The Heel Report 11.15.13: Pier-Six Brawl

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, after 100 weeks naming the reigning wrestler a ‘Heel Centurion’.

This is a place where the heels of wrestling can be praised for all the hard work they do trying to get us all to hate them (or in other words the smarkiest chart of smarkdom ever to smark), so without further ado let’s get on with the report…

1st Place: Alberto Del Rio

It’s one of those weeks where the sneaky Del Rio managed to steal the top spot again since no one else really stepped up and made a massive impression in terms of ‘heeldom’. The interaction between the Shield and the Wyatts was nice and it is something I have been waiting for since the Wyatts first debuted in the WWE, but fighting amongst themselves and then being run off after putting aside their differences didn’t do too much for their standings, although certainly the Wyatt Family as a unit didn’t do so bad on their own, just not enough to beat out Del Rio.
To be fair to the guy he did get wins over the Great Khali and Big E. Langston this week, as well as giving a very simple generic foreign heel promo, as he often does. He also managed to brutalise John Cena’s arm in the same manner as he did when he first debuted in the WWE, and if this wasn’t John Cena we were talking about then you might have even thought that this was an angle to take a guy so soon back from injury out again, bit of course it is just yet another thing for the announcers to carp on about while singing the praises of John Cena while he is massively booed by a majority of the audience.
Honestly I am surprised that Cena got the strongly negative reaction he did, even here in England. After all he has been talking about bringing prestige back to the world title, something many people in the IWC have wanted for a long time, he is staying out of the main event picture at least for now, and he is facing a man universally detested by the fans of the WWE; the aforementioned Alberto Del Rio. Yet still the fans have beef, maybe Cena shouldn’t be such a smiley douche all the time, or maybe these fans are just stubborn, who knows.

2nd Place: Bully Ray

I thought it was pretty surprising this week that the Aces & 8s stayed together in the name of Bully Ray, although it wasn’t a pleasant surprise. Now that everything seems to have been played out in this up and down saga it really is time for the group to come to an end, after all what real backup do they provide for the Bully anymore? And why does he need backup anyway? Hell even Taz doesn’t have that many annoying ‘Club business’ related things to blather on about anymore (thank heavens for small mercies eh?).
Still this all led to the Bully getting the jump on Ken Anderson and once again beating him within an inch of his life. I am not sure that I care about this feud all that much, I’m not even sure if I buy this as a reason to keep the Bully out of the title hunt before AJ returns, but it is sure better than him getting shuffled back down the card like someone like Sabin or countless superstars in the WWE who have won a world title and then never climbed to those heights again.

3rd Place: The Wyatt Family

Wow this was a busy week for the Wyatts, with at least one family member appearing on every show, NXT included, and coming away with victories on two of those occasions. I love that the WWE seem to be leaning away from turning Reigns face against the rest of the Shield just yet, and instead seem to be turning the whole group face while the Wyatts position themselves more in conjuncture with the powers which I assume are HHH and Stephanie McMahon.
I really like the angle of ‘evil’ wrestlers being drawn to the ‘evil’ regime, Kane being an example of this, and the Wyatts don’t seem too far behind. I highly doubt they will have the same corporate makeover however, which I am glad for since outside of that first appearance on Raw last week, so far corporate Kane isn’t actually all that impressive, being much less corrupt monster and much more like a larger version of David Otunga.
This potential feud between the Shield and the Wyatts has been fantasy booked since their debut to lead up to Wrestlemania XXX and it is possible that such a scenario could actually take place. The two teams combine for Survivor Series, things go wrong, eventual face turn for the Shield, interactions at the Royal Rumble, maybe one or more members of the Shield/Wyatts get put in Elimination Chamber matches, and some interactions their lead to a big three-on-three matchup at Mania. Of course this could all go down a hell of a lot quicker than expected but I really hope not as this could be a feud that could be drawn out for quite some time and even help in the rejuvenation of the tag team division as a secondary storyline outside of the titles themselves.

4th Place: Robert Roode

The IT Factor has seemingly once again found himself in the middle of a blood feud that is more interesting than a lot of the other main event angles on Impact, this time against the Olympic Gold Medalist; Kurt Angle.
The problem with this feud, at least for me, is that it requires great matches between the two not having a satisfying ending, and what’s more Angle has to get the big win as that is what the angle is about, and yet if either man needs the rub from this matchup it is Bobby Roode.
Still so far Roode has gotten a lot out of his matchups with Kurt, two wins, one being at Bound For Glory, and he was featured enough on Impact this week that he was able to reach the upper end of the chart, something he doesn’t get to do much anymore.

