By Nathan P Hunt
One of the main criticisms levied by the internet wrestling community and by ‘insider’ fans against the current wrestling landscape, and in particular, at WWE is that too much emphasis and value is placed on merchandise sales rather than actual in-ring ability. For casual fans, of course, or those who are not yet ‘smart’ to the business, this may not be apparent because to them, whoever is on top of the card must be the best. When I was a child, the ultimate example of this was Hulk Hogan, and I believed the hype, as did countless others. Despite his limited repertoire and the plodding pace of many of his matches, Hogan captivated audiences with his microphone work and almost all of the merchandise you could buy bore his likeness, so he appeared almost god-like in the world of pro wrestling. The most obvious example of this today is John Cena; WWE’s merchandise-selling machine. While casual fans, children and their kayfabe-protecting parents cheer for Cena and snap up his latest T-shirts at the merchandise stands, the more experienced and devoted fans (mainly consisting of the 18-34 year old male demographic) loudly and regularly show their unified disapproval of his skills (or lack thereof) with their audible chants of “Cena Sucks” and “You can’t wrestle”. Those same fans tend to be the ones who currently chant ‘CM Punk’ during live WWE TV and Pay-Per-Views, knowing full well that Punk will not be appearing, just to show the WWE office that they know better than the creative minds who script the shows that we all follow week by week.
The main eventers of the industry who tend to be more accepted by this portion of the audience tend to be the more technical, believable, and in some respects ‘old-school’ performers, who rather than fulfilling the role of a cartoonish character with ‘big’ moves, highly exaggerated movements etc, strive to achieve a level of realism, grit and (for want of a better word) attitude. Many of these performers become big sellers of merchandise in their own right, such as CM Punk, Daniel Bryan and in days gone by, the likes of Eddie Guerrero, Ric Flair & Bret Hart. For them to get to the top of the card, however, it took more than just five-star matches and any degree of legitimacy that they brought to their roles: they all developed the skills needed to be Sports-Entertainers, as well as great wrestlers, in that they learned to embrace the need for outstanding microphone work, to develop catchphrases and a depth of on-screen character that many of the best wrestlers of bygone eras had underutilised, often to their own detriment.
If success in pro wrestling was based solely on in-ring ability, then the likes of Dean Malenko, Dynamite Kid, Lance Storm and Chris Benoit would have been in every main event for every promotion they worked for, but in what is, at its core, an entertainment business, pure athleticism and a thorough knowledge of holds and moves is simply not enough to make someone a megastar. What some fans seem to forget is that this has been true in pro wrestling since long before Vince McMahon took control of his father’s wrestling territory and created the worldwide sports-entertainment giant that WWE has become. It was probably inevitable, given how pro wrestling evolved from a legitimate sport into the show that it has become.
While real wrestling still exists in various forms around the world, it is simply not a lucrative business like many other legitimate sports. There would be no way for the business to exist on the scale that it does without the drama from the soap-opera elements and the construction of the matches by the performers and agents who determine what will happen in the ring.
In the 1920’s wrestling promoters were afraid of being double-crossed by performers going into business for themselves, so while the majority of matches were worked, it was still commonplace to only put the World title on real wrestlers. This was the era of Ed ‘The Strangler’ Lewis, regarded by many as the greatest shooter ever. Despite his reputation for being legitimately tough, he was not above performing worked matches. He understood that the primary function of pro wrestling was to make money, and that working matches was the most successful way to accomplish that. He even voluntarily lost his world title to a former football player called Wayne Munn due solely to Munn’s ability to draw a crowd.
From it’s formation in 1948, the National Wrestling Alliance tried to preserve the credibility of wrestling by continuing to book real wrestlers as champions. Between 1969 and 1978 the only exception to the rule was Japanese star ‘Giant’ Shohei Baba, who was a big attraction due to his size but was not in the same league as, say, Dory Funk Jr., Harley Race, Jack Brisco and Terry Funk, in terms of legitimacy or technical talent. Meanwhile, massively popular stars such as ‘Nature Boy’ Buddy Rogers was not considered ‘legitimate’ enough to be their world champion, but was awarded that accolade elsewhere because he could sell out shows based on his charisma alone. The territories and companies that thrived were those who recognised the drawing power of their stars, and created main events from the stars who drew crowds, regardless of ‘technical proficiency’, such as Bill Watts’ UWF Mid-South making a megastar out of Junkyard Dog. JYD was a performer who was exciting, relatable and incredibly charismatic, and as such was a big draw, despite what some purists may call a limited repertoire. That didn’t matter to the audiences who paid to see him, as was the case with Hulk Hogan in the AWA (a company that had usually made it’s stars from more traditionally believable performers, like Nick Bockwinkel, Curt Hennig & of course, it’s owner Verne Gagne). It’s no coincidence that these types of performers were later chosen by Vince McMahon when he was expanding his territory into a national (and international) empire.
In August 1979, when Dusty Rhodes won the NWA World Heavyweight Championship from Harley Race, some traditionalists considered it the death of professional wrestling as it had been until that point. Rhodes, despite his charisma was not considered a credible or ‘believable’ performer, but was undoubtedly a huge box office draw due to the entertainment value that he created with his character development and promos. Professional wrestling was now more of an entertainment spectacle than a sport, and it is in this way that the industry has thrived.
