Images via: Explo-WHAM, NXT-Comic Book, ACope-Wrestling Obs....w/ edits by D. Marinelli
It’s funny how many WWE fans state that WWE is thinking about the future, yet whenever they go head-to-head with AEW’s cast of legends, WWE as well goes to the reliable legends that helped build the current platform of the industry, they knowing full well that the younger portion of the roster isn’t enough to stand toe-to-toe with the likes of a roster filled with Christian, Edge, Sting and many others.
People forget it seems that it was with legends that WCW beat WWE in the ratings during the Monday Night Wars, and there’s very good reason for that and it’s an old, tried tested and true theory: Nostalgia. It works, friends.
People want to see the wrestlers that built the platform the younger generation are learning on, and this ageist mentality that the legends can’t garner or the legends are too old is total bull. They garner even more, if anything.
In WWE as well. Why do they bring out the big guns at WrestleMania? Because the younger generation isn’t enough yet. But they will get there, rest assured…in time. But for now, the proper respect should be shown to the legends—specifically Adam Copeland right now—who had his part in making equal legends like John Cena, Randy Orton and others along their own respective trajectories to the top.
If Adam Copeland wants to go out and wrestle for the competitor, he deserves to, because he helped build and carve the current platform those kids at the performance center are training on. Heck if he wants to open an ice cream shop, he deserves all of us, and the younger generation of wrestlers, to walk in every day and order a cone or two. Whatever he wants to do, he deserves the right and the support, because without the legends, this business wouldn’t be where it is today and that’s final. There’s no debate there, folks.
This revisionist history bull won’t touch wrestling. I won’t allow it. And for the WWE fans that are out there, suddenly forgetting what these legends did for the business as a whole and for WWE, just because they go to AEW, shame on you. They did their time and without their contributions, the WWE platform you know and love wouldn’t exist.
So much emphasis is put on the management side of the business, but you know who a smart wrestling fan bets on …? The talent, the boys and girls in the back that break their backs every day for you and me and anyone who might suddenly give a darn about the business; the people battling it out on the indies, wrestling for at times shady promoters and little pay. That’s who I bet on every time.
I am overjoyed that Cena will be at NXT next week. I am a Cena fan and a big one at that. I was in college when he started his run and yes, I had a Word Life poster up in my weight room. But therein is my point.
He’s an over 20-year veteran in the business, and really on the same night that many on social media were debating which company was thinking about the future more (AEW or WWE), NXT announced that not 1 but 4 legends would be appearing on NXT next week, and all this to go head-to-head with a company that next week is featuring a particular ex-WWE wrestler, who is going head-to-head with, get this, a young wrestler by the name of Luchasaurus, a man who by the way was forsaken by WWE and given a chance at a “future” buy AEW no less. Now how’s that about thinking about the future??
-via WWE on YouTube
And if you listen to Copeland’s remarks during the media scrum following WrestleDream, he wants to work with young talent, so…
In the end, it doesn’t matter and the debates online are really a lot of noise. If you want to be a fan of WWE be a fan, but be logical when making comparisons. No one can say that AEW doesn’t think about the future because of a few bad occurrences. If we went off of bad occurrences, WWE would win in that race, as so much has gone down over the years; enough ex-NXT wrestlers can profess to that.
Julia Hart, Kris Statlander, and there would be no Jade Cargill without AEW. And the work that QT Marshall is putting into the new generation cannot be ignored. Lutte Académie in Quebec put on by the veteran Jacques Rougeau…its graduates are given training at the Nightmare Factory (oh yeah, Cody Rhodes owns that), and these graduates get to train there and they get to wrestle at AEW shows.
-via Jofo In The Ring on YouTube
I know because I spoke to some of these graduates. Jeremy Prophet, whom I’ve interviewed, was one such person, and he states that what AEW does for future stars is unmatched and yes, he had some experience even with WWE.
So at the end of the day, if we’re going to debate, let’s debate intelligently and with facts as backup and not just play the old schoolyard game of My Toy Is Better Than Yours Just Because.
Both rosters are epic in my opinion, and both of them flourishing are a great thing for the business. Let’s not forget how dire the situation was for the pro wrestlers themselves when there was only one single place to apply their art, folks. It was pretty bad.
Now the platform is better for the wrestlers themselves, and like it or hate it, AEW provided another platform for legends to make their mark.
As stated before, even in the early 90s, McMahon and company were trying to push out the talent that was “aging,” and they went on to another company and almost destroyed him.
So never sleep on a legend, because a legend always has something to prove, especially with a society that’s intent on erasing the past.
“One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.”
-Golda Meir
“I must speak the truth, even at the risk of being ostracized by my fellow scribblers. In fact, anticipating their rage, I have already applied for a place in the Canada Council’s witness-protection program. This because, much as it pains me to turn on my kind, I fear the time has come to admit that far too many celebrated writers were outrageous liars, philanderers, drunks, druggies, unsuitable babysitters, plagiarists, psychopaths, parasites, cowards, indifferent dads or moms and bad credit risks.”
