The Heel Report: 01.12.12: Selfish Bully

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.

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

Top of the pile once again after a TNA PPV is the heel World Champ; Bobby Roode. TNA actually seem to be doing a good job of putting Roode over as a Flair/Triple H-esque champion who will do anything to retain the belt. His biggest test was definitely against Jeff Hardy, a man who by any logic should never be let near a world title again, but then this is TNA and often logic doesn’t come into it. If you saw the match then you will know why Roode is number one on the list, not only did he keep his title but he really did do it by any means necessary. He tried to walk out more than once, used the ropes, and the ref, and when that didn’t work he called for a time out and then hit the referee square in the nuts to cause a disqualification, its been done before but Roode certainly did it with style.

2nd Place: Bully Ray

This may seem like a weird choice seeing as Ray ended his match with Abyss by lying flat on his back on a barb-wire board, but let me explain. First there is the fact that Bully Ray attacked Abyss backstage after the match, add to that his dominance on the last Impact, and then factor in the sheer effort and carnage that Bully brought to his match and you’d have to be mad not to see him as one of the top heels of the week. He gave us the barb-wire sandwich, then suffered cheese-grater to the nuts anguish, was Choke-slammed onto thumb-tacks, and then took a Black-hole Slam onto barb-wire. But what he took, he took well, and he also dished out his fair share, enough to make him look damn good by the end of it all.

3rd Place: Daniel Bryan

Considering that I pulled my punches with Jericho last week it might seem strange that I am jumping the gun on Bryan now, but seriously the guy is clearly a heel already. If you describe a guy as begging to get a disqualification win as anything but a heel then you are deluded as to how professional wrestling works. No, Bryan is a heel for definite, what’s more he has taken Jericho’s ‘irritatingly nice guy’ gimmick and already made it better with his interaction with the Big Show on Raw and his general over-celebrations with his World Heavyweight title. This is just the beginning my friends.

4th Place: Kurt Angle

Next is the Olympic Gold Medalist, who had a little more trouble with his Genesis opponent than Bobby Roode, but still managed to come out on top thanks to a more subtle thumb to the eye and kick to the ‘nethers, as well as a poor looking Super Kick. Angle finally got one over on the Cowboy and I for one couldn’t be happier, I really don’t get the buzz around James Storm and when people were saying that he makes for a better champion than Roode I had no idea why people would think that. I just can’t relate to the guy in any way, maybe that’s just because I’m not a dumb, red-neck hick.

5th Place: Kane

The Big Red Machine came out at the start of Raw and did what he does best this week; take a non-sensicle angle made up by WWE creative and deliver a monologue that not only completely explains and justifies that angle, but also makes his character’s reasoning down right understandable. I loved how he accused the audience of not embracing the hate, labeling both the Cena supporters and deniers as being self-deluded and pathetic. He also justified his terrorization of Zack Ryder before going on to live up to his word and ended the night by destroying both men in the lead up to his match with Cena at the Rumble, all that’s left to ask is how much punishment can he inflict on them before the PPV?

6th Place: Austin Aries

If you thought that A-Double would be left off the chart after a TNA PPV then you are sorely mistaken. TNA are doing two things right and that is having solid heel champions in both their main event and their mid-card. What I really like is that while Roode is the type of champion who is desperate to keep his title against a tide of top-tier face challengers, Aries is a cocky and conniving champ who is working his way though the same guys as they struggle to find some way to actually beat the guy, and at the mid-card level you can get away with that. I’m not sure how much we should thank the bookers and how much we should thank the men themselves, but one thing is for sure; we should be thankful that TNA finally has got their act together in some regard.

7th Place: Cody Rhodes

If it weren’t for the TNA PPV then Master Rhodes would have come much higher on the chart. After a great title defense that saw Rhodes looking completely dominant, turning away Booker’s best moves and then beating him without using his own, he then went on to verbally bitch-slap his own brother, moving things along one step further to their upcoming feud. The Rhodes boys will clearly now be facing off against each other at the Royal Rumble rather than Wrestlemania, or so it would seem, which leaves me to wonder exactly what the plans could be for the fastest rising heel in the company.

8th Place: Gail Kim

Kim had two successful title defenses this week but not that much to say on the mic and not too much heel presence in either match. Instead the champ mainly relied on help from Madison Rayne and then escaped with her Knock-Out title by being laid out by her opponent Mickie James after failing to successfully employ the use of a pair of Brass Knucks. You could count Gail as TNA’s third main-stay heel champion, although her current style is that of the Miz during his US and tag team title reign and it doesn’t suit this more talented performer in my opinion, Kim could defend her titles much more forcibly and still be believable. Still a win is a win, and a successful heel champion is still something to cheer in my book.

9th Place: Gunnner

I think we were all surprised by this one, with the aid of Ric Flair by his side Gunner managed to knock off the whole F*in’ Show; RVD. Sure he had some help in the form of a DDT to the concrete but he still got the three count at the end of the night and that is a major statement in my book. Of course this big win might partly be explained if the rumors of a WWE return for RVD are actually true since surely TNA would want to use him to put over their new talent while they have the chance and they wouldn’t shy away from making Rob eat a few pins before he made his way out of the company. If not then TNA must just have a great deal of faith in Gunner, let’s just hope he can live up to it.