Viewers will tune in every week to keep up with the story-lines, which determine the success of the companies’ viewing figures, as it does in a soap opera, but pro wrestling also benefits from the knock-on effect of merchandise sales, which generates huge revenue all over the world. By developing a character that people can believe in, creating catchphrases and T-Shirt slogans, performers not only sell the increasingly diverse and often mind-boggling merchandise (such as the John Cena garden gnome…), but they also ensure that they sell tickets to events and keep the company in profit. If they are the people that the audience is paying to see, then of course they will remain in the main event spot. Wrestling is first and foremost, as ‘Strangler’ Lewis and his peers recognised, a business, and just like in Hollywood, the stars who put the butts in seats and the fans in the T-shirts will always get the top billing. In April 2014, it was reported that John Cena was selling five times the merchandise of the second most popular merchandise seller in WWE. This means that no matter how bad we may think he is in the ring, no matter how unbelievable his cartoonish comebacks, exaggerated moves and terrible swinging punches may be, he is the best ‘wrestler’ in the world at the moment, because (as in any business) cash is ultimately king.
The main eventers of the industry who tend to be more accepted by this portion of the audience tend to be the more technical, believable, and in some respects ‘old-school’ performers, who rather than fulfilling the role of a cartoonish character with ‘big’ moves, highly exaggerated movements etc, strive to achieve a level of realism, grit and (for want of a better word) attitude. Many of these performers become big sellers of merchandise in their own right, such as CM Punk, Daniel Bryan and in days gone by, the likes of Eddie Guerrero, Ric Flair & Bret Hart. For them to get to the top of the card, however, it took more than just five-star matches and any degree of legitimacy that they brought to their roles: they all developed the skills needed to be Sports-Entertainers, as well as great wrestlers, in that they learned to embrace the need for outstanding microphone work, to develop catchphrases and a depth of on-screen character that many of the best wrestlers of bygone eras had underutilised, often to their own detriment.
CM Punk delivering his infamous 'Pipe-Bomb' promo
If success in pro wrestling was based solely on in-ring ability, then the likes of Dean Malenko, Dynamite Kid, Lance Storm and Chris Benoit would have been in every main event for every promotion they worked for, but in what is, at its core, an entertainment business, pure athleticism and a thorough knowledge of holds and moves is simply not enough to make someone a megastar. What some fans seem to forget is that this has been true in pro wrestling since long before Vince McMahon took control of his father’s wrestling territory and created the worldwide sports-entertainment giant that WWE has become. It was probably inevitable, given how pro wrestling evolved from a legitimate sport into the show that it has become.
While real wrestling still exists in various forms around the world, it is simply not a lucrative business like many other legitimate sports. There would be no way for the business to exist on the scale that it does without the drama from the soap-opera elements and the construction of the matches by the performers and agents who determine what will happen in the ring.
In the 1920’s wrestling promoters were afraid of being double-crossed by performers going into business for themselves, so while the majority of matches were worked, it was still commonplace to only put the World title on real wrestlers. This was the era of Ed ‘The Strangler’ Lewis, regarded by many as the greatest shooter ever. Despite his reputation for being legitimately tough, he was not above performing worked matches. He understood that the primary function of pro wrestling was to make money, and that working matches was the most successful way to accomplish that. He even voluntarily lost his world title to a former football player called Wayne Munn due solely to Munn’s ability to draw a crowd.
Ed 'Strangler' Lewis
From it’s formation in 1948, the National Wrestling Alliance tried to preserve the credibility of wrestling by continuing to book real wrestlers as champions. Between 1969 and 1978 the only exception to the rule was Japanese star ‘Giant’ Shohei Baba, who was a big attraction due to his size but was not in the same league as, say, Dory Funk Jr., Harley Race, Jack Brisco and Terry Funk, in terms of legitimacy or technical talent. Meanwhile, massively popular stars such as ‘Nature Boy’ Buddy Rogers was not considered ‘legitimate’ enough to be their world champion, but was awarded that accolade elsewhere because he could sell out shows based on his charisma alone. The territories and companies that thrived were those who recognised the drawing power of their stars, and created main events from the stars who drew crowds, regardless of ‘technical proficiency’, such as Bill Watts’ UWF Mid-South making a megastar out of Junkyard Dog. JYD was a performer who was exciting, relatable and incredibly charismatic, and as such was a big draw, despite what some purists may call a limited repertoire. That didn’t matter to the audiences who paid to see him, as was the case with Hulk Hogan in the AWA (a company that had usually made it’s stars from more traditionally believable performers, like Nick Bockwinkel, Curt Hennig & of course, it’s owner Verne Gagne). It’s no coincidence that these types of performers were later chosen by Vince McMahon when he was expanding his territory into a national (and international) empire.
Viewers will tune in every week to keep up with the story-lines, which determine the success of the companies’ viewing figures, as it does in a soap opera, but pro wrestling also benefits from the knock-on effect of merchandise sales, which generates huge revenue all over the world. By developing a character that people can believe in, creating catchphrases and T-Shirt slogans, performers not only sell the increasingly diverse and often mind-boggling merchandise (such as the John Cena garden gnome…), but they also ensure that they sell tickets to events and keep the company in profit. If they are the people that the audience is paying to see, then of course they will remain in the main event spot. Wrestling is first and foremost, as ‘Strangler’ Lewis and his peers recognised, a business, and just like in Hollywood, the stars who put the butts in seats and the fans in the T-shirts will always get the top billing. In April 2014, it was reported that John Cena was selling five times the merchandise of the second most popular merchandise seller in WWE. This means that no matter how bad we may think he is in the ring, no matter how unbelievable his cartoonish comebacks, exaggerated moves and terrible swinging punches may be, he is the best ‘wrestler’ in the world at the moment, because (as in any business) cash is ultimately king.
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(This article was originally posted on the 'Inside The Squared
Circle' website in May 2014, but was moved here after that site closed.)