10 Worst WWE Booking Decisions Of 2017 (So Far)
Burials, pointless title changes, and good old James Ellsworth...
WWE is full of great wrestling at the moment. Raw and SmackDown usually deliver at least one or two quality matches every week, NXT is on the resurgence, and 205 Live is much improved from its early form. Exciting action is inevitable from such a huge, talented roster, and in-ring standards have rarely been so high.
Despite this, it's hard to shake the feeling that the company could be doing so much better. It often feels like WWE's wrestlers are performing well in spite of the bookers, not because of them, and while the promotion's top workers are among the world's most exciting, their good work is often overshadowed by shoddy decision making.
WWE's booking mechanism has rarely been as faulty as it is today. The company have created an environment with little suspense, surprise or drama, in which nobody ever gets over, and storylines rarely reach satisfying conclusions. Their work regularly leaves fans pulling their hair out, and things are as bad as ever in 2017.
The company have given us much to get excited about this year, but many more reasons to feel frustrated by their direction. Let's take a look at the decisions that have had us changing the channel...
10. Dolph Ziggler Defeats AJ Styles
Once a consensus pick for WWE’s most under-pushed worker, Dolph Ziggler’s interest levels have never been lower than they are today. ‘The Show-Off’ has been abandoned by all but his most ardent supporters, and while this is primarily down to years of bad booking, he is one of WWE’s most pointless wrestlers in 2017.
That hasn’t stopped the company persisting with him as a moderately well pushed wrestler, and Dolph has been the focus of a couple of confusing booking decisions this year. At Backlash, Ziggler was granted way too much offense in a match that was supposed to put Shinsuke Nakamura over as a star. He lost, but it was him, not Nakamura, who felt like the most important wrestler coming out of the bout, thus defeating its purpose.
Then, nine days later, Ziggler inexplicably defeated AJ Styles on an episode of SmackDown. Putting him over the brand’s franchise player made zero sense on paper or in practice, given their contrasting positions within the hierarchy, and to make matters worse, Ziggler didn’t even benefit from the win. AJ avenged his loss the following week, making it even more confounding that he was booked to lose to such lowly opposition in the first place.