CONTACTABOUTFACEBOOKTWITTERPODCAST IPHONE APPANDROID APPAMAZON APPRSS
Pro Wrestling Torch
Pro Wrestling Torch Reaches The Most Wrestling Fans Every Week: #1 in iTunes • #1 on iPhone and iPad • #1 on Android • #1 on Kindle
GOT THE PWTORCH APP YET?
iPhone & iPad
Android
Amazon Kindle
Windows Phone
PWTorch Phone App
KELLER'S TAKE
KELLER'S POLL: I want to know what you think of the term "sports entertainer"

Nov 5, 2013 - 3:57:48 PM
PLEASE TAKE A MOMENT TO BOOKMARK US & VISIT US DAILY


StaffKeller08_wide_1.png


I want to know if the term "sports entertainer" bugs you as much as it bugs me. I don't want my opinion to affect how you vote in the poll I created below. I just want to know if this is a "pet peeve" of mine that few people share with me, or if WWE really is irritating most ardent fans. I think I'd rather listen to someone scrape their fork on a ceramic plate while rubbing their finger nails on a chalk board than listen to JBL - someone who knows wrestling's history and doesn't have a complex about being part of the legacy of the "pro wrestling industry" - use WWE's Orwellean Dictionary trying to redefine what they are.

I could live with an alternative term to "pro wrestler" if it made sense and sounded okay. I'm not sure what that alternative would be, but I am quite sure calling someone a "sports entertainer" is awful, awful, awful to my ears. The term "entertainer" just "takes me out of the moment" when I'm trying to get into the world WWE presents to me of these great athletes engaging in simulated combat, trying to make it as realistic looking as possible. When JBL says Randy Orton is the image of what you'd design if you were to build the ideal "sports entertainer" from scratch, I just shake my head.

When Orton is on TV playing the role of a fighter trying to win matches, he is NOT AN ENTERTAINER. Orton can be called an "entertainer" when he's being writtenn about in a magazine article about WWE. Orton can be called an entertainer if he's on a talk show. But on WWE TV, Orton is in character as a fighter, and his goal is to win matches, not "entertain fans" or be "an entertainer." How would you react if characters on TV shows referred to themselves as "comedy actors" or "drama actors" instead of by their characters and the roles they play (doctor, lawyer, coffee shop worker, stay at home parent, etc.)? It'd totally take you out of the moment.

To take it to the extreme, the "ring announcer" could be re-dubbed "introduction entertainer." The play-by-play announcer could be redubbed the "sports entertainment TV show narrator." The wrestling ring could be rebubbed "the sports entertainment performance platform." Where does it stop?

I get that the McMahon family are trying to reframe the business they're in as an attempt to appeal to advertisers and network executivers who they assume consider "pro wrestling" something shameful and embarrassing to be associated with, but that can be done without, in the context of the wrestling show, referriing to the people who are wrestling for money (i.e. professional wrestlers) as some clunky awful term that's the equivalent of someone, in the midst of a movie, whispering in your ear "you know these are actors reading a script, and the only reason this movie was made was so people involved in the movie-making could make money and none of this is genuine or real and you're a big mark for even allowing yourself to get wrapped up in the story being told."

Pro wrestling succeeds as a genre and as a formula when fans are absorbed in the product as much as possible, with as few reminers that it's all a "performance" to "entertain us" with the end-goal being to "make as much money as possible for the McMahons." Yet, more and more over the years, Raw has become in great part a story about the McMahons trying to make money by presentinig "sports entertainers" in "compelling storylines" to try to "entertain the Universe." It pulls us out of the moment needlessly. As much as wrestlers try to make their matches as real as possible to draw us into believing, at least for a few minutes, that what we're watching is a genuine dispute or rivalry being settled in a wrestling ring between two fighters, the McMahons' odd insecurity with being in the pro wrestling industry and obsession with redefining their business actually is undercutting their bottom line by taking viewers out of the moment and making it nearly impossible to fully get absorbed in the story the wrestlers are trying to tell.

Okay, so you know how I feel. How do you feel? Vote below...


How do you feel about the term "sports entertainer" as a substitute for "pro wrestler"?
I've always liked it. Gets rid of a stigma of old-time pro 'rasslin'
At first I didn't like it, but I'm coming around to accepting it
I hated it at first, and now I just grit my teeth and tolerate it
I hated it then, now, and always will - it's awkward and clunky
I don't give it a second of thought. It doesn't matter to me.
  




