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By Shane McKinley, Torch specialist

This the truth spilling out of my guts
If I, would of took the chance to see
What was place right in front of my face"
-"Do Over" by Ghostface Killah

Can I imagine me plopping down $50 every three weeks for a wrestling PPV? No. I'm getting uneasy about wrestling nowadays. Sure, big things are on the horizon. But will it matter? Are the doomsayers of wrestling correct?

There used to be a time when a WWE PPV (check the start of the year) where I felt my money was well-spent. Fast-forward to the present, and frankly, WWE PPVs are a joke. I'm sure that proponents of the "three weeks to hype up a PPV" would argue that it's important to not lose fans (it's why typically the first Raw after a PPV features them talking about the next PPV in the first segment). What's frustrating about WWE PPVs is that fans feel that WWE is taking the lazy route. Throw out a concept PPV, hype it up as happening "only once a year," and watch the buy rates "skyrocket."

That's why it's comforting to me to know that WWE PPVs aren't doing so hot nowadays. Maybe we can go back to making the PPVs actually worth the money. Sorry, I don't need to pay money to see Batista turn on Rey or Randy Orton try to blow up John Cena. Even the "shocking storyline developments" are getting lame.

It used to be that even when a WWE PPV didn't look so hot, I felt confident that WWE would make it worth my money. The tactic I think some people might use is to wait for the big ones (Royal Rumble, No Way Out, WrestleMania, Summerslam, Survivor Series) and then take a "wait and see" approach with the rest of them. As an older fan I'm not going to waste money on a cheesy and uneventful concept PPV that doesn't mean squat (the main culprit here is Bragging Rights).

"Hooray! 100,000 domestic PPV buys! Yes!"

With the price increase in WWE PPVs, it's akin to asking fans to buy a UFC PPV every three weeks (nearly $50 for a wrestling PPV is steep). I would be in favor of scaling the sheer number of WWE PPVs and to make damn sure that fans are satisfied with buying a WWE PPV. There are many fans out there who feel like WWE's latest concept PPVs are copouts.

-It does excite me that they are hyping up a possible Chris Jericho vs. Undertaker feud to take place after Survivor Series. Jericho can go heavy in dissecting Undertaker's promos. But what's with Big Show in the PPV match? Is Show's involvement just a stall tactic for a possible Jericho-Undertaker feud?

-I wouldn't mind seeing Mike Knox head on back down to ECW. He might flourish better down there than simply being a big monster jobber over on Smackdown.

-It's a testament to Punk that somehow he is salvaging his credibility with his performance in his feud...with ref Scott Armstrong. Ugh. "Hey at least Punk's on TV! Hopefully this is just a holdover for Punk until they have something better in store for him." Sure. But it's hard to shake the feeling that this bit reeks of lameness. Punk reeks of awesomeness. Or used to.

-Batista did a good job of making sure fans boo him because his wrestling matches are so boring. Well, they did that before, but now Batty's heel, and from his boring match with Matt Hardy, the heel Batista isn't going to be a cakewalk. Some guys are just naturally better as faces or heels. Maybe Batista should kill more bunny rabbits on-screen.

Email is mckinley.torch@gmail.com


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