Shining a Spotlight 4.08.10: Gimmick Matches

This week, however, was not an example of that mentality. Instead, TNA, a company that’s already given us some crazy-ass stipulation matches outdid themselves with that bizarre Knockouts match. For those who might have missed it, here were the rules:
1. 8 Knockouts competed in an elimination tag team match.
2. If someone is pinned or forced to submit, they’re eliminated and the person who got the fall has to leave the match.
3. The winner of those falls, gets one of four lockbox keys.
4. The keys contain either Tara‘s rat, a contract for any match at anytime, the Knockouts title or being forced to strip to bra and panties.

So basically, Tara loses the Knockouts title when Angelina opens the right box and Tara ends up with her rat and Daphne does a strip-tease ending in a messy fight. The Knockouts, the division that is supposed to be so much better than the Divas, ends up looking foolish thanks to this completely ridiculous bout. It got me to thinking on how much “gimmick” matches have gotten massively convoluted in the last few years and that’s not exactly a good thing for the business.
　

Evolution

Look, I’m not exactly a wrestling purist. I like some wild “garbage” battles as much as the next guy. And let’s face it, stipulation bouts do have a history in the business as promoters have wanted to spice things up. Battle royals and tag team bouts started as gimmicks, after all and you had stuff like lumberjack matches and then ladder bouts. Mexico still packs in folks with hair vs. mask matches as they’re able to use tradition of the masked wrestlers to their advantage. One of the absolute coolest matches ever, War Games, was a gimmick bout that worked wonderfully. The whole idea of spending the better part of half an hour whittling your opponents down in a double-ring cage was great and led to terrific brawls. That sort of thing was great to use the gimmick idea for.

But other bouts failed to really connect. Scaffold matches might seem cool but never work out because no one wants to take a bad fall from that height. Just ask Jim Cornette, when Bubba Rogers failed to catch him and he landed from a 20-foot scaffold and blew out both his knees. And I never understood that whole “triple decker cage” thing both WCCW and WCW tried out, it never made much sense or worked out properly. Coal Miner’s Glove bouts, or hell, any bout where the object is to get something off a pole generally end up being lame. Sure, a gimmick match is good but you can’t make it so convoluted the fans are unable to follow it properly.

ECW gets a bad rap for leaning too much on gimmicks with so many brawls and things like Taipei blood matches where guys punch each other with fists taped and covered in glass, giving ECW its rep for “mindless violence.” The barbed wire Terry Funk/Sabu match was pretty much a total mess of a bout and not in a good bloody way and table matches were good but the over reliance on them took away from the actual good wrestling ECW was capable of. The more cynical can point out that relying so much on gimmick bouts was a way to overcome the weaknesses of the ECW roster in the ring.

WWE has somewhat understood that. Ladder matches are clear-cut and easy to follow especially adding things like MITB and Hell in the Cell takes cages to a new level. But the Elimination Chamber is pretty confusing to me. Hell, I enjoy better the whole set-up bouts first where they fight to see who can get in first with timed matches. It’s okay but still not as wild or amazing as WWE likes to pretend it is. TLC bouts were good at first but the constant use of them weakened the great concept and can get pretty mess now. On the other hand, they still have the Royal Rumble, which remains one of the most brilliant match concepts ever. But if I never see another Inferno match or Punjabi prison bout, I’ll be a happy man as those are just way too over the top. And don’t get me started on the humiliating stuff for Divas like “lingere battle royals” or such. It’s gotten to the point of WWE doing PPVs with nothing but stip matches which sounds good but can be overwhelming to fans. An old rule is that you put too much wild stuff in the undercard, fans get worn out and tired of it by the end of the card. Spreading it out is a much better idea, one that a lot of companies can ignore.
　

TNA’s Addiction
　
So WWE can go too far with their gimmicks and such. But TNA seems to really have a problem with making matches as complex as possible. It’s easy to blame Russo as the man’s WCW tenure was filled with ridiculous matches like the “San Francisco 49’ers Box match” where the object was to open four boxes, one with the WCW title, the other three with various whacky items; the “Junkyard Invitation”, a brawl held in real junkyard with three major injuries among the fighters; a match between Dean Malenko and Kidman that would end if a guy left the ring, Malenko forgetting the rules and thus losing in a minute; and matches ending with guys doused in “blood.”

