by Erin Anderson
Exclusive to OnlineOnslaught.com

I normally try to be positive about the WWE product, but there is an ugly cloud hanging over the potential greatness of Smackdown! I'm pissed off about it, and I'm going to bitch about it. If you don't like excessively negative columns (or profanity, for that matter), I'm warning you now: you won't like this one.

Not long ago, I wrote a column explaining why the Thursday night show was floundering, while Raw consistently entertained us every week: Raw was doing a bang-up job in preparation for their first brand-specific pay-per-view, while Smackdown! was just treading water. Well, now that Smackdown! has Vengeance just over a week from now, they should be blowing the roof off the place every Thursday night. With guys on the roster like Guerrero, Hardy, Benoit, Rhyno, Angle, Lesnar, Cena, Benjamin, Haas, and all the cruiserweights, they couldn't possibly fuck up. Right?

Apparently not. The writers and bookers don't have their priorities straight, as nearly every facet of the show is in some way overshadowed by the continuing saga of Stephanie, Vince, Sable, and Zach Gowen. While the need to build Zach up to the fans before they see him in a match is understandable, the fed has completely dropped the ball here: not just in the Vince/Zach and Stephanie/Sable feuds, but in the entire direction of the show.

Just take a look at last week's show; most of the matches barely made it past the three-minute mark. Cutting Guerrero v. Ultimo Dragon, Benoit/Rhyno v. Hardy/Moore, and the Basham Brothers v. Kidman/Mysterio short was just an all-around bad idea, as every single one of those matches had the potential to steal the show. And for what were these contests sacrificed? A full replay of the entire Gowen/Stephanie v. Big Show match from the week before. Honestly, was that really necessary? There is something very wrong here.

And to top it all off, Vince's presence on the show has taken attention away from where it belongs: the title belts. Vince stuck his nose in the Brock/Show/Angle feud last night by sending Lesnar home and "punishing" Kurt, which was entirely unnecessary. And the tournament for the newly reinstated U.S. Title has been mishandled from the start.

There was no big announcement that the belt was being brought back -- instead, Sable was chosen to blow the surprise for everyone in a backstage segment to piss off Stephanie and further a feud that nobody has any interest in. Why not have Stephanie open the show, making the huge announcement of a new title, and ordering that the first match in the tournament start right then? Or have the show open with a pre-taped montage in which Stephanie goes through the matches for the show and explains the significance of the new belt? She did the latter last fall for the introduction of the tag titles, and the former to determine the number one contender for Brock's title following Wrestlemania. Both instances worked well and got the fans interested.

The absence of brackets in the early part of the tournament also downplayed its significance. Brackets ordinarily make it easy to predict the finalists, but not in the case of the U.S. Title tournament. Any number of competitors -- Cena, Hardy, Benoit, Rhyno, Guerrero -- could plausibly win the belt. When the fans don't have brackets to look at, it's difficult to get hyped up for something like a Matt Hardy/Rikishi match. Why should we care when no attention has been paid to the belt and we don't know who the winner will be facing next?

Without any kind of build-up, no brackets, and criminally short matches, a tournament which had the potential to carry the entire show for a month has been shoved on the back burner in favor of a McMahon soap opera. My only consolation is that Benoit and Guerrero are likely to steal the show at Vengeance; we expect nothing less from those two, and they are going to deliver. But wait… isn't Eddie supposed to be a heel? I'd sort of forgotten about that, since he hasn't been given any time to develop a heel persona. Giving him a promo won't cut it -- he needs to kick the ass of a babyface that the fans are solidly behind. Tajiri just won't cut it.

Even the tag team title match slated for Vengeance has suffered at the expense of the McMahons. Mysterio/Kidman v. The World's Greatest Tag Team looks great on paper, but the two teams had no interaction of any sort last night. Why? Vince felt the need to punish Kurt Angle (and get himself over as an even bigger heel) by putting him a handicap match with the tag champions and the Big Show. In the meantime, Kidman and Mysterio took on two masked men in a match that served no purpose, save making the two cruiserweights look good in the ring. We already know how talented Kidman and Mysterio are, so the match was completely pointless. Would it have been so difficult to have those two take out Benjamin and Haas in the main event? Now there is only one show for a feud to develop between the champions and the number one contenders -- not much of a build-up there.

The best build-ups for Vengeance have been for Vince/Gowen and Stephanie/Sable. I reiterate: the most intensive build-ups have been for two matches which involve three non-wrestlers and are likely to be the poorest matches on the card. If Vince's rambling promos are any indication, they are also likely to run twice as long as they need to. Why is Smackdown!'s focus continually placed on a soap-opera storyline, when its obvious strength is in the ring? Why in the blue hell is a show that employs some of the best wrestlers in the Western Hemisphere not using said wrestlers?

I don't really dislike Vince or Stephanie McMahon as performers. Both of them, especially Vince, entertain me when I see them in small doses. But I'll go on record right now: their extended presence on my television screen every Thursday night is completely ruining Smackdown! for me. The only thing that saves the shows for me is the outstanding wrestling that we see when it's given enough time (just look at Benoit/Hardy from last night). While Smackdown! may not completely suck, it's not great when it very easily could be. With that in mind, I'd like print an open, ranting letter to Vince McMahon:

Dear Mr. McMahon,

GET YOUR UGLY ASS OFF MY TELEVISION SCREEN. Pronto. Like yesterday. Haven't your tortured us enough already with your boring family saga that nobody gives two shits about? Seriously, nobody gives a fuck. You're putting yourself in front of the performers who made you filthy stinking rich, and driving down ratings and buyrates in the process. I don't want to see you beat up a one-legged wrestler, I don't want to see Stephanie and Sable in food fights, and I don't want to hear another one of your interminable promos where you insinuate that you fucked Sable again. Ever. Plot developments like that give me an almost uncontrollable urge to vomit.

Are you trying to bring some dramatic storylines to Smackdown? Leave that to Raw, a show filled with entertainers who have the mic skills and acting chops to pull it off. Let the guys on Smackdown! do what they do best -- kick the shit out of each other every week.

Just give it a fucking rest, okay? You bore me, and even worse, make me want to change the channel.

Kiss my ass,

Erin Anderson
A devoted fan that you've pissed off too many times.

E-MAIL ERIN
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Erin Anderson is an Atlanta native and a student at Georgia State University. Since writing about wrestling didn't go over too well with her English professors, she vents here at Online Onslaught.

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