SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...
Triple H said the goal of WWE talent development is to build generational stars. In an interview with The Athletic, he spoke about what star power means in WWE and the patience it takes to create the stars they want.
“Three years ago, ‘The Tonight Show’ would call and want a guest and ask for Triple H or The Undertaker or John Cena,” Triple H said. “There was a year I couldn’t make it work and I asked them to pick Roman or Braun Strowman. They weren’t interested. … Now Roman is on that show on his own. It takes time. You’re building stars. It’s not like flash-in-the-pan stars, where this guy’s hot in boxing today and six months later, no one remembers him.”
“You’re trying to build generational stars that last,” Triple H said of WWE’s goal with talent. “It takes time. It’s a slow and steady progression, and they’re getting there. Becky Lynch, Roman, they’re becoming household names.”
Triple H also discussed the process WWE takes in developing talent and when they know which talents are ready and which aren’t.
“The tryouts we did before, where there were a lot of athletes and experienced indie guys, I don’t think there’s any less of a ‘That’s a rock star,’” Triple said of what the company is looking for. “The indie stuff, half of it is, ‘He’s a good in-ring performer, but the rest is a mystery. He’s got bad habits I have to get him out of.’ This is almost cleaner. It’s a blank slate.”
“The numbers force us to be more regimented,” Triple H said. “We used to be like, ‘Well, he’s only been here a year, let’s give him more time, see if he picks it up.’ Now we know there’s a six-month coming in the door of adapt, get rolling and then we’re looking at your aptitude for this. We know in that six months — and some won’t make it that long.”
I love Triple H, and what he’s meant to this business. But if building generational stars is their goal, then they’ve failed. That’s why Steve Austin, The Rock, The Undertaker, John Cena, Triple H himself and others have been brought back so many times. They’ve failed to create these generational stars. The “stars” of today just aren’t taking. They don’t have the charisma that the wrestlers of the previous generations had. They just don’t. There were the Flairs, Hogans, Austins, and before then, the Sammartinos, and so on. That’s the top level of the business. There’s the level under that, where I put Hart, Michaels, Rhodes, Savage, Sting, etc., and that’s a much more broad level.
Who of today comes REMOTELY CLOSE to that?