Was Triple H's reign of terror actually necessary?

[Deleted]

I'm probably opening a can of worms here but I was thinking recently about HHH circa 2003 when he was at his absolute worse for burying people.



But at that time The Rock had left, Steve Austin had left on bad terms, Triple H was an established star who was married to the daughter of the boss so wasn't going anywhere.


is it a possibility that Triple H's mega push was Vinces idea of what was best for business as by pushing someone he knew for a fact wasn't going anywhere and was committed to the WWE he had a safe bet at the top of the card who acted as a sort of gatekeeper whilst work was done on creating new stars.



Hell it's similar to in the old days where regional promoters would always build their promotion around their sons, it wasn't strictly out of neopotism but rather because someone with family ties was less likely (in theory) to quit or try and screw the territory over.

[Zaq "That Guy" Buzzkill]

I see it as the reign itself wasn't a horrible idea, it just wasn't executed that well, and I say that as someone who thinks the BURIEZ thing is overblown.
Theyw ere obviously trying something along the lines of having a major NWA dominant heel champion who would later be overcome by a a big hero, and it that regarded it succeeded.

[Ben Wyatt]

Yes and no.

They needed someone to establish the World Heavyweight title as important. Triple H as the top heel they had, was a wise option. They were going for an NWA-old school type reign.

That all said, it should have ended sooner.

[Sparkybob]

In a sense it was needed to establish the world title. It could certainly have been booked better but there was some bad luck in the reign too. Hunter getting injured really made his matches with Goldberg suck more than original thought.

[Ben Wyatt]

Dec 12, 2013 11:58:30 GMT -5 Sparkybob said:

In a sense it was needed to establish the world title. It could certainly have been booked better but there was some bad luck in the reign too. Hunter getting injured really made his matches with Goldberg suck more than original thought.

Not to mention that Steiner came in and what could have been a cool feud, sucked because Steiner was horribly out of shape.

[Zaq "That Guy" Buzzkill]

Dec 12, 2013 12:00:12 GMT -5 Ben Wyatt said:

Dec 12, 2013 11:58:30 GMT -5 Sparkybob said:

In a sense it was needed to establish the world title. It could certainly have been booked better but there was some bad luck in the reign too. Hunter getting injured really made his matches with Goldberg suck more than original thought.

Not to mention that Steiner came in and what could have been a cool feud, sucked because Steiner was horribly out of shape.

Also Kevin Nash.

[EyeofTyr]

Hey, let's not kid ourselves, it wasn't all on Steiner that his feud with Haitch blew. The pose down and a few other mind numbing choices in it helped a great deal to make that one a stinker. Especially by all accounts Haitch wanted to go longer in their matches than Steiner and pulled an HBK in intentionally trying to get him blown up ASAP in the matches. Something Goldberg, and Booker T when he was in TNA, admitted Haitch tried with them too in their matches with him.

Which on the one hand, maybe HHH was purposely trying to make them look inferior to him and expose them. On the other hand, maybe he was trying to do those old school 20+ long world title matches he grew up on. Either way, much like HBK in the 90's when he was trying to do it even to his friend in Nash, Haitch should've known better.

I say this as a man that's been a HHH fan since he entered the WWF and a man who didn't mind the Reign of Terror as much as most, it wasn't a bad idea but alot of the parts of it were executed horribly. Not helped by the fact that HHH tried to jam several reigns worth of storylines, mostly riffing from Flair's and Race's reigns, into essentially what was one reign.

[TGM]

Triple H was cosplaying as 1980s Ric Flair.

I'm always on the fence with this. On the one hand, he did bury RVD, Booker and Jericho.

But this will always be a loaded question while people refer to it as the Reign of Terror. I think he did an absolutely sound job of making Batista a star and he tapped out to Chris Benoit at Wrestlemania. He even tried to make Goldberg look good. Facts HHHaters tend to ignore to fit their point.

[Baldobomb-22-OH-MAN!!!]

no. it drove fans away, many of whom have never returned, he buried several other guys to make one guy (Batista) who was only around for about 4 years afterwards, there were plenty of other top heels who could've held the belt so there was no reason for it to always be him. and worst of all it gave us Katie Vick (though that one might've happened anyway). if anything it exposed Triple H as being a guy who was better as the guy who wrestles the guy who makes money, and not someone who can carry the show on his own. I will readily admit that the likes of Goldberg and Scott Steiner did him no favors, and he was ultimately correct about not putting over RVD, though. the first half was largely him burying guys who might've been actually interesting opponents (Kane, Jericho, Booker T etc.) but the second half was hurt by him having few quality opponents. ike I said, he's the guy that wrestles "the guy" and if "the guy" sucks there's only so much he can do.

[Bub (BLM)]

It was necessary until WrestleMania 19. After that it became ridiculous.

[DrBackflipsHoffman]

As necessary as his all cheeseburger diet was from around the same time.

[Boo!]

It wasn't necessary. WWE isn't the NWA. Tradition for WWE has always been face/fan-friendly champions. So it's a concept totally alien to the audience to have domineering heel champ. But what made it worse was their stout refusal to pull the trigger on anyone else. All the money they paid for Bill Goldberg and they gave him the strap for less than three months. Orton had it a month. Michaels had it a month. He was ever present. And whichever belt he had, became the main belt. First the World Heavyweight title the the WWE championship. It was unbearable. Even if he wasn't champ he was the challenger.

From Summerslam in August of 2002 through to Taboo Tuesday in November 2005 (excl Rumbles) HHH was either in the main event or championship match in all but two PPVs for which he was on the correct show for.

