looked at in a better light. In the end, Diesel prevailed. 

So, if Diesel was given booking like this against two extremely skilled wrestlers, what chance did he have against ones that weren’t as skilled? The next Title defense for Diesel was at In Your House the next month against Sid. Sid had been Shawn’s bodyguard of late and after Shown loss and subtly blaming him for the loss, Sid turned on him, leading Diesel coming to Shawn’s aid and reconciling with him. With Shawn injured, Diesel had a new challenger but also had revenge on his mind. Don’t get me wrong, because storyline wise this made sense. However, as much as I found Sid entertaining, he wasn’t exactly a ring technician or savvy on the mic. Diesel defeated Sid to retain the WWF Title but the ratings suffered. 

Diesel continued his feud with Sid in the coming months. By this time, Sid was the main guy in Ted DiBiase’s Million Dollar Corporation stable. After Bam Bam Bigelow’s loss to Lawrence Taylor at WrestleMania, he was kicked out of the stable and replaced with Sid. Diesel made the save and befriended the Beast From the East. The next event was the King of the Ring. While Shawn Michaels had recently made his return to participate in the tournament, the main event was Diesel and Bam Bam against Sid and Tatanka. Beyond the match not being very good, I believe a big factor was that the crowd was just deflated after the previous match saw Mabel win the King of the Ring.

In Your House 2 revisited Diesel vs Sid. Nothing different from their last encounter was in this match. This leads into SummerSlam, featuring the worst main event in the event’s history, where Mabel’s King of the Ring win earned him a WWF Title shot against Diesel. Not only was Mabel just not the right guy, he also injured people, Diesel being one of them in this match. No one wanted to see Mabel in a main event, let alone as WWF Champion. The build up to this match actually leads into In Your House 3, in which Diesel would defend against the newly heel British Bulldog, who turned on Diesel out of the blue in their match against Mabel and Mo, known as Men On a Mission, a week before Diesel’s match with Mabel. With the turn, the Bulldog joined up with the Tag Team Champions, his brother-in-law Owen Hart and Yokozuna, under the tutelage of Jim Cornette. 

After Diesel’s successful defense against the British Bulldog, which was definitely a step up from his series with Sid, the WWF tried something they hadn’t done before. Diesel would team up with his pal Shawn Michaels, now Intercontinental Champion, now referred to as Two Dudes With Attitudes, for a shot at the Tag Team Champions Owen Hart and Yokozuna at In Your House 4. However, in this match, Diesel’s WWF Title and Shawn’s Intercontinental Title would also be up for grabs. Again, this was another idea that sounded good on paper. Unfortunately, the failure was because of something no one could control. When the event rolled around, Owen Hart was not at the arena. The British Bulldog stepped in on his behalf to defend the Tag Team Titled with Yokozuna. This also presented the Bulldog with a chance at once again winning the Intercontinental Title or finally winning the WWF Title. As the match was close to ending, Owen made it to the arena and ran down to the ring, ascending to the top rope about to delivered a blow to Diesel. However, Diesel nailed Owen with a punch to the gut, gave him a Power Bomb, and pinned him, causing Diesel and Shawn to become “Two Chaps With Four Straps.” By Raw the next night, they were no longer Champions. Jim Cornette’s legal team contested that since Owen had dropped out of the match, him getting pinned would be meaningless, thus no Title change should count. WWF President Gorilla Monsoon stripped them of the Tag Team Titles. However, the change was still officially in the record books and he would not just hand back the Titles to Owen and Yokozuna, as they had to defeat the Smoking Gunns, the very men they defeated for the Tag Team Titles the first time around at WrestleMania earlier in the year. It become a convoluted mess.

After this came the best match and story of Diesel’s reign as he would once again defend against Bret Hart. However, this would mark the end of Diesel’s reign. Bret defeated Diesel to win the WWF Title in an amazing match. Beyond Bret and Shawn, there were several others that could have given Diesel better quality matches. That would have been better than what happened. Therefore, you cannot blame Diesel at all for being the least successful draw in Championship history. There were too many factors working against him. This is why I call this the Diesel Defense.