We suggest these recent related articles...
KELLER: Austin says no to Lesnar match, and he's right; Sting & Taker are wrong
KELLER: What was the Vince McMahon tweet about “E is for Entertainment” above New Day dancing with The Authority all about?
LATEST WADE KELLER VIDEO BLOG: Three Hot Topics - Hogan, Angle, ROH
prowrestling.net
CLICK HERE FOR EVEN MORE PW.NET HEADLINES


CLICK TO EMAIL THIS ARTICLE
CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO MAIN LISTING

NEW! SIGN UP FOR FREE PWTORCH BREAKING NEWS EMAIL ALERTS
BECOME A PWTORCH VIP MEMBER
-FORMER MEMBERS LOGIN HERE TO RENEW
-NEW MEMBERS CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP
SELECT BY ARTICLES CATEGORY
SEARCH PWTORCH.COM



CLICK HERE FOR LIST OF UPCOMING PRO WRESTLING EVENTS
MORE HEADLINES AT AFFILIATE SITES
MMATorch
LATEST HEADLINES - CLICK TO READ CLICK HERE FOR MORE MMATORCH HEADLINES


PWTORCH POLL - VOTE NOW!
RAW POLL 10/12: Vote on Monday's show
 
pollcode.com free polls


RAW POLL 10/12: What was the Best Match on Raw?
 
pollcode.com free polls
MCNEILL LIVECAST POLL: TNA will have a 32-person tournament to determine a new Hvt. champion - your thoughts?
 
pollcode.com free polls
CENA POLL: If John Cena takes a year-end break, who should win the U.S. Title from Cena?
 
pollcode.com free polls
VOTE IN OR SEE RESULTS OF PREVIOUS POLLS



LATEST HEADLINES - CLICK TO READ CLICK HERE FOR EVEN MORE INC HEADLINES

_
LATEST FREE AUDIO SHOWS - CLICK TO LISTEN VIEW MORE PWTORCH LIVECAST EPISODES
DOWNLOAD PWTORCH LIVECAST APP
SUBSCRIBE TO PWTORCH LIVECAST IN ITUNES


ABOUT US

THE TORCH REACHES MORE COMBAT ENTERTAINMENT FANS THAN ANY OTHER SOURCE

PWTorch editor Wade Keller has covered pro wrestling full time since 1987 starting with the Pro Wrestling Torch print newsletter. PWTorch.com launched in 1999 and the PWTorch Apps launched in 2008.

He has conducted "Torch Talk" insider interviews with Hulk Hogan, The Rock, Steve Austin, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, Eric Bischoff, Jesse Ventura, Lou Thesz, Jerry Lawler, Mick Foley, Jim Ross, Paul Heyman, Bruno Sammartino, Goldberg, more.

He has interviewed big-name players in person incluiding Vince McMahon (at WWE Headquarters), Dana White (in Las Vegas), Eric Bischoff (at the first Nitro at Mall of America), Brock Lesnar (after his first UFC win).

He hosted the weekly Pro Wrestling Focus radio show on KFAN in the early 1990s and hosted the Ultimate Insiders DVD series distributed in retail stories internationally in the mid-2000s including interviews filmed in Los Angeles with Vince Russo & Ed Ferrara and Matt & Jeff Hardy. He currently hosts the most listened to pro wrestling audio show in the world, (the PWTorch Livecast, top ranked in iTunes)


REACHING 1 MILLION+ UNIQUE USERS PER MONTH
500 MILLION CLICKS & LISTENS PER YEAR
MILLIONS OF PWTORCH NEWSLETTERS SOLD
PWTORCH STAFF

EDITORS:
Wade Keller, editor
(kellerwade@gmail.com)

James Caldwell, assistant editor
(pwtorch@gmail.com)

STAFF COLUMNISTS:
Bruce Mitchell (since 1990)
Pat McNeill (since 2001)
Greg Parks (since 2007)
Sean Radican (since 2003)

We also have a great team of
TV Reporters
and Specialists and Artists.

PWTORCH VIP MEMBERSHIP

PWTorch offers a VIP membership for $10 a month (or less with an annual sub). It includes nearly 25 years worth of archives from our coverage of pro wrestling dating back to PWTorch Newsletters from the late-'80s filled with insider secrets from every era that are available to VIPers in digital PDF format and Keller's radio show from the early 1990s.

Also, new exclusive top-shelf content every day including a new VIP-exclusive weekly 16 page digital magazine-style (PC and iPad compatible) PDF newsletter packed with exclusive articles and news.

The following features come with a VIP membership which tens of thousands of fans worldwide have enjoyed for many years...

-New Digital PWTorch Newsletter every week
-3 New Digital PDF Back Issues from 5, 10, 20 years ago
-Over 60 new VIP Audio Shows each week
-Ad-free access to all PWTorch.com free articles
-VIP Forum access with daily interaction with PWTorch staff and well-informed fellow wrestling fans
-Tons of archived audio and text articles
-Decades of Torch Talk insider interviews in transcript and audio formats with big name stars.


**SIGN UP FOR VIP ACCESS HERE**

CONTACTABOUTFACEBOOKTWITTERPODCASTIPHONE APPANDROID APPAMAZON APPRSS
VIP SIGN-UP
VIP LOGIN
THE TORCH: #1 IN COMBAT ENTERTAINMENT COVERAGE | © 1999-2013 TDH Communications Inc. • All rights reserved -- PRIVACY POLICY