Who else gets more into the matches than the angles?

[kingbookermark]

NXT and 205 I watch for the matches. WWE proper I watch for the angles & promos, except for PPVs I watch those for the matches.

[metylerca]

Yeah we're spoiled with great wrestling. The roster right now is the best it's ever been and can only improve from here. Even lower end workers like Mojo are cromulent enough to be mid to upper midcard levels if this were the 80's.

I truly believe that if I were to only watch for stories in 2017, I'd quit watching. It's the in ring product that keeps me watching WWE these days. And Chris Jericho.

[Deleted]

I kinda wanna give Bayley's ponytail a tug. Don't tell anyone.

[Oh Cry Me a Screwball]

Well, if you want to see how a great match can just flounder without any storyline of substance to speak of, check out Neville vs. Cedric Alexander from a couple weeks ago on 205 Live. Those two guys went out and put on a Wrestlemania caliber match, and yet the crowd couldn't have given two shits about it and even the Live thread here seemed like it was yawning because there was just no investment in anything regarding the Cruiserweight division.

[Woo]

It's all about the angles. I'll take an incredible Savage/Roberts feud with not great matches over a pointless 10 minute great match on Raw that is utterly meaningless. The trouble is that in the WWE the angles suck.

["Gizzark" Mike Wronglevenay]

I think that the two have a symbiotic relationship.

If I want to see two wrestlers have a match and think the match will be good, then I won't care if the build sucks.

A good build will make a bad match something more worth investing in, and a good match something more special than it was before.

And of course, if the build to a match is great but the match is truly terrible I will most likely still remember how good the build was.

[machomuta]

I have always watched wrestling for the wrestling matches.

It is called pro wrestling for a reason.

[Clash, Never a Meter Maid]

Feb 7, 2017 6:05:22 GMT -5 Oh Cry Me a Screwball said:

Well, if you want to see how a great match can just flounder without any storyline of substance to speak of, check out Neville vs. Cedric Alexander from a couple weeks ago on 205 Live. Those two guys went out and put on a Wrestlemania caliber match, and yet the crowd couldn't have given two shits about it and even the Live thread here seemed like it was yawning because there was just no investment in anything regarding the Cruiserweight division.

Well, yeah, you have to have good storytelling to have a truly great match.

When I say I'm mostly into the matches, I'm not advocating for two wrestlers with no storyline or history hitting moves until there's a fall. That's bad wrestling to me. Savage/Steamboat wouldn't have been as good without the emotion involved.

What I am saying is, when I think back on my history watching wrestling, memorable matches (and promos) stick out to me more in my mind than bad angles. Great matches definitely stand out to me more than any news/backstage stuff, for that matter. I don't "armchair book" that often. It's more fun for me to just mark out over stuff.

Like when I think back on CM Punk's 2011-2013 run, I don't dwell on the mistakes they made. I don't stew over the way HHH, Del Rio and Nash got into the story. Maybe it could have been written better, there's all sorts of ways someone could have booked it. All I know is that he had a ***** match with Cena, and that's the real marker in my mind for that period.