Vince Russo Explains Why In-Ring Wrestling Has Been Changing, Says Agents Are Responsible

On the most recent edition of Vince Russo's Nuclear Heat, the former WWF, WCW and TNA writer examines why in-ring wrestling has changed so much in recent years.

Russo said that American wrestling started to change a lot when the cruiserweight division hit WCW. The WWF adopted a less successful light heavyweight division, and later, TNA Wrestling would help kick off their promotion with the X-Divsion.

"Slowly but surely, that one X-Division match would turn into two X-Division matches, and a lot of the old school agents really did not know how to lay out an X-Division match. So basically what the relied on was the talent laying out those matches. The agent would go to the X-Division talent and say 'this is what we're looking for, this is the finish we need, ' and let the talent lay out the match," Russo said.

See Also: Vince Russo Ranks Best And Worst Wrestling Television Shows In The U.S.

Vince said that he would often see the talents backstage repeatedly going over their X-Division matches, whether it be to themselves or their opponent for the evening. Russo said that he feared when that happened, they would forget the characters that needed to be defined.

Russo points to a few agents that worked this style in their careers, and says that wrestlers that have worked the cruiserweight style in their careers are now working as an agent for heavier wrestlers.

"Some of them have become agents. Shane Helms was more or less an X-Division guy who is now agenting some of the heavyweight matches. He's bringing the knowledge of what he knows to the traditional wrestling matches, so the traditional matches are becoming more like X-Division matches," Russo said.

Russo sees similar things happening in the WWE.

"Jamie Noble was an X-Divsion wrestler and that's the way he was trained. He's now bringing that over to the more traditional matches," Russo said.

Also, don't forget to check out Vince Russo following tonight's Raw on the Wrestling Inc Podcast. We will also have an exclusive interview with Shane Helms coming up soon on Wrestling Inc.

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