The Heel Report: 12.18.11: Dashingly Selfish

Each Week there are ten places, with points out of ten awarded based on these positions. These points are then added to a rolling chart that will continue each week to show who is wrestling’s overall top heel.

Sorry for the lateness this week, all the images on the report were broken for some reason and I don’t usually check back after I’ve posted as it is at least 1am GMT when I post.

This is a place where the heels of TNA and the WWE can be praised for all the hard work they do trying to get us all to hate them, so without further ado let’s get on with the report…

Weekly Top Ten

1st Place: Robert Roode

If you thought it was going to be anyone else at number one then you were sorely mistaken. Despite TNA being borderline retarded in their finish of Final Resolution, and if you’ve seen the spoilers then you’ll know how they’ve dealt with that one on the next Impact, the in-ring work of the match was top notch. Roode started off his week in TNA by spitting in the face of Dixie Carter, finished the night off on Impact on top and then waltzed into his Iron Man match with AJ knowing that he was facing a wounded challenger. Roode has started off his title run right, despite the unreliable booking he has managed to put across the character of a ruthless heel champion who will do anything to keep the belt. I for one hope that TNA realise the unique position they are in with Roode. The fact is that TNA has a hardcore group of fans who won’t abandon the company no matter what, and on the other hand there is a hardcore group of wrestling fans who will never watch the show; basically what I am saying is that their ratings are probably going to stay about the same, and as such they have nothing to lose from trying to pull off a long standing heel champion. TNA really needs to try to differentiate themselves from the WWE and a great way of doing that would be to have one consistent champion who stood at the head of the company for a good year at least, further highlighting the ‘hot potato’ situation in the WWE at the moment with their major titles.

2nd Place: Cody Rhodes

Rhodes is truly amazing, he doesn’t even have to feature on a PPV or even win a match to claim second place on the chart. Rhodes earns more points in a five minute promo than some guys do in a fifteen minute match. Attacking Booker T and then representing well on commentary gave him a good standing, and his great performance in the Fatal Four Way on Raw pushed him over the edge. It is clear that Rhodes is going to go over in his feud with Booker T and it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy since Rhodes has spent the past year developing his character and now with a fleshed out persona and a fresh set of knee pads he is ready to take things to the next level and should be in the main event by this time next year.

3rd Place: Austin Aries

Not being featured on Impact hurt A-Double as with even a short promo on the mic he would have overtaken Rhodes’ score and scored himself second place. Still Aries clearly deserves to be at the higher end of the chart after having a brilliant heel-orientated match with Kid Kash. Apart from all the bad guy goodness in the match, the end sequence with the roll of quarters and the title belt were shades of the late, great Eddie Guerrero, and Aries still managed to finish off strong with the Brain-buster. Kid Kash was clearly the sacrificial lamb in this match, but he also gave a good showing for himself. My only complaint would be that Kash clearly wasn’t the established face for the match, in fact you could argue that it was Aries, only because the crowd was cheering for him so loud throughout the whole god damn match.

4th Place: Wade Barrett

The Barratt Barrage just isn’t enough to see Barrett through to the top spot this week, although he did give a nice effort, facing off against Ezekiel Jackson and winning, and going toe-to-toe with the Big Show and not being utterly destroyed. Considering Barrett’s promo on the Big Show before the match I was surprised that he didn’t end up flat on his arse with a choke-slam. The best thing that Barrett did this week was be constantly in the head of the Viper by running in and making sure he was a persistent presence, costing Orton on Raw and nearly achieving the same beforehand. Of course Orton technically beat Barrett in the ‘Beat the Clock’ challenge, but did that stipulation choice really hurt Barrett or was it just an arbitrary stipulation to support a gimmicky PPV?

5th Place: The Miz

The Miz stepped up this week, after last week’s contract signing where he basically got his arse handed to him he cut a burning promo on Punk, who was buried in a ladder at the time, that made him not only look dominant over Punk, but also like the leader in the team of him and Del Rio. I have no illusions that Punk is going to retain at TLC still, but at least now there is some intrigue and Punk’s title at least appears to be in jeopardy.

6th Place: Dolph Ziggler

He used to be perfection and now he is just a show off, but at least he managed to win the great Fatal Four Way that took place on Raw. He might have lost out to Ryder as Most Trending Superstar of the Year but who cares, that award is for marks and we all really know who is the best mid-carder of the year; Mr. Ziggles! While the WWE are apparently aboard the Ryder Express now and Ziggler will most likely lose to him at TLC I can’t imagine it will be very long before we see Ziggler go against Punk again, only this time the title will be on the line.

7th Place: Gail Kim

The real queen of the Knockouts makes it onto the chart after beating Hardcore Country to retain her Knockouts title. Mickie got in quite a lot of offence in on the champ and there wasn’t too much actual heel work in the match so Kim doesn’t get any higher on the chart, but the match itself was great and was reminiscent of the type of women’s matches that were being wrestled ten years ago, which for once is a good thing for TNA.

