Strange Things This Week In Wrestling with Marc Madison 2/17/17

Welcome to the newest edition of Strange Things In Wrestling This week with Marc Madison. Once again, this column is intended to be lighthearted in nature, and allow fans to explore (or even point out) some of the more out there, unusual events in wrestling for a given week. It would be safe to say there are enough highly-detailed accounts of matches and stories out there already. We ask readers to ensure they aren’t operating any heavy machinery while reading this as it could be fairly dangerous, beyond the regular danger that kind of multi-tasking poses. Here, we’ll dive into a few occurrences from the week that stood out since their strange nature is something that should be highlighted. Why? Because of you, the good readers of TJR, deserve it.

You can anticipate something outside normal online wrestling culture when it comes to the (generally) bi-weekly edition of this column. We may focus on a tweet from a wrestler, an image, a scenario, a match or even a storyline, and really hope to lighten up your day in the process. This week’s edition includes a confused Italian from Staten Island, two Englishmen comparing the size of their…moustaches, confused and angry authors, and a new commentary team that is a little rough around the edges. Once again, we could easily point out something related to the current Alicia Fox and NoamDar on-screen awkwardness, but we’re focusing on the strange, not necessarily the pointless. Without further ado, here is the Strange Things In Wrestling for the week of February 13th to the 17th.

Is he in or is he out?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LIVeZyyMNPU

If you watched the match this past week between EnzoAmore and Cesaro, you saw a clash in styles between two men that couldn’t be more different, physically and aesthetically. The match didn’t do anything to make fans think that Enzo had a chance of coming out on top. During his time in WWE, he’s been made to look like a punching bag more times than he’s been made to look like a star. We aren’t quite sure whether we should celebrate each time Corey Graves wants to see Enzo put on his back, and calls for him to shut up because he yaps so much, or if we should be upset that he won’t cut Enzo some slack… Yeah, we should celebrate him being put on his back.

The oddest part of this match was a moment in the contest where Cesaro threw Amore into the ropes. Ideally, if someone is supposed to go over the top rope, they go to the floor while making it looks like they are helpless to stop themselves. However, on this particular occasion, Amore didn’t go over the top rope due to his momentum, in fact he regained his balance and jumped over the top rope to the floor. It looked odd, and the commentary crew tried to play it off, asking if Amore wanted out of the match That’s a great question! His actions suggested that he was supposed to go over the top rope, but he got tangled in the ropes, creating a rather awkward moment on Raw.

The Authors of Pain are upset…they got help?

On this past weeks episode of NXT, fans saw former NXT tag team champions DIY come into the ring and thank the fans for their support. Johnny Gargano and TommasoCiampa thanked everyone for voting their match against The Revival as match of the year. It was a perfect face action for them to be thankful for the support after capturing the NXT tag team championship. Then they said that they weren’t broken and wanted their NXT tag team championship rematch. It was precisely at that moment when the Authors of Pain, flanked by their manager Paul Ellering, came out at the top of the ramp to essentially say be sure to tell your loved ones you love them before you face them for the tag team championships. So Ciampa and Garano shared how much they loved each other and didn’t want to wait to face the Authors of Pain. It was at that moment when The Revival jumped DIY from behind, not only wanting to beat them down, but take them out of the running to face the Authors of Pain.

The strangest moment here wasn’t that The Revival jumped DIY from behind, it was the Authors of Pain running down to ringside to basically scare off Dash and Dawson. Heels generally take advantage of a weakened opponent and are glad to do so. However, when the Authors of Pain ran down to the ring they appeared upset. I guess the old saying is true, bad guys don’t beat other bad guys, the beat good guys. Confused? Me too.

Is the UK Championship only defended against those from the UK?

Last month, fans witnessed the crowning of the first ever WWE United Kingdom champion. 19-year-old Tyler Bate won the two-day tournament to capture the championship when he defeated the Bruiserweight, Pete Dunne. Since then, whenever we saw Bate he was either in the crowd or backstage at an event. However, nearly a month after capturing the title, fans witnessed his first televised championship defense. This isn’t to say that Bate hasn’t defended the title on house shows or as part of dark matches before either a Raw or Smackdown Live has happened. However, this was the first time he was featured on a televised program.

