In the other corner, you have John Cena. My nephew, who will turn 7 in a few months, says his favorite wrestler is John Cena. While we were watching Cena's match on Raw this week, I asked him why he liked John Cena. His response? I don't know, all the kids like John Cena! He actually said that. Not too proud of that. Whether we are talking about wrestling, sports, music, or whatever, I will never say I am a fan of someone because everyone else around me is a fan of that someone. I would have rather he said his favorite wrestler was Jinder Mahal because of the fancy headgear.
Put it all together, the title match at the Royal Rumble PPV will feature a midcard WWE World's Heavyweight Champion going against my nephew's favorite wrestler. The first issue to bring up with this match is obvious, and it isn't my nephew's choice of wrestlers. This feud isn't getting a lot of the main attention. There are times when you don't complain about non-title matters trumping title matters. The Rock coming back is a good example of that. But there are also times where it is just not necessary to not give title matters better focus. There have been times where John Cena has gotten top billing over title matters and really didn't need to. I would say his feud with Kane a while back would fit in that category. It is true that this rivalry between Cena and Orton has gotten stale, but you have just unified the titles. That is a big deal. How do you sell the importance of the title after you book Orton to win it? Start booking him as a midcard Champion? Really? If you shook your head at the WWE doing this to CM Punk during part of his historic run with the WWE title, how do you feel about the WWE doing this to Randy Orton at this point? Titles have just been unified, entering Wrestlemania season, feuding against the centerpiece, Brock Lesnar looming in the background, and the WWE is putting better attention on a feud between Daniel Bryan and Bray Wyatt than they are the title feud. I would hope Orton vs. Cena takes back the spotlight heading into the PPV.
Another issue with this feud is the issue that never seems to go away. Randy Orton is having issues with The Authority. This is supposed to be the part where I talk about whether or not this will be the breaking point and you will see a split in the corporate heel faction. I don't care. They have teased it so much and not followed through, I'm sure a lot of people that were interested in that part of the storyline have also lost interest in it. Any intrigue that this could have caused is just being wasted. It really isn't helping to make the feud between Cena and Orton better.
Who should win this match? I would say Randy Orton. I know you have Brock Lesnar getting a title shot. John Cena vs. Brock Lesnar has been done. From the time Randy Orton has become a top star, he has not faced Brock Lesnar. How can you get a feud between Orton and Lesnar to work well? How about doing more with The Authority not being on Orton's side completely? Sell that better and it could make Orton look like the face trying to overcome a legitimate threat. And after Brock Lesnar gets his title shot, regardless of who wins, the WWE can just go back to Orton and The Authority going back and forth with each other. It'll never end, will it?
Let me change subjects. Go back to when I was talking about the difference between being efficient and being productive. I was watching a basketball game last night and one of the commentators said something that illustrates my point. The commentator praised a player that was defending against Kevin Durant, even though Durant had scored 31 points at that point in the game. The commentator was not being sarcastic. He explained that the player defending against Durant was doing the right things that he was supposed to do. In terms of how he was going about his duties, he was efficient. Problem is, he was obviously not productive enough to stop a great player and help his team win. Being efficient is not the same thing as being productive. You can do all the right things, but you just need to be absolutely superb to be able to get the job done in some situations. There are a lot of wrestlers out there that are solid in the ring and try to connect with the fans. In terms of skill and effort, they are being efficient. But does that mean all of them become as over as a guy like Daniel Bryan? That is an extreme standard to go by, but my point is that you don't get the job done until it is actually done. You want to be as efficient as possible to help make it easier to get the job done, but you are not truly successful in terms of being productive until the job is done.
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