5th Place: Curtis Axel

I think the Curtis Axel experiment is well and truly dead. When I am rooting for a face above a heel in a title match then you know that something is up, and strangely enough it seems to be happening more and more, maybe that is because all the best heels of the past few years have become faces and the new heels that replaced them aren’t measuring up.
With everyone expecting Axel to drop the title to Big E. when that match finally rolls around it looks like he is on borrowed time anyway. At least Paul Heyman made a brief appearance once again and Axel got to try to protect him, before being disposed of like yesterday’s garbage.
But a successful title defence is enough this week to get Axel onto the chart, even if he did so with very little charisma and just made me wish that Ziggler was getting more airtime once again.

6th Place: Gail Kim

While not competing herself Gail Kim made sure that her competition knew that she truly is the most dominant knock out in the division. I just wish that Lady Tapa didn’t have to make so much noise while she was trying to speak.
The Knockouts champ issuing an open challenge to any woman from any company could yield some interesting results if TNA are looking to give some people from the indies a shot, or if they can even call upon their extensive back catalogue of former female competitors that they have somehow let go, either way maybe there could actually be some competition in the knock outs division once again.

7th Place: Zeb Coulter

Coulter got raw this week in his insults against the United Kingdom, never has he said such an inflammatory utterance simply to provoke a reaction from the audience. I know as an Englishman I was physically shaken when he criticised Mr Bean, such a thing just isn’t done!
Anyway that cultural bombshell earned him a place on the chart this week over all others (who come underneath him), I wouldn’t be surprised if his Looney Toon arse was hounded out of England before the week is out though with that type of rabble rousing!

8th Place: Aces & 8s

What is left of the group actually managed to orchestrate a brutal attack on Mr Anderson and actually perpetrated a somewhat believable ruse of breaking up.
However before we go about praising Garrett ‘the carrot’ Bischoff’s acting ability I think that some of that believability came from actually wanting it to be true; nothing brings in the suckers like the promise of free money or a chance at seeing the end of a ridiculously played-out pro-wrestling angle.

9th Place: Randy Orton

The WWE Champion didn’t muster up all that much heel power this week, being cajoled into a two-on-one handicap match against the tag team champions and then getting choke-slammed through the announce table by the Big Show, and it wasn’t even the first half an hour of the show!
I liked seeing the Shield say that they were not at Orton’s bidding and really I’m not sure why the champ had any designs that they were in the first place. I think that the title of ‘face of the WWE’ has gone to his head somewhat and surely that will come into play more and more until someone steps up to challenge this title.

10th Place: Kane

I really wish they had done more with Kane this week besides issuing vague threats and having a power squabble with Vickie Guerrero and Brad Maddox (I suspect that Vince McMahon might have been the one running the show on Monday night).
Still there is a lot of room for this gimmick to work in and really the sight of Kane in a suit and tie, if used sparingly from now on, could really be used to great effect.

(Week 018)

1. Randy Orton (95)

2. Bully Ray (90)

3. Bully Ray (82)

4. Alberto Del Rio (66)

5. AJ Lee (56)

6. Damien Sandow (51)

7. Dean Ambrose (46)

8. Paul Heyman (46)

9. Dixie Carter (41)

10. Ryback (40)

Heel Centurions:

That’s all for this week, it already looks like we have our Survivor Series matchup and since it doesn’t seem to involve either major championship it is unlikely to change in the coming weeks. I am actually pretty surprised by the apparent teams since a couple of months ago I was certain it would either be Team Punk vs. Team Heyman, or Team Bryan vs. Team Orton/Authority, and hey in some ways either of those angles could still come into play, but I am certainly fine with seeing the Usos, the Rhodes, Punk and Bryan on one side, and the Shield and Wyatts on the other. I only wish that perhaps the WWE had the patience to do with the Summer of Punk storyline what TNA have done, although having said that who knows if it will pay off? AJ Styles wasn’t exactly the hottest property when he won the title, so how will a couple of months of being off TV serve him? We’ll just have to wait and see, for now though this is James Wright signing off.