10 Things I Hate About WWE Champion Dean Ambrose
1. He’s Not Our Guy
I’m a huge fan of so much that Ambrose does - when he bothers to do it.
He was electrifying against Triple H in the lead-up to Roadblock earlier this year, and he was doing similarly well in feuding with Brock Lesnar leading into WrestleMania.
I think the reason the Triple H match worked and the Lesnar one didn’t is that Paul Levesque had a vested interest in making Ambrose look like a million dollars, and knows how to work snug. He brought out the best in the man… Lesnar, on the other hand, clearly didn’t want to be there and felt that Ambrose was beneath him.
We were promised a lot more from that weapons match than Lesnar and Ambrose delivered, and Ambrose himself has thrown Lesnar under the bus for that one, claiming that the Beast Incarnate simply couldn’t be bothered to put in the effort.
But it takes two to tango, and Ambrose himself is no stranger to laziness. Based on his own words, he gave up trying to make the Lesnar match work and just went out there to wing it.
That’s Ambrose to a tee. When it comes to motivation and putting in the effort, he’s happy to work hard if the work comes easily, as it did with Triple H. He stays in character backstage and in interviews because he is old school, and because, like old school veterans Dusty Rhodes and Randy Savage before him, he’s found it’s easier to stay in character all the time rather than dip in and out.
But when it comes to working hard and snug every single day with whatever opponent is at hand; when it comes to being on point for every promo; when it comes to protecting his character and his spot and campaigning for the best, not settling for less… well, there’s a reason that ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin, who did all of that stuff when he was on top, got shirty with him in that podcast interview.
People want to get behind Dean Ambrose because of the flashes of brilliance they’ve seen in him. But he's not that guy - at least, not often enough to matter. He’s not our guy, not really. The Dean Ambrose that people got behind earlier this year only appears when he feels like it.