The Week In Wrestling (1/11/24): 3 Promos That Rocked & 3 That Fell Flat
Many people associate pro wrestling almost exclusively to wrestling matches, but promos are just as important to the product — arguably more so. Wrestling conflicts unfold in the ring, but a large part of the time, the audience's investment in the outcome of a wrestling conflict is created on the mic. A tree may as well not have fallen if nobody is around, and a great wrestling match may as well not have happened if nobody cares who won. And while in-ring, non-verbal storytelling is very much a thing, wrestling still relies heavily on promo segments for its internal drama and narratives, which tend to be praised or criticized as strongly as any match.
So since we've been giving you WINC's Top 5 Matches every week for a little while now, we figured it was about time to start informing you about the week's best promos. Only this time, we're also going to talk about the bad ones, because boy do some of these things get bad. For the week starting on Saturday, January 6 and ending on Thursday, January 11, here are three promos that rocked and three that fell flat.
Fell Flat: Adam Copeland talks about TNT Title (AEW Collision)
AEW star Adam Copeland can't stop thinking about the AEW TNT title. One can't exactly blame him for what happened at the Worlds End, when he had the title for a few minutes until Christian Cage used Killswitch's anytime TNT title shot to become the champion once again; that being said, a week after the PPV on this past Saturday's episode of "AEW Collision," the "Rated R Superstar" delivered the same old promo, which led to an underwhelming match against Griff Garrison.
The promo itself was less than three minutes, starting with Copeland saying that he wouldn't be in the back of the line since he is a "former champion." He said that Cage has always complained that he was given all his opportunities, but that's true — he just worked harder. Copeland then called Killswitch by his old ring name, Luchasaurus, before quickly fixing his flubbed line. He ended by talking more about how he works harder and is going to do an open challenge. The cringe moment came when he told the crowd, 'We can call it the Cope Open, I don't know." Sounded like he didn't care, and was tired.
After Garrison came out, Copeland said he liked him, and Garrison reminded him of himself at that age — not real sure about that — and after Garrison hit him, Copeland said that he "likes him even more." The whole ordeal was bizarre and repetitive. Does Copeland need to move on from Cage?
Written by Kellie Haulotte
Rocked: Drew McIntyre & CM Punk (WWE Raw)
Monday's episode of "WWE Raw" kicked off with an in-ring promo segment featuring Drew McIntyre and CM Punk. While fans have yet to see these two wrestle one-on-one in WWE, their verbal exchange provided a compelling foundation for when the opportunity (hopefully) arises, eventually.
Coming off his loss to World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins last week, McIntyre was aggravated, particularly with how Damian Priest attempted to cash-in his Money in the Bank briefcase during the McIntyre-Rollins title match instead of waiting until after. McIntyre also brought up his ongoing frustrations with Jey Uso's arrival to "Raw" and CM Punk's return to WWE. Finally, McIntyre teased the idea of leaving the company for nine years, much like Punk did, so he could get a hero's reception of his own.
This statement cued the arrival of Punk, who laid out an open forum for McIntyre to express his thoughts. McIntyre then proceeded to make reference to Punk's previous stint in WWE, in which Punk was one of the self-proclaimed leaders of the locker room. As Punk soared as the WWE Champion at the time, McIntyre noted that he was battling some inner demons — something Punk didn't have, because, per McIntyre, Punk was a demon himself. And with Punk taking a near-decade hiatus from WWE, McIntyre declared that he was the leader in this situation now.
Punk later reiterated that he wasn't back to make friends in WWE, but rather, to win the Royal Rumble and main event WrestleMania. In response, McIntyre boastfully reminded Punk that he had already conquered both of those feats, during a time when WWE needed someone to step up in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
"Some of our superstars stepped away. If you were still here, you would probably step away too, because when the going gets tough, Punk gets going," McIntyre said.
Before tensions rose any further, Punk left the ring — but not before making one final proclamation, vowing to crush McIntyre's championship aspirations by eliminating him last from the Men's Royal Rumble on January 27.
Written by Ella Jay
Fell Flat: Lyra Valkyria's verbal exchange with Lola Vice (WWE NXT)
On Tuesday's episode of "WWE NXT," a confident Lyra Valkyria revealed that there would be a 20-Woman Battle Royal held next week that would finish by become a fatal four-way, with the final four left standing doing battle to determine who is next in line for an NXT" Women's Championship match. It was at this point that Elektra Lopez and Lola Vice interrupted her, with the latter reminding Valkyria she was still in possession of her Women's Breakout Tournament contract and putting her on notice. An argument ensued between the pair leading to a physical brawl between them, Lopez, and Tatum Paxley.
