AS I SEE IT
Bob Magee
Pro Wrestling: Between the Sheets
PWBTS.com
Writing this one early to comment on this week’s Money in the Bank PPV.
First, Petey Staniforth, frequent PWBTS contributor and promoter of the UK’s Prime Time Wrestling passed this along, regarding Michael Morrice, a brave 13 year old from the UK, who is awaiting a kidney transplant. Michael is currently undergoing dialysis.
If any readers within the business (indies, WWE, TNA, puroresu, or lucha promoters or workers or even staff) or even fans… who would be willing to send a key chain or pen from the country in which they live… or just plain good wishes, please contact Michael and his mom, Sylvia, via Michael Morrice Transplant Support Facebook page. This isn’t one of those chain deals….he’s a real kid (who happens, as it turns out, to share my birthday)…not a mysterious someone looking to get some magic number of Facebook friends. He’s just a 13 year old wrestling fan, with a mom who loves him, and who asked Petey for help. I thought I’d pass it on to all of you…
Some of you have already sent him good wishes, and many other things…if some more of you can be moved to do so, it’d be appreciated.
So now we come to one of those increasingly rare things…a PPV that a lot of people are actually looking forward to…. a PPV not named Wrestlemania, or based in the individual fan’s hometown. Vince McMahon with Sunday’s Money In The Bank PPV live from Chicago, IL featuring CM Punk vs. John Cena for the WWE Championship….has actually done that rare thing and gotten even jaded online writers excited about tomorrow night’s PPV.
From one longtime fan to the leading wrestling promoter on the planet: PLEASE, Vince, don`t . this up.
The obvious finish to the Cena-Punk match, as has been suggested by Dave Meltzer…and probably a hundred others… is to have Punk go over Cena. Earlier in the night, Alberto Del Rio wins Money In The Bank. Post-match, DelRio cashes in, and becomes WWE champion. The Chicago crowd goes insane for stealing Punk’s hometown guy moment of glory from him.
Punk then comes back whenever he’s going to do so…as is widely expected. Alberto DelRio and John Cena are projected to be a program for SummerSlam. That gets set up. Everything is neatly tied up.
Starting with the June 27 Monday Night RAW finish and the CM Punk promo of the year , the thrill ride of the last 2 1/2 weeks. For anyone who hasn’t seen it…go to this link
It’s not a secret that Punk is white-hot right now. He has interviews everywhere from GQ Magazine to the Chicago Sun-Times to ESPN to Hell, Punk was even picked to throw out the first pitch at the Cubs game yesterday at Wrigley Field, and singing “Take me out to the ballgame”…a pretty major thing in Chicago for political and sports figures, forget a wrestler, even one from Chicago.
An excerpt from that GQ interview has Punk questioned about how real the storyline is…and well, how storyline it is:
“How much is real? That’s 100 percent real. That’s not to say that there are still not negotiations. It’s not like I’m leaving and they’re like, ‘Good. Go f*** yourself.’ I think that’s why this whole thing works. I’m not doing my job if people are like, ‘What you do is fake.’ And literally people on the street are confused, generally, for the first time. That’s a great thing.”
Yup. Isn’t it fun to have someone working us…doing a storyline and cutting promo where we’re treated like adults…and not getting content that would be too cheesy for an old-school ABC Afterschool Special? One where we can’t predict the finish?
There is the smart fan side of me that is afraid that Vince will do the usual Super Cena crap and having Cena go over Punk clean. If WWE does that, it would kill Chicago as a live venue…and kill off the fans who’ve actually been willing to take a chance and buy this PPV tomorrow night; the ones who’ve been around for a long time.
Think that can’t happen in Chicago? Take the wrestling way-back machine to Starrcade 1987, when Dusty Rhodes killed WCW as a draw in Chicago when he booked a Dusty finish for the Road Warriors vs. Arn Anderson/Tully Blanchard match, when the Road Warriors lost on a disqualification. A town that drew great crowds for WCW never did so again.
So one last time: PLEASE, Vince, don`t . this up.
Until next time…
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