Russo really seemed to have a problem in WCW with embracing the entire “wrestling” concept and that sadly seems to have continued a bit in TNA. True, you can’t blame him for every whacky TNA bout but clearly some carry his fingerprints. That’s not all bad. Ultimate X is still a brilliant match, a ladder bout with no ladder, just cables and that leads to some of the coolest spots imaginable. A favorite part of the year is when Mike Tenay talks about King of the Mountain and how “the rules are very simple,” then spends over five minutes explaining them. The whole thing is wild but as it only happens once a year, you can stand it. Hell, I didn’t even mind that “reverse battle royal” idea they did a couple of years back, I didn’t think it was the train wreck so many say it was.

But some of these other TNA ideas can be downright insane. I still remember that match between Abyss and Dr. Stevie at Christmas time so you had a tree filled with metal knives to try and use for weapons. “Feast or Fired” may seem fun but the whole “object on a pole” motif is still a poor match concept. It really seems like Russo and other matchmakers in TNA have a problem with matches that can be clear-cut and easy, they assume fans want them to be wildly over-the-top with stips and even some of the most confusing rules imaginable. They want to do some cool Knockouts match, okay, but when you have rules that literally take five minutes and graphics to explain and the results still seem confusing as hell, that’s not a good thing. TNA has some awesome wrestling out there with Styles, Daniels, Angle and others but shoving them into these types of matches makes TNA look weaker. That goes for WWE too as the matchmakers can be a bit too blinded by the gimmick to see the effects.

Back to Basics

Again, I hate sounding like one of those “things were so much better in the old days” type of guys. I recognize how times have changed and the audience as well. People don’t really go for forty or sixty minute battles anymore, they want excitement and gimmick bouts do provide that. But you have to know how properly to use them. WWE has made mistakes a lot with stuff like Punjabi Prison and Elimination Chamber but they still have cool stuff like the Rumble. TNA also makes things work like Ultimate X and King of the Mountain.

But just throwing out some wild gimmick bout with no real warning or impact isn’t a good thing. Sometimes it works better with a TV show than a PPV as I didn’t really see this Knockouts battle working for a three-hour show but did well for the Impact broadcast. The problem was, again, that when fans have to take notes to figure out the rules of a match, it just distracts from whatever impact it might have. Hell, I often still can’t figure out how the Elimination Chamber works even as I watch it as they have to constantly remind you of the rules but it gets bothersome. You can argue a lot about how it also devalues the titles by letting them change hands on a random choice but that’s a whole other discussion.

I’m not saying get rid of gimmick bouts totally as they can be big deals. Again, Mexico continually packs in massive crowds with mask vs. hair, a concept that’s been done for decades. Ladder matches, cage matches, no-DQ fights, they all work when used okay. But just throwing out some wild match with overly-complicated rules and expecting fans to automatically buy it is a bit much. Saving some for PPVs is good although some do work better on free TV. But you have to make sure they’re effective and not just ridiculous contests. And even the biggest TNA marks have to admit that at least WWE doesn’t turn their matches or title changes into Deal or No Deal stuff. The whole point of MITB is you earn the briefcase through a wild ladder bout against seven or eight other guys, not get one chance in four to open the right box. And if I have to watch one more Abyss match involving tacks or nails or other objects allowed, I’m going to scream. TNA has so much talent, they don’t need to rely on these types of bouts every week and it just makes them look weaker. WWE can be the same but at least they don’t go too wild on them nearly every single week and/or PPV. True, they have Extreme Rules which is a PPV of stip matches but considering how TNA practically does that every month themselves, it doesn’t look as insane even though it just makes both companies look like they can’t push real matches and feuds instead of giving fans real matches.Look at Wrestlemania which had some great bouts with Cena/Batista and Michaels/Undertaker that showed how a no-stips bout between two top competitors can blow fans away. Both companies have the talent to entertain and don’t have to rely on these crazy matches to sustain fans. Hopefully, they can both accept that.

Summation