If WWE Was Being Honest About AEW

Apollo Crews MVP
WWE.com

Turns out that the new competition in the form of AEW did not force WWE to improve its product. The precise opposite is true; AEW has brought into abject focus just how ineffective WWE is.

To very briefly break a rule here, and venture into the first person, "if AEW did" book Darby Allin Vs. Ricky Starks in various matches eight times in five months I promise, for whatever my word is worth, that I wouldn't pretend it wasn't drastically uninspiring.

Those numbers were not dreamt up for hyperbolic snark. This is literally the amount of times Apollo Crews and MVP have faced one another in some form or another in 2020.

And it's not just MVP: this Apollo Crews Vs. the Hurt Business programme, and it's hardly a twisting, complex plot building to a super-dramatic peak, shows no signs of ending after several months of the outrageously lazy match/post-match beatdown/repeat formula. In one of the only actual developments so much TV time has yielded, Cedric Alexander literally turned heel because he was bored, tired, and felt compelled to spare himself from a looped fate in which he gets destroyed every single week.

And it's not just Apollo Crews Vs. the Hurt Business: Andrade & Angel Garza Vs. the Street Profits went on forever, with Andrade and Montez Ford booked in various matches seven times in three months.

And it's not just Andrade & Angel Garza Vs. the Street Profits: so many Cagematch database entries for the performers on RAW and SmackDown scan like they would in years gone by, except none of these performers are working the same match on a house show loop that no longer exists. The main roster, simply, is a European tour in 2020 localised to Florida and, erm, national television.

CONT'D...(3 of 6)

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Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!