From summer 2002 until winter 2005. And that was preceded by Wrestlemaia being built around him and even after November 2005 he still had three more title wins

[crowwreak was WRONG]

RVD
Kevin Nash
Steiner
Booker T
Benoit
HBK
Jericho


no, it wasn't needed

[Zaq "That Guy" Buzzkill]

I find it interesting that people still say Triple H buried Jericho, even though in his second book Chris more or less put the entire blame on Vince and himself.

[SCCB Was Told To Do Steroids]

My ONLY cynical comment attached to this is that, in critique, it looks like he got the job because no one else wanted it. Like in the old Abbott and Costello movies when they were legionnaires, and, when the commander asks for volunteers for a dangerous mission, all the others step back, leaving A & C to look around, dumbfounded. In other words, dare I even suggest HHH was a transitional superstar?

[Deleted]

Dec 12, 2013 13:58:13 GMT -5 Boo! said:

It wasn't necessary. WWE isn't the NWA. Tradition for WWE has always been face/fan-friendly champions. So it's a concept totally alien to the audience to have domineering heel champ. But what made it worse was their stout refusal to pull the trigger on anyone else. All the money they paid for Bill Goldberg and they gave him the strap for less than three months. Orton had it a month. Michaels had it a month. He was ever present. And whichever belt he had, became the main belt. First the World Heavyweight title the the WWE championship. It was unbearable. Even if he wasn't champ he was the challenger.

From Summerslam in August of 2002 through to Taboo Tuesday in November 2005 (excl Rumbles) HHH was either in the main event or championship match in all but two PPVs for which he was on the correct show for.

From summer 2002 until winter 2005. And that was preceded by Wrestlemaia being built around him and even after November 2005 he still had three more title wins

Sounds pretty much the same situation as John Cena Between around 2006-2011



Except Cena is (on paper) a Face/Fan friendly champion

[Boo!]

Dec 12, 2013 14:07:49 GMT -5 @graant said:

Dec 12, 2013 13:58:13 GMT -5 Boo! said:

It wasn't necessary. WWE isn't the NWA. Tradition for WWE has always been face/fan-friendly champions. So it's a concept totally alien to the audience to have domineering heel champ. But what made it worse was their stout refusal to pull the trigger on anyone else. All the money they paid for Bill Goldberg and they gave him the strap for less than three months. Orton had it a month. Michaels had it a month. He was ever present. And whichever belt he had, became the main belt. First the World Heavyweight title the the WWE championship. It was unbearable. Even if he wasn't champ he was the challenger.

From Summerslam in August of 2002 through to Taboo Tuesday in November 2005 (excl Rumbles) HHH was either in the main event or championship match in all but two PPVs for which he was on the correct show for.

From summer 2002 until winter 2005. And that was preceded by Wrestlemaia being built around him and even after November 2005 he still had three more title wins

Sounds pretty much the same situation as John Cena Between around 2006-2011



Except Cena is (on paper) a Face/Fan friendly champion

John Cena's also more popular. He brings in the kids. He's a mainstream figure. Little kids who don't really like wrestling know John Cena. He goes to Kids Choice Awards and does all that hokey "Hi kids, hey-hey-hey" clown stuff. It's cheesy but he does it. So there's at least a logic to giving him that position. With HHH it just seemed that there was no real logic to it. They were almost pushing him in spite of what the audience were telling them. They've desperately tried to make him into some kind of figure of mainstream attention what with his constant title runs, that movie and various other things but it's like throwing raw pasta at the wall - it just doesn't stick.

I think it's almost beyond denial that he got that position through his family connections. I'm not saying he would have have won world titles or main evented but the relentlessly focusing of television shows around him for year after year after year, without obvious reason. He may have eaten at the exclusive restaurant a few times but he wouldn't have got the balcony table night after night after night after night were he not porking the bosses daughter

[wisdomwizard]

To establish the World Heavyweight Championship at the time? Yes.


Could it have been executed better? Yes.


Did it really do any permanent damage on WWE? No.

[Deleted]

Dec 12, 2013 14:12:53 GMT -5 Boo! said:

]John Cena's also more popular. He brings in the kids. He's a mainstream figure. Little kids who don't really like wrestling know John Cena. He goes to Kids Choice Awards and does all that hokey "Hi kids, hey-hey-hey" clown stuff. It's cheesy but he does it. So there's at least a logic to giving him that position. With HHH it just seemed that there was no real logic to it. They were almost pushing him in spite of what the audience were telling them. They've desperately tried to make him into some kind of figure of mainstream attention what with his constant title runs, that movie and various other things but it's like throwing raw pasta at the wall - it just doesn't stick.

Good point. I agree, to be honest Triple H was never and will never be a top guy despite how they try and shoehorn him in as one, he's the guy the top stars work with who is never the top star himself. he's a good wrestler with a great mind for the business which I sometimes feel he exploited for his own benefit.

But as I stated in op there was logic behind it in the sense that WWE had lost 2 of their most over stars of all time in the last year and if they were going to build anyone up it made sense to go with the promoters son in law.

Plus after the title hot potatoing of the Attitude era they really did need to give someone a long reign to show they were over it


And from all accounts and what is visible Triple H does seem to be redeeming himself now he has stepped back from being an active competitor and can put his great mind for wrestling to use in a way that benefits the company instead of just himself. Shame he can't resist coming back once or twice a year to put himself over though (I really don't think he's that much of a draw, he competes against guys who are big draws so it appears that he has contributed more to the boost the match gives the buy rates or tv segments rating than he really does)