This past week, Bate defended the championship at Full Sail University against someone he is not only familiar with, but a friend. Trent Seven isn’t only an ally of Bate, but is also his tag team partner as part of Moustache Mountain. It’s hard to argue that these men know each other and would have good chemistry in the ring. And we aren’t taking anything away from either man or how exciting their match was. The question that remained with us was since both men are from the UK, does that mean the title will only be defended against competitors from the United Kingdom? Has the UK become its own ‘division’? It seems odd if that’s the case, and runs the risk of being fairly gimmicky, especially if it goes down the path of challengers asking for having to produce birth certificates to prove their UK origins. Well, that may be a stretch, but anything is possible.

McGuiness, Watson and Philips and not one is even slightly heel?

A few weeks ago, fans were told about Corey Graves’ departure from NXT, as moving forward he would only be working on Raw and 205 Live. There is no question that Graves is a throwback announcer whose greatest skill is being an antagonist to those around him, while also being entertaining to listen to as well. He has provided some fun calls, and his exchanges with Tom Phillips has been tremendous. Graves’ departure left an opening in the NXT broadcast booth, and Nigel McGuiness and Percy Watson are there to replace him. We aren’t going to suggest that Watson may end up like David Otunga, but we are concerned about the banter that takes places amongst the three announcers. Right now there just isn’t that sense of unity amongst them, and chemistry is lacking. What is rather strange to hear is that among the three broadcasters, not one leans towards being a heel commentator in the slightest. It is odd to hear, as having difference of opinion or blatant bias towards the heels makes for some amusing commentary. We aren’t sure what will happen and how their banter may evolve, but as it stands right now McGuiness and Watson don’t offer enough to make up for what left with Graves. McGuiness was a convincing heel during his time in the ring, so if there is someone that could be the heel commentator amongst the three of them, it would be him.

Emmalina…to..Trollusalla

We had been so good. We had waited so long. In, fact after seventeen weeks of waiting and endless promises, she finally arrived. The problem was when she did arrive, it completely fell flat. This after all the hype, the speculation and the promises about Emma becoming Emmalina, and fans hearing Corey Graves jumping out of his skin in anticipation. When she walked out fans cheered, only to be met with. ‘You witnessed the transformation to Emmalina. Now witness the transformation back to Emma”. Even Graves responded with a huh, a reaction about as genuine as the one from those watching at home.

After hearing that the character has returned to what she once was, speculation was that it was Emma’s lack of commitment to the character. That doesn’t seem fair, as not everyone can pull off a character the way that it has been drawn up. It was apparently supposed to be a homage to the days of The Kat and Sable, but we have to understand why Emma had a hard time pulling off the character; how does a wrestler pretend that she doesn’t know how to be a wrestler anymore? Think about it: Sable and Kat were used primarily for their sex appeal and not their wrestling skill. Emma is a trained and technically savvy wrestler that has worked to be where she is today. Imagine if I pretended to be a good writer? See, I couldn’t pull it off either.

So ends another edition of strange things in wrestling this week with Marc Madison. That title is certainly a mouthful, but we think that all the food in the world couldn’t please your wrestling palette like this column has. See what I did there? I tried to be clever, much like I tried to highlight the odd this week and hope that it will be the reason we watch wrestling. In the words of one Simpsons character, wrestling is like brunch: it isn’t quite breakfast, and it isn’t quite like lunch, but at the end of it you get a nice piece of cantaloupe. Personally, I’ve never received a piece of cantaloupe after watching an episode of wrestling, but if we are going by what that dude said, we really should be.

For strange things in wrestling this is Marc Madison saying, if you catch the strange things in wrestling be sure to always make fun of them. It is why they are there.

Check out Jon Curry, Mike Holland, Brandon Lasher and I on TheMemNetwork. We will can be heard every Sunday and live after every WWE pay per view from this week moving forward.

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