10th Place: Zema Ion

Another loser at the PPV comes last, but an interesting loser shall we say. Zema Ion looked damn good in the X-Division title match, only being eliminated by a sneaky small-package, and then he returned to screw over the guy that pinned him; Jesse Sorenson, arguably costing him the matchup. Ion has gone from nothing to interesting in the space of a few weeks and it is just a shame that he wasn’t included in WWE’s recent influx of high-flying talent as I think he could go far if given the opportunity, but with Aries as the dominant alpha male heel of the X-Division it is unlikely that he will be getting near the title again any time soon, at least not with any success.

Rolling Chart (Week 23):

1. Mark Henry (135)

2. Cody Rhodes (117)

3. Alberto Del Rio (96)

4. The Miz (87)

5. Wade Barrett (72)

6. Robert Roode (70)

7. Dolph Ziggler (67)

8. Christian (59)

9. Bully Ray (51)

10. Austin Aries (49)

The Wright View

The Face-Off: Sting & Jeff Hardy

While I might have been mostly positive about TNA this week, one thing that really has stuck in my craw, apart from Jeff Hardy being back in TNA in general, is that now apparently Sting is the main guy behind him. I understand the whole idea of second chances, but there are just some things that shouldn’t be forgiven, and not caring about a title, company, or the fans enough not to turn up to a PPV intoxicated is one of them. Apart from anything else I find it strange that Sting persists with the view that as a born-again Christian he couldn’t go to the WWE, and yet he is fine with all the goings on in TNA, it makes no sense, especially with the whole ‘PG’ climate right now. Now I don’t exactly want Sting in WWE as he would be just like Nash and be taking a payday away from younger and much more capable wrestlers, but I just get annoyed by that illogical thinking. The worst thing is that I’m pretty sure these two are going to be main stays in TNA main events and storylines for at least most of the year, which is a depressing thought.

Face the Facts: Brotus Clay

It’s only the second week in 2012 and we already have a candidate for OMG moment of the year, this really was something I think none of us saw coming. First that Brotus Clay would actually debut on Raw, and second that his debut would actually almost have been worth waiting for. I personally thought that Clay’s debut had become a running joke that would never actually happen, and if it did that it would result in a couple of squash matches before being quickly relegated back to Superstars, or lord forbid; NXT. Instead we got a surprise in that Clay came out and was actually interesting, the WWE have tried this gimmick before but this time I think they are actually onto something as Clay is just the right build to be both funky and a dinosaur in the ring, so the funk-a-saurous gets a big thumbs up from me, at least for now.

On the Rise: Kurt Angle (& James Storm)

Now I have already talked about Kurt Angle this week, and I’ve also mentioned my dislike for James Storm, but here I want to talk about their feud thus far in retrospect. To me looking back on this feud it has actually been one of the most solidly built feuds in TNA in quite awhile. Storm comes out of nowhere and takes Angle’s title away from him, giving Angle the motive to get revenge. Meanwhile Storm loses the title and is forced to abandon his championship dreams in favour of AJ Styles after Kurt Angle exacts his revenge in a blind-side attack before Storm’s rematch with Roode. Then the two go onto feud on successive PPVs, both men getting a victory a piece, setting up for the inevitable final confrontation, possibly in a steel cage. It is textbook, but for TNA, who often seem to do everything but have simple feuds and who seem to have a text book where all the words have been taken out and the pages are covered by crude pictures of penis’, it is something to sing about.

Flat-Footed: Drew McIntyre

Yes the Sinister Scotsman is here again, this time for the heinous crime of losing to Santino Marella. Now for those of you who read my other heel report that runs on WrestlingTruth.com you’ll know that I don’t usually overlap anything, but here I am willing to make an exception as Drew clearly deserves to be in the Flat-Footed column anywhere and everywhere this week. Now maybe the WWE are leading up to some type of come back and maybe finally we will see the return of a dominant Drew McIntyre, but more likely they will just continue to humiliate him until he leaves and we can cement the lesson etched out by John Morrison, which is that in the WWE you should stay away from the divas, or at least treat them like the company do; as if they have little importance and should only be used sparingly for a quick fix before being tossed aside again. Not really a great lesson, but then again the WWE aren’t really the greatest role models for female rights at the moment are they.

That’s all for this week, it has been a busy time for heels and a bunch of talented WWE guys didn’t make it onto the chart due to their TNA counterparts (unlike on my other heel report that you should all check out). I have to say I was disappointed by Jericho this week on Raw, after what was a great start last week he let us down by just showing us the same thing again, I think it would have been better if he had just not shown up at all, kept us in the dark and annoyed us further, this gimmick of not speaking is already feeling tired and its only been two weeks! Still perhaps he has more in store, whatever the case he is certainly playing the long game, so we will just have to see. For now this is James Wright signing off.