4 Ups & 5 Downs From WWE SummerSlam Night 1 (Review & Results)

DOWNS…

5. WWE’s Baghdad Bob

At this point, Michael Cole’s title should be changed from “The Voice of WWE” to “WWE’s Minister of Propaganda.”

Announcers obviously have to sell the product in front of them, which sometimes means stretching the truth or pretending that something is amazing when it’s utterly underwhelming, but for Cole to mention multiple times about a “capacity crowd” when the cameras will only show half the stadium is beyond laughable.

In an era where fans can go online to see how many empty seats there are, saying something that can be disproven with just a few mouse clicks erodes any credibility you might have. U.S. Bank Stadium has about 72,000 seats, and about half were filled with fans. That’s still impressive in many respects, but calling it a capacity crowd when you can see tarped-off sections is a joke.

Cole also continued his trend of utterly botching calls left and right. Wade Barrett talked about how Nick Aldis was in his very first match in a pub, and Cole immediately repeated that same point back to Wade, proving he wasn’t listening and just reciting lines. He called an Aldis body slam a “version of a Michinoku Driver;” called a slam a powerslam; and called a Royce Keys spinebuster a powerbomb.

When Barrett tried to talk about how CM Punk would have to focus on submission holds because his power game was gone due to Cody Rhodes’ attacks on his knee, Cole started talking about Cody’s submission attempts, completely ruining any attempt at actual analysis.

It’s embarrassing, and it detracts from an already flagging product. 30 years is more than long enough; he’s not going to go through a career renaissance suddenly. Just give Cole his gold watch and move on.