WWE supplemental draft thread (results)

Your right, ECW isn't dead, they didn't lose "that" much. I dont know what I was thinking when I typed that.

Hey, maybe this means Dreamer will get more TV time, I just like that guy, have really no good idea why.

[QUOTE="IsThisIt_basic"][QUOTE="The_Dude14"] Oh, quit being over-dramatic, ECW ain't that much worse off than they were to begin with. They lost Kofi and Shelton, whoopty-doo. They've accounted for a decently entertaining mid-card (of the mid-card brand) feud that has taken up, what, 7 minutes of TV time in total. Yall are seriously overstating their value. Shelton was as lost in the shuffle as per usual and while Kofi shows promise, its not like he was a big time player there. Unfortunately, he's unlikely to get continue to develop on Raw as he would in ECW. Matt, Morrison and Mizanin are a solid trio to work around. If Burke ever finds his way out of the doghouse he's apparently in, he offers everything, if not more, than Shelton offers. Sydal can fill Kofi's shoes. ECW can easily continue to be, if nothing, else consistent.

I think getting the midget was more damging than anyone they lost. Knowing WWE, he'll get pushed more seriously than Matt. The talent is there for ECW to stay consistent, its just a matter of whether the writing can keep that consistency.

The_Dude14

1. Neither of them were anywhere close to done exploring all the different possible rivalries they could've had on ECW (even with that small of a roster). I don't think we got one single Kofi/Morrison match, which I was dying to see. Plus, Benjamin going for the title ... which leads me to my next point ...

2. Neither of these guys are really going to go anywhere on these other shows. ECW was the perfect place for a guy like Shelton to shine (although, honestly, I feel this guy would be HUGE in the main event scene if WWE would just push him). Kofi might just become a breakout star (I think WWE has high hopes for him), but, ****, if a guy like Shelton Benjamin can't make it here, I wouldn't hold my breath.

If anything, it's not so much that it sucks that ECW's losing these guys, as much as it just sucks for their respective careers.

Also, if you look at last year's draft, it really did outline what WWE's vision for ECW was for the next year - people like Benoit and Morrison more or less defined what kind of wrestling that show was about. If Mark Henry and Hornswaggle define what we can expect from the next year of ECW, count me out.

And while ECW will probably still have two good matches per show, they were pulling off three prior to the draft. Just sayin'; it was nice to know I could come home from work on Tuesday and watch some enjoyable wrestling. It really has been that knowledge that there's still one pretty consistently, pretty entertaining wrestling show on every week that's kept me from having to turn to Ring of Honor.

I also agree that this move is probably worse for both men that it is for ECW, especially Kofi. Its very unlikely they'll get the ring time and spotlight they got in ECW on their new brands. I never said that ECW was better off without them, only that ECW wasn't that much worse off without them.

I am still baffled to this day that Chavo is a former ECW Champion while Shelton never got a true program with Punk while he was ECW Champ (unless I missed something)

With Henry, lets keep in mind that ECW managed to handle Big Daddy V very well while he was there. They got more out of Viscera than I would ever predict. Not expecting miracles, though. The midget, I've got nothing and he's probably the biggest element that concerns me, but at least Finlay provides that veteran presence that Beniot was supposed to.

As for the tag titles, have they officially shut down the Smackdown/ECW talent exchange? Even with ECW going over to Raw tapings eventually, I haven't heard anything about shutting down that talent exchange, so its possible that either team could hold on to the belts until that happens and lose them back to Smackdown when the move happens and the exchange is shut down (assuming they even shut it down, they don't exactly keep the shows that divided these days). To who, though, is something of a question mark.

Well, with another post-draft week of wrestling in mind, my views on the draft have changed a bit.

Clearly Kofi will be used better on Raw than I ever would've imagined. While he probably will have to hold back on his move arsenal a bit, I'm sure he was already being held back a bit anyways. Unfortunately, though, Jericho is probably the best person he'll have to feud with on Raw, and they're getting that out of the way right off the bat. On Smackdown, Shelton hasn't shown up yet, but I'm really liking the prospect of him feuding with Kennedy (something I'm sure we'll be seeing relatively soon). In the short term, the draft has been good to these guys, but I don't know how it'll look a year from now.

As for the new talent ... while I can't bring myself to agree with you on Big Daddy V - even Striker couldn't save him - I think they could do worse than Henry. I've actually found some of Henry's last few promos pretty funny, and as long as they have someone interesting facing Henry, it shouldn't be that bad. Finlay really surprised me this week, though ... that was the most inspired Finlay match I've seen in years. I just wouldn't have figured there would be that much of an improvement, since Smackdown pretty much just lets people wrestle, too ... but this was miles more entertaining than anything he's done recently on Smackdown. I'd love to see them give him a real tag partner (Matt Hardy?) and have a real run against Morrison/Miz.

And with the tag titles; I don't even know, at this point, how much a point there would be to put the titles back on Smackdown. Barring the talent exchange, as far as I know, there are only two tag-teams on Smackdown (Hawkins/Ryder and Yang/Moore). I'm sure they'll probably put together some tag teams out of random low-card guys that came over in the draft though (I don't even want to think about who Kendrick will inevitably be teamed with).

Teddy Long's ECW "new talent initiative" is probably the most interesting thing about post-draft ECW, though. I'm really curious about how they'll handle this. The two cases I'm most interested in are 1. with Kofi over on Raw now, the door is wide open for Ron Killings to make a debut on ECW, and he'd be perfect for this brand. And 2. if perhaps they'd bring up Brian Danielson as well, so I can finally see this guy. The "new talent initiative" has a lot of potential, but, at the same time, even with their small roster, they still don't even manage to fit everyone in one hour (no Super Crazy, Sydal, or Knox this week, and of course there's guys like Nunzio and Steven Richards that never get airtime). I'd love to see them increase ECW to two hours and keep this same style of wrestling ...