10 Modern WWE PPV Matches Allocated Far Too Much Time
4. Michael Cole Vs. Jerry Lawler - WrestleMania XXVII
Match length: 13:45
Why it was too long: Cole shouldn't have been trusted with five minutes, let alone nearly fifteen. He couldn't do anything in there.
The Cole-as-heel experiment is still a head-scratcher, five years later. It worked up to a point - he really was a detestable figure in his pomp. McMahon, for whom Cole was acting as mouthpiece, has a way with a withering putdown. Cole's admonishment of Davey Boy Smith Jr. - 'He needs a transfusion of personality' - was hilarious, even if it was counterproductive.
The main problem, of which there many, was that Cole's voice was all over every WWE broadcast. This was very much a character who worked in small doses - so why it was assigned to the company's lead character is thoroughly mystifying.
And, as we learned in Georgia, the pay-off definitely wasn't worth it. Not only did we not even get it - the sorry saga dragged on interminably for another two months - but seeing a flabby non-wrestler who'd only received the most basic of training get any sort of comeuppance was thoroughly unsatisfying.
He should have appointed a proxy in his place, who'd have turned face on the back of it by belting Cole following his loss. Everybody would have won in that scenario, not least the midcard talent whose matches were senselessly truncated in favour of this debacle.