The way I see some fans reacting, they think the WWE predetermines every Slammy winner, despite the fact that the awards are supposed to be voted on by fans these days. I wouldn't go that far. First of all, some of these awards are really meaningless. You have lower-midcarders winning some of them. No push needs to be attached to them. It just leads to a segment and everyone moves on in many situations. Even at a time when the WWE did decide the winners, no big push needs to come of it. Beth Phoenix was the winner of "Diva of the Year" in 2008. That wasn't decided by fans. She got pushed as a credible jobber in 2008. She got pushed that way in 2009. She never stopped being pushed like that. The Slammy didn't mean too much.
Another thing to keep in mind is that whatever is likely to win is something or someone that was popular or talked about the most in a given year. There are also situations where something that just happened might be fresher in people's minds and they would vote for that. There are multiple explanations why something or someone might get an award as voted on by fans.
And then you have Roman Reigns. Roman Reigns winning that award last year was very suspicious. He had not accomplished anything memorable in 2014. He was over, but obviously not as over as the WWE would have liked. He was out for weeks prior to the Slammy Awards last year, so you can't say that he had just returned and done something to get fans interested in him. Seth Rollins winning that same Slammy this year makes sense because he held the WWE Championship longer than anyone this year and retained it against some big names. He is not extremely popular, but I can buy into him winning. Fans bought into his booking. But would those same fans that voted Roman Reigns last year really pick Seth Rollins this year? If popularity is supposedly the driving force behind the "Superstar of the Year" Slammy, you might expect someone like Dean Ambrose to win this year. He has never been World Champion, but neither was Roman Reigns when he won the Slammy last year. And if Roman Reigns was supposedly popular enough to win it last year, when he didn't really accomplish anything and was out for a while, why wouldn't he win it again this year? He was here all year. He actually won the WWE Championship, twice. He seemed to win his haters over at TLC and the night after.
Why would the WWE rig the Slammies for Roman Reigns last year? To hype him up prior to his big push. People could see his big push coming even before he won the Royal Rumble this year. Problem is, he was out for a few weeks, which hurt his momentum. Giving him that Slammy would be a way to hype him up big again as the WWE continued his big push, which ended up backfiring. I do not think the WWE rigs all their polls, but this is a company that tries to build stars, sometimes forcibly, and is known to screw people. I definitely believe the WWE would take advantage of a Slammy win, or non-win, to make someone look great, or sell that someone else is not that popular.
Onto Nikki Bella. I do not find her winning a Slammy suspicious. If you can accept fans voting for Seth Rollins because he was WWE Champion for most of the year, you can use that same logic to buy Nikki Bella winning her Slammy. She broke the record for longest reign with the Diva's Championship. PWI named her #1. Some fans buy into booking for awards like this.
Just to make it clear, this is not a sign that Nikki Bella is popular. I remember fans on Twitter being very against her breaking AJ Lee's record. And even a hashtag about her deserving to break the record was full of more negativity towards her than positive comments. But if you want to talk about which diva has had the best year, it is Nikki Bella. I have seen divas win polls based on how well they were booked at the time or for the year. It doesn't always come down to a popularity contest.
Another reason I do not find Nikki Bella winning suspicious, who is really the most over diva on the roster? There isn't one diva knocking it out of the park right now. Sasha Banks obviously has her fans, but I have said before that those chants do not mean she is as over as some people might expect. Paige is also liked by many fans. Charlotte is currently holding the title and there was a time when people were actually looking forward to seeing her debut and get pushed. I think her support has died down a bit. Despite fans wanting to say that Nikki Bella slept her way to the top, there are still people that like The Bellas out there. I am not surprised Nikki Bella won. I can imagine a lot of fans looking at how she was booked all year and hearing about her beating AJ's record and deciding to vote for her. There was really no one diva in the whole roster that was so over that you would expect her to win instead, despite Nikki's booking.
The fact that there isn't one diva that is that over is a problem. If the WWE had a worker with the in-ring talent to connect with wrestling fans and the charisma and look to appeal to a wider audience, they can build around her. That's the centerpiece. Push other eye-candy divas in the periphery to also appeal to viewers that want to see something sexy or glamorous. Push a female wrestler in a unique way in the periphery to draw some unique interest there. Have a strong foundation of credible jobbers to keep things respectable. The WWE really had a great system at one time, but it has unraveled. They have not had workers they were willing to push as stars connect with the fans at a great level since Trish and Lita.
Even going back a year to when AJ Lee was still around, they did not have someone bringing A+ results. I remember paying attention to polls in 2014. After Paige debuted and won the title from AJ Lee, I would see fans voting Paige as hotter and better than AJ. Soon after AJ returned and won back the title, that love went back to her for a while. I have seen this kind of swing just on one message board. AJ was obviously the diva they wanted to push as a star, while Paige is a credible jobber. Some fans have criticized AJ's wrestling ability. They say she just wasn't interested during her last year in the WWE. I think part of that was her aloof character. And yet, she was the closest thing to a great star the WWE created in the diva division since Trish and Lita.
They say absence makes the heart grow fonder. Yeah, I would not mind seeing AJ back in the WWE. But she is just at her best as a periphery character. Pushing her in wrestling matters just ruined her edge. I already pointed out many fans criticizing her wrestling ability. And her character just made her hard to buy into for some feuds and storylines. In the periphery, however, she wouldn't be that annoying. She works well as a character performer. She has charisma. She is attractive without looking like the typical diva. Depending on how they would handle her, AJ Lee might have ended up a better periphery diva than Lita.
To top it all off, I do not even mind Nikki Bella coming back. The diva division has been sour the last few months. Most of the blame should go to the WWE and their creative ideas. Moreover, things probably still would have been bad even with The Bellas pushed during that time. But I am starting to think even The Bellas can be more useful and possibly get over. But it will take more than a long title reign and a Slammy to get it done.
No comments:
Post a Comment