While Valkyria had a couple of good lines during her spat with Vice, this entire segment felt like one long advertisement for a Battle Royal and a future title match between them. I understand wanting to create hype, but this felt like a very uninspiring way of trying to do so. The time used up by this segment could've been used to build some sort of story aside from the inevitable contract cash-in (that will likely happen after Valkyria defends the title against her next contender), and it all felt very lackluster.
Written by Olivia Quinlan
Rocked: Oba Femi is here to dominate (WWE NXT digital esclusive)
There seems to be this misguided belief that wrestlers should be constantly learning on the job, to the point where people are often stretched outside of their comfort zones even if the results lead to less-than-quality television. This is why it is so refreshing to see "WWE NXT" understand that less is more when it comes to popular young upstart Oba Femi.
Femi cashed in his "NXT" Men's Breakout Tournament contract on Tuesday after the North American Championship match between Dragon Lee and Lexis King, taking the title from Lee moments after the "WWE SmackDown" star had successfully defended it. Following the win, Femi was asked what to expect from his reign as North American Champion; in response, Femi huffed, puffed, looked directly into the camera, and said "Domination," before swiftly exiting.
Less is always more, especially with massive a**-kickers like Femi, and it's wonderful to see WWE not overexpose the young giant. There's a lot of money to be made with the former shotputter if WWE can maintain his streamlined, minimalist presentation, especially in an overly-wordy promotion like "NXT" where we are often left sitting on our hands while wrestlers talk and talk and talk and talk. Finally, there's some promise of the hard-hitting, smash-mouth action that made Titan Sports worthy of that name.
Written by Ross Berman
Rocked: Samoa Joe's potential opponents (AEW Dynamite)
Samoa Joe knows how to cut a promo, and once again he showed fans as much this past Wednesday on "AEW Dynamite." The charismatic heel knows that everyone wants his AEW World Championship since he defeated former champion MJF at Worlds End, so he went ahead and shared a few rules, including a ban on "Hoe-a** comments" on social media or "cry babies" talking about their misfortunes to get a title shot.
That was when the man of the hour, Swerve Strickland, came out and told Joe he wanted the title. "Hangman" Adam Page came out next to talk about how he did a lot of stuff in 2023, including defeating Jon Moxley, but that he was coming back for his championship in 2024. Strickland left the ring with his eyes set on Page, who tried to intimidate Joe before leaving himself. Joe, of course, wasn't intimidated by anyone, holding the title up to pose for the crowd — but this wasn't the end for the champ, as HOOK's music hit. The laconic FTW Champion told Joe he's coming for the world title in one week, and they had an intense stare-down before HOOK departed.
All in all, it was a great promo segment with some of the most popular members of AEW's roster. It made the world title feel important, made the champion feel intimidating, and set the stage for presumably the next few months of the AEW main event scene.
Written by Kellie Haulotte
Fell Flat: Adam Cole repeats himself (AEW Dynamite)
On this week's episode of "AEW Dynamite," Adam Cole sat on a chair in the ring, surrounded by his new stable, the Undisputed KIngdom, and explained that each and every one of them would soon be wearing championship gold. Which is weird, because that's also what he did on last week's episode.
While last week's Undisputed Kingdom promo segment was a breath of fresh air after months of Cole trying in vain to play a believable babyface, this week's promo segment was flat-out a waste of time. It different from the previous edition only in that it was shorter and less specific, and therefore didn't matter in the slightest. It's really just Cole going through all the members of his group again, explaining why they're awesome and saying they don't need to earn respect because they should have it already. Which, fine, but you still have to tie it back to a person or an angle or something, otherwise there's literally no reason to care. Last week's promo was a direct follow-up to Worlds End and the long-running Cole/MJF storyline, and led to advancements in that storyline involving other characters. This week's promo followed a random Roderick Strong vs. Bryan Keith match and didn't involve any other characters (not even just by name) starting from nothing and building to nothing. It was extremely odd that MJF wasn't mentioned even once, and that's indicative of the fact that there was nothing to anchor this promo to reality — not even to fictional reality.
And then, to cap things off, we got this:
"Boys and girls, say hello to your new home," Cole said. "Or should I say, your new kingdom. And do me a favor, make sure you get comfortable, because we're gonna be here for a very, very long time."
That just ... that makes no sense. Those are gibberish nonsense words. "Make sure you get comfortable, because we're gonna be here for a very, very long time?" If you're going to be here a long time, aren't you the one getting comfortable? Is that not how that saying works? If we really had to shoehorn the whole "Homecoming" thing into this promo, could have been done in a way that didn't make thumbscrews sound like a pleasant alternative? Because if this metaphor were any more tortured it would have violated the Geneva Conventions.
Written by Miles Schneiderman