8th Place: Alberto Del Rio

Coming slightly behind his partner in crime this week is the relatively silent Mexican Aristocrat. Del Rio did help win the match on Raw and then locked C.M. Punk in a ladder and slapped on the Cross Armbreaker. Despite his title match at TLC, I can’t see Del Rio lasting too much longer in the title picture considering how stale he has appeared as a heel on the mic. He still deserves to be a mainstay on Raw, but not in the title picture, hopefully the WWE will realise this, that way they can avoid the whole Cena debacle of constantly keeping a guy in the main event who clearly doesn’t deserve to be there and then you get much of your fan base hating the very guy that you so desperately want them to love. How big would Cena have been if he was allowed to evolve naturally?

9th Place: Mark Henry

Again the World’s Strongest Champion can’t catch a break and comes in at the lower end of the chart. He was saved from being taken out by Cena with the return of Kane and did technically finish off the night by World’s Strongest Slamming the face of the company, but what with being chaired and not getting a single pin over anyone this week, Henry is lucky that he has such a vast lead on the overall chart. I’m sure that Henry will keep going strong after TLC but he will also have to step things up if he is going to maintain his rep as a dominant monster heel champion.

10th Place: Jeff Jarrett

Last but not least is the man destined for foreign shores as soon as the next Impact rolls around, or at least I hope that is the case. Jarrett lost to Hardy in a convincing fashion but I have to give him credit for being in a PPV Steel Cage match, even when on the losing end of things. Jarrett facilitated Hardy’s road to the world title and that is an unforgivable sin, as such I hope he never darkens the chart again.

Rolling Chart (Week 19):

1. Mark Henry (129)

2. Cody Rhodes (95)

3. Alberto Del Rio (88)

4. The Miz (78)

5. Christian (59)

6. Wade Barrett (55)

7. Dolph Ziggler (48)

8. Robert Roode (47)

9. R-Truth (47)

10. Austin Aries (44)

The Wright View

The Face Off: JR & The Worst Rap Battle in History

This one is obvious but the fact is that this segment just showed that JR is just past it when it comes to being on the mic or on commentary. The whole thing was just plain embarrassing, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything so excruciatingly painful in the history of the WWE. The whole Michael Cole arc has been one massive train wreck and just seems to be for the fun of the boys backstage, punishing the audience for a few laughs at the expense of guys who really should have been fired five years ago is not something that a faltering company should be doing. This isn’t the Attitude Era, a Mae Young Hand style storyline can kill the WWE’s popularity even more, they don’ t have a free pass to put on crap like this and have everyone still want to watch them. I’m really hoping that the guys backstage realise just how dire all this is and that they actually stop with whatever it is that they are trying to set up with Cole and JR. Fire both of them and bring in some new announcing talent!

Face the Facts: Road Dogg & The Pipe Bomb of the Year

Possibly a stupid title but I have to admit that when you work all those clips together like that you realise that there actually have been some funny moments this year and in a sea of mediocre promos there have been some flashes of brilliance, most of which came from people going off script. I think that was reflected in the host of the awards; Road Dogg. The guy hasn’t been on the mic in the WWE for years and he clearly hadn’t missed a beat, which is a lot easier to do when you don’t rely on scripted promos from week to week. I think that the WWE is starting to realise that going off the script isn’t such a bad thing for the guys who actually have the talent to pull it off and I wouldn’t be surprised if much more promo work begins to be organic as the WWE has always been good at noticing a trend and capitalising on it, sometimes to ridiculous degrees.

On the Rise: Gunner & The Destruction of Garrett Bischoff

This was a make or break moment for Gunner. Facing Garrett on Impact and losing once again would have confirmed him as a joke within the company and I wouldn’t have been surprised if he wasn’t seen too much again. Instead he stepped up and took out Bischoff’s son with the greatest of ease. Carrying on from this it looks like Gunner will be TNA’s new garbage man after reading the Impact spoilers and I for one am pleased for him. I know that Gunner has had some choice words for the IWC in the past but that doesn’t change the fact that the guy looks like he can go. He might not be on par with someone like Robert Roode or Austin Aries, but I could certainly see him feuding convincingly with guys like Mr. Anderson or Matt Morgan. He definitely doesn’t need to be jobbing out to a guy like Garrett Bischoff, so well done TNA for not going down that road twice in a row.

Flat-Footed: Kane & The Pointless Re-Masking

Kane’s surprise return on Raw has been met with some split reviews. Now I personally have always liked Kane, at least as a heel, but his re-masking seems just strange to me. I honestly can’t see how the WWE thought that this was a justifiable move on their part, besides it all factoring into their plans to break the ‘most masks in one building’ world record, which really doesn’t seem worth it to me. Apart from anything else Kane’s return is confusing because he should be coming back to get revenge on Mark Henry for taking him out months ago, instead he came out to Choke slam a fallen John Cena. Does this make Kane a heel? Was Cena just unfortunate and this was all another part of Cena’s potential heel turn? Or could Kane not see through his mask and ended up making a terrible mistake? I honestly don’t know, but I do know that a re-masked Kane is not the same as a masked Kane and the Big Red Machine will not be the unstoppable monster that everyone is hoping he will be.