Suggestions From The Sheriff To Improve US Wrestling

Ok, let's get straight to the point here... Smackdown, in the main, sucks - despite an outstanding recent PPV - and so does ECW.

This is what I would do:

1) Consolidate the World titles, the Tag Team titles and the Intercontinental/US titles

For years, when a championship changed hands, it felt like it mean something. Not now, though. Too many championships - and silly booking - have reduced this.

Less championships mean more when they are won. So lets get the amount of them down.

In addition, the roster is nowhere near strong enough to justify so many champions.

2) Drop The Raw & Smackdown Brand Split

However, to give it a seperate feel, keep some of the divisions seperate still. Also, make sure some decent stars are going over to ECW. I will explain more...

3) ECW

As above. Build up the roster. Give it a two-hour show. Make all matches under 'Extreme Rules', but don't over-do it with the weapons. Try to keep the traditional big man that Vince likes, out of there (he says with Big Show & The Great Khali on there now... oh well...).

I have another idea, which you will see below.

4) The World Title

Don't let it be changed constantly, and don't let it be changed cheaply. Keep 'screwjobs' out of matches as much as possible.

5) The Intercontinental Title

First of all, yeah - leave this belt, not the US belt. Then, make a big thing out of it. Put it on a real star, and make sure they have really good storylines. When I was young, the Intercontinental Title -more often than not - meant something, and was not far off the World Title.

With some history education to the fans, decent writing and a bit of star power, the Intercontinental Title can mean something again.

6) The Womens Division

Leave it as it is. Keep it on Raw, and keep the Divas that aint so good at wreslting, out of the ring and on Smackdown.

7) The Cruiserweight Divison

Shift it to ECW!

This could be done quite easily, actually. Clearly the division gets barely any air-time, and most cruiserweights spend half their career jobbing to other stars.

Also, Paul Heyman was partly responsible for a lot of smaller wrestlers (and the cruiserweight style) being introuduced to the US.

So, write a storyline where the Cruiserweights walk out on Smackdown, and sign contracts with ECW. Then, get ECW making a big deal of the division. Get Rey Mysterio over there, for example. Then, book them freely. Don't worry that the quick action will overshadow the big guys or anything, cause there wont be many big guys wrestling on ECW.

8) The Tag Team Division

So, make THIS division the baby of Smackdown. Again, build it up. Educate the fans on the good teams, the history. Create new tandems with under-used people. Get MNM back together. Get the Hardy Boyz back together. Get Benjamin & Haas back together.

See this is the thing. I was watching 'TNA:Bound For Glory' and the second main event was AJ Styles & Christopher Daniels v LAX.

That's right - the second biggest match on the card was a tag team title match. The belt changed hands too, and it felt like something big had happened.

So it can be done. Again, they just need to make sure it is written propely, that the belts are treated with respect and make sure that there are characters in the division that the fans care about.

9) The Rest of the Roster

So, we have:
The Womens division on Raw
The Cruiserweights in ECW
The Tag Teams on Smackdown

In theory, that should leave the best of the rest and a few glorified jobbers. To me, that leaves plenty of people to be wrestling on Raw & Smackdown, competing for the World Title, the Intercontinental title and the rest having decent enough, slow-burning feuds.

You know, how it used to be?

10) TNA

Finally, 'the other lot'. To me, if WWE is going to get back to it's best, it needs TNA to be as successful as possible. Competition is good! Without WCW & ECW we would never have had Stone Cold, The Rock, etc. and Diesel would probably still be champion!

So, my suggestion to them is this - the in-ring action is sound, so keep it going. Protect Kurt Angle and use him wisely, because that way he can still be an astronomical asset. Finally - Brock Lesnar, Chris Jericho etc - anyone that still has a future in the wrestling business that is not tied down, fight tooth & nail for when they become available.

So there. The US wrestling business sorted. Not that hard, was it?