10 Best Booking Decisions In Wrestling History
Elite-level booking decisions - starring Steve Austin, Hulk Hogan and more...
Roman Reigns, Tribal Chief, is the biggest star in pro wrestling.
The decision to book him in this heel role wasn't a huge money-drawing decision in the old world sense - WWE is staggeringly financially successful through TV rights fees, which were last negotiated when Reigns was floundering as a babyface - but WWE is nonetheless red-hot with him on top for the first time in years and years. And years.
How much credit do Vince McMahon, Triple H and Paul Heyman truly deserve?
The latter earns more praise than the former, who screwed Roman up so often and for so long that he effectively created his own competition. Everybody else on the planet knew that Roman should have been positioned as a heel by, at the latest, 2015. A great decision-maker is meant to be ahead of their audience. They are meant to a visionary.
Vince saw the vision six full years after everybody else did, including Roman himself, who noped out of WWE and basically said that he was not going back if he was getting covered in dog food. It was a good decision, but "concession" is probably the more accurate word.
What were the best actual booking decisions, ideas, ever...?
10. The Grand AEW Comeback
'December 18' is literally a date that will live in infamy. It is shorthand for "Well, the first competition for nearly two decades was nice while it lasted (eight months)".
It was the Dynamite on which The Dark Order Angle happened, Kenny Omega and Cody Rhodes bumped for "creepers", and Evil Uno drew blood from a rubber johnny in Matt Jackson's mouth in a Bray Wyattpilled angle. Even the good matches on the show, the culmination of a bizarre, weeks-long flirtation with spooky nonsense, were botch-plagued. It was as if the entire promotion was haunted, which was ironic, since the supernatural vibe in the fiction was not remotely effective.
Tony Khan knew of and was hurt by the response, and took a drastic step to resolve the mounting problems: he disbanded the booking committee he had formed with himself and the EVPs, took final cut privileges for himself, and set about restoring the aura of his star babyface unit.
He did so on the incredible January 1, 2020 Dynamite, one of the best editions of the show ever. Easing the anxiety felt by an audience scared that the dream was over, he asked the same question many cynics had posed in an opening video package voiceover:
Are the Elite still Elite?
The answer, revealed throughout the show, was both "yes" and "no".
Cody defeated Darby Allin in a great continuation of their legacy rivalry while Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks defeated the future Death Triangle in a lush illustration of what AEW's heart looks like: pulsating, state-of-the-art Trios action set against the unique, gorgeous backdrop of Daily's Place.
The Elite also wasn't Elite since, in a great cliffhanger, piss-funny boozehound Hangman Page was relegated to commentary. He didn't feel Elite, but his comedic tour de force, in which he finally showed his All In chops on TV, was Elite in the minds of the fans.
AEW in the aftermath of the grand return to form quickly negotiated a rights fee, and never again faced such a position of peril.