The thing is it takes good booking to create interesting personas.

Note- Cena won the world title for the first time at WM21. Beating HHH at WM22 is what turned him into a huge huge superstar.

I'm not taking away from the drawing power of Triple H, I'm just saying at this stage in his career he needs to start putting people over to try and make new stars, and it would have been a good idea if there had been done earlier.

The Paul London/Brian Kendrick burial springs to mind. I'm not suggesting for one second that those guys had much of a shot at becoming stars, but hell, when Austin was in WCW did he look like he was going to become a star, he didn't become a mic god till later. If he had been buried like some of the guys that HHH has done to we might never have seen Stone Cold Steve Austin but only seen Stunning Steve Austin who we wish all the best, in his future endeavours.

I never said once that Triple H was poor in the ring, poor on the mic or couldn't carry a storyline. All I was saying he has possibly gone over TOO often in the past. And Ziggler out of the current crop is one of the best young guys on the roster and has improved a lot in the past few months on the mic.

The one thing I can see we all agree on and it is, imo, the reason for almost all grievances that have been mentioned in this disucssion: The Booking.

It's focused too much and put over the already established stars for so long now, that they are now struggling to get the new guys over, and because of this they aren't given a chance.

Example: guy like Ziggler, has been described as a complete douche, untalented and been brushed aside as a nothing. He's not been given much of a chance. He rarely gets to talk and he needs a big push with a good storyline in the midcard to become established- problem? THEY DON'T BOOK ANY ANY ANY MIDCARD feuds. A midcard title feud nowadays is

Wrestler A: Wrestler B, you have belt I want your belt.
Wrestler B: It's my belt, you can't beat me.

Whichever one is heel attacks the face a couple of times and then there's a PPV series.

That's it!

Now let's take a fairly recent example of a midcard title feud from a few years back: John Cena Vs Carlito

Cena fights for months trying to gain his first US title and finally does at WMXX. After Carlito beats him on his debut for the belt. Cena has a rematch inevitably, Cena gets stabbed in a club, they get given decent time to go back and forth on the mic. This helps to eventually push Cena through the midcard to Main Event, where he goes on to win a tournament and faces JBL for the WWE Title at WM21 where he wins. Carlito is also established immediately as serious threat in the midcard (although his lack of sustained push later would eventually ruin him).

This is what they need to do. They need to give their young stars proper pushes in the midcard, have them win their first world titles at big PPVs and go over some of the established stars- otherwise these guys will never be taken seriously.

Counter example: Daniel Bryan. I think he's great and is a phenomenal in-ring talent, BUT they job him out for months and now that they have him cash in a briefcase I'm supposed to take him seriously as a World Champion. Less than a month ago he lost clean to the Intercontinental Champion!

Ziggler's actually shown to gain ratings if you look at the past few weeks. Del Rio does kill though, as does Orton surprisingly. Punk usually does okay, as far as I understand the game that night started late and also, as much as I love the guys, Ryder and Bryan probably aren't the draws I wish they were.

Either way it would be stupid to jump the gun and hotshot the title back to one of the established star(s)... I mean Cena. Because that's the problem and why this is happening. When Cena and Orton were coming up they had:
Chris Jericho, Edge, Kurt Angle, Triple H, Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, later Edge (he had been over for years and just needed the push), Benoit, hell Hogan came back for a while in 05 and others. Now the two established stars that are actually active are Cena & Orton.

They've built no one and unless they're prepared to put people over Cena (they've shown they are almost willing to do it with Orton- put Henry over)
then the only other way to build new stars now is to just give them the ball, let them run with it and put the spotlight on them and since they aren't established ratings are going to drop until they do get more over.

WWE Superstars 22/12/11

First match no points

Kofi Kingston & Evan Bourne defeated Tyler Reks
+5 Points slashsfro (Kofi Kingston/Extra Opponent)
+5 Points slashsfro (Evan Bourne/Extra Opponent)

No other Superstars Matches give anyone points

WWE Smackdown 23/12/11

Zack Ryder defeated Cody Rhodes via Pinfall
+4 Points Axl S (Zack Ryder)

Sheamus defeated The Miz via Pinfall
+4 Points redarmy76 (Sheamus)

Kofi Kingston defeated Primo via Pinfall
+4 Points slashsfro

Daniel Bryan & Big Show defeated Dolph Ziggler & Jack Swagger via Submission
+10 Points Axl S (Daniel Bryan/Extra Opponent/Main Event)
+10 Points redarmy76 (Big Show/Extra Opponent/Main Event)

Shows Score Board

1. Axl S/redarmy76/slashsfro : 14 Points
4. Atari Legend: 0 Points

Game Score Board

1. redarmy76: 157 Points
2. Axl S: 154 Points
3. Atari Legend: 128 Points
4. slashsfro: 84 Points

Question: Should I give us all 1000 extra Christmas bonus points?

I've been back home from Uni now for a few days and it still does not feel that Christmassy, tbh I don't really mind though, I'm just enjoying the time off.