10 Secrets To A Guaranteed POP In Wrestling
6. Insulting The Local Sports Team
Certain ancient wrestlers will harp on relentlessly about the lost art of getting heat.
It isn't lost because this generation of talent isn't as good as Bully Ray, whose means of drawing a reaction was saying things along the lines of "Your c*nt aunt bathed my balls with her tongue you [horrendous slur]".
It is lost because people don't really care about much anymore, desensitised as they are by the conveyor belt of horror that is everyday life. People either can't bring themselves to care, or care too much about their escapist fantasy as a coping mechanism, and develop parasocial relationships with the people involved. Ultimately, a Twitter user is more likely to get a toxic reaction for burying a wrestler than the rival with whom that wrestler is feuding.
But mostly, when the heel mocks the babyface, the reaction is at best performative. It's amusing half the time. With rare exceptions, the psyche of the general public is out of step with wrestling's traditional method of evoking emotion.
Unless!
The fans really feel something, still, when their local sports team gets insulted. Sport is real, closely bonded to the DNA of those who love it as a family tradition, and makes up their regional identity. It really hurts when the local team fails, it penetrates the calloused husk developed across this hellscape of a century, and even the most basic heels grasp this.