3. Van Dam Jobs...Why?
WWE.comIm not a big fan of Rob Van Dam. His in-ring work was incredibly exciting back in the day, but his stoner character never really resonated with me. However, RVD is popular with a segment of the crowd. Hes also a former ECW and WWE Champion, therefore, beating him should mean something. But when Rusev defeated him on Raw, the announcers didnt act as if it was any sort of accomplishment. Ever since Van Dam's return to WWE, pinning him is essentially no different than beating Titus ONeil. El Torito literally has a better win/loss record than him. It just makes no sense to pay a man hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, fly him around the country, give him valuable TV time and not make the most out of his appearances. WWE needs to make wins matter. The company wants to get Rusev over in a bad way, so theyre lining up opponents for him to knock down. Hes out of the initial stage of beating the scrubs, and how hes challenging the mid-card. The problem is that theres a gigantic number of mid-carders trading wins back and forth for all eternity, and then theres half-a-dozen guys on the top who are protected. WWE isnt going to let Rusev win clean against Cena, Orton, Hunter or Roman Reigns yet. That means his wins against former champs like Van Dam and (presumably) Jack Swagger need to feel like accomplishments on his journey to the top of the card. If not, then Van Dam may as well stay at home and eat a bowl of Cheetos, or worse yet, go back to TNA.