3. WWE's Midcard Is About To Be Crowded...
...and it's great that they employ another person besides Kevin Owens who can play a miserable prick who likes beating people up. Samoa Joe is an old-school superstar. Actually, he's the perfect old school superstar for WWE. Just like it was in the Attitude Era, WWE's midcard is overstocked. However, similar to WWE's midcard in the Attitude Era, there's people who are so outstanding at being bad guys employed by the company that they can excel at thinning things out a bit until it's time to make a few new stars. Samoa Joe is a 16-year veteran who, for WWE main event and upper midcard stars of this generation is a folk hero who held Ring of Honor's Heavyweight Championship for 19 months with over 20 successful defenses. Does that correlate to being say, the Intercontinental Champion in a retooling WWE? Certainly. Could Joe even be a touring NXT Champion raising the legacy of that championship, too? Sure. But as IC Champ he's a much better fit.
Marcus K. Dowling
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Besides having been an independent professional wrestling manager for a decade, Marcus Dowling is a Washington, DC-based writer who has contributed to a plethora of online and print magazines and newspapers writing about music and popular culture over the past 15 years.
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