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Updated Wednesday, August 6, 2008

WWE has re-defined the purpose of Saturday Night's Main Event. Instead of going in with major hype to impress on network TV and show they're truly "mainstream," WWE seems to have given up this line of thinking and is using it as a hype machine for whatever upcoming PPV needs to be sold.

WWE has run only one SNME this year, this past weekend, and it was cut down to just one hour. To show the difference in philosophy, the last SNME before this past week was almost a year ago.

WWE was in the thick of the "Who is McMahon's child?" angle and on the show, Jonathan Coachman said he'd reveal the identity later on. That led to the surprise appearance of Stone Cold Steve Austin. Also on the show, Evander Holyfield boxed Matt Hardy. Two big-name celebrities appeared on the show, which had no effect in the ratings. It's no surprise WWE has pretty much thrown up their hands and given up on the project.

This past week, the three matches we got were a version of a match we'd seen as Raw main event already (Cena & Batista & Cryme Tyme vs. JBL & Rhodes & Dibiase & Kane), Khali in a squash, and Jeff Hardy vs. Edge.

The most-hyped part of this show was Jenny McCarthy's appearance for Generation Rescue. Even then, she didn't interact with any superstars. Perhaps telling was the lack of mention of the show on Raw or Smackdown the previous week. No matches were hyped ahead of time, and if you flipped channels during commercials of those shows, you probably wouldn't even know it was airing that Saturday.

Compare that to WWE's SNME return, in March of 2006. They even went so far as to do old-style openings with soundbites from the main players. It also featured J.R.'s return, Shane McMahon in a street fight, JBL vs. Austin in a beer-drinking contest, and Mick Foley on The Cutting Edge.

Clearly, that episode was put on a much higher pedestal than the latest airing. Not that there's anything wrong with that; most of this past week's show was devoted to Summerslam hype. If a casual WWE fan came across the show, it might have enticed them to buy the PPV. Any hardcore fan who would go to the lengths to tune in to the show on a Saturday night would probably be buying Summerslam anyway.

WWE seems to have conceded that there really isn't an immediate future for them on one of the big network TV channels, at least, in prime-time. That's not necessarily a bad thing; many shows that thrive on cable have not blown away network audiences. I'm sure WWE won't lose much sleep over the ratings.

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Updated Thursday, July 31, 2008

Remember back in the day when announcers were just announcers? They called the match, play-by-play men vilified the heels, color guys ripped the babyfaces and that was that. Announcers were heard, but not often seen. These days though, announcers do everything from wrestle, turn heel, and become General Managers of shows. What exactly is Vince McMahon's fascination with angles built around announcers?

Monday night was a prime example. One announcer defended a former colleague in a match, another announcer was forced into the same match and still another one was named head of Raw. Wouldn't this TV time be better spent getting wrestlers over, rather than the men calling their matches? I understand using Jerry Lawler occasionally. He can still go in the ring, and it's fine when the situation calls for it, like when someone steals his delicious Subway sandwich. But too often it feels like announcers are being forced to play roles they're not comfortable in.

It's not even just being part of an angle; if you're a backstage interviewer, chances are you're going to get ridiculed a lot. This can be traced back to The Rock calling Kevin Kelly "Hermie" and making Jonathon Coachman dance the Charleston. Even now, you have Triple H making fun of Todd Grisham every time Grish goes in for an interview with The Game. WWE tries its hardest to hire broadcasting professionals, but not those in the wrestling industry. Yet if you were a broadcaster, why would you want to be part of a company that regularly treats its announcers like fools?

Perhaps the most egregious announcer angle was the creation of the "new" ECW being based around Joey Styles's disgust with how he was being treated as new lead announcer for Raw. Instead of making Tommy Dreamer, Rob Van Dam, or someone who could use that kind of boost as the catalyst for ECW's comeback, it was Joey Styles. The announcer.

Vince McMahon was an announcer, and he's also the man who knows best what he wants the announcers to get over during the course of the show. In that regard, I have no problem with him being on the headsets backstage, even feeding lines to his announcers. It's when you hear stories of him verbally ripping into Styles, Michael Cole, Coach and others both during the show and afterward that really makes you wonder what Vince's deal is with announcers.

I haven't even touched on Jim Ross. First there was the heel turn when he brought in Razor Ramon and Diesel. Then there's the hundreds times he was replaced and brought back as lead announcer for Raw. And who could forget the inspiring, emotional Raw segment where Vince personally made fun of Ross's serious colon surgery by staging an overly-long, pointless segment where he pulled intimate objects out of a fake JR's ass. You stay classy, Vince.

Whenever they put an announcer in an angle, generally, there's a wrestler who could use that TV time, either in that role or in another, to get himself over. Instead, for some reason, McMahon insists on pushing announcers into the limelight and making them part of the show. Me? I prefer to listen to them on commentary....and that's it.

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Updated Thursday, July 24, 2008

When I watch ECW these days, I hearken back to the latter days of WCW Saturday Night in the late 1990s, early 2000s, before it was ditched by Vince Russo. Those days, Saturday Night was a show that allowed younger guys a chance to wrestle on TV, while also throwing in some veterans in the main event scene. Toward the end, they even had storylines and angles for the younger guys. Jimmy Yang, Braden Walker, and Chuck Palumbo were some of the younger wrestlers featured on the show that later became stars.

For the last few weeks, ECW has been a place to showcase new, young talent. And while it isn't always smooth, it does make for an entertaining show more often than not. It just feels different than the bland old ECWs that WWE was putting out for a while. It's not can't-miss TV, but it is fun if you want to get a look at some of the future WWE superstars.

Like WCW Saturday Night, there are young guys like James Curtis, Colin Delaney, Ricky Ortiz, Braden Walker, Evan Bourne, and Mike Knox, who have a platform to showcase their talents. There are also proven WWE wrestlers to top the card, like Chavo Guerrero, Mark Henry, Tommy Dreamer and Matt Hardy. Getting these guys integrated into storylines will be the next step. We've already seen that with Bourne and Guerrero after Bourne's upset last week and Chavo joining commentary for Evan's match this week. And we got a glimpse at the marketing side of Ortiz this past week, as he pitched ideas to Teddy Long.

It's no secret WWE's developmental program isn't what it used to be. Teaming up with Florida Championship Wrestling, the wrestlers don't get a lot of time in front of live crowds and even the training building wasn't what you'd expect an organization such as WWE to have until it was recently re-launched. ECW gives these guys a low-profile show to work TV matches and get experience in front of big, live crowds. That doesn't mean they need to scrap the developmental program. On the contrary, if they are able to re-work things and get developmental to a respectable point, the wrestlers would ideally be even more polished when coming to ECW.

I think ECW would be even better if you added some underutilized guys from Raw and Smackdown. ECW's roster still relatively dwarfs Raw and Smackdown's, so why not add guys like Paul London (provided he's not part of the Michaels-Jericho storyline), Charlie Haas, Deuce, and DH Smith. They could work with the younger guys too, as well as giving them time they won't get on their respective shows to work on whatever they're lacking, whether it's in-ring work or personality. I'm sure finding a way to get them to ECW wouldn't be difficult.

When I covered those WCW Saturday Night shows for the Torch eight years ago now (holy cow!, that was a long time ago), there were guys on that show you could tell had "it" and were going to be stars. Watching ECW, you may get that feeling with some of the newer wrestlers as well.

Greg Parks publishes his weekly "virtual time" review of Smackdown every Friday night on the Torch main listing. You can also hear him every-other-week in the post-Raw audio show Monday nights in the Torch VIP audio section.

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