>>6267164There's a chance the company would've been less blatantly Cenacentric between '08 and '15 if Lashley hadn't gotten injured and fell out with Vince for a few years, but that would've merely been a mild treatment of the symptoms rather than a cure.
The single biggest issue with WWE, which was fairly blatant even in the Attitude Era, but which reached new heights after Eddie died, is that VKM always goes out of his way to show there's a vast gap between the genuine main eventers and everyone else; and if the audience wants someone pushed who for whatever reason VKM doesn't get, he actively resents them for it, and will move heaven and Earth to kneecap their choice. He's even doing it right now with Becky Lynch, for the crime of not being Charlotte, and presumably not blowing him.
Though nothing beats what he did to Mysterio in '06. Seriously, look at how many jobs he did. Before, while, and after he was champion. Not only did he job clean to both of his Wrestlemania opponents less than two months before the PPV, and in a handicap match where his team had the advantage. He even jobbed clean, as a babyface, in an "I Quit" match to Chavo Guerrero of all people:
http://www.profightdb.com/wrestlers/rey-mysterio-351.html?year=2006This is also the biggest reason why AEW's the superior product. Almost nobody who appears on either Rampage or Dynamite is booked like they're utterly beneath the main eventers. The exceptions to this -- Brabdon Cutler, Rebel -- can be counted on one hand, and their presence doesn't bother me, because it's fine to have a few stooges in a fed as long as they don't make up the majority of the roster. And when Tony legitimately doesn't want someone around anymore, he just takes 'em off TV rather than spending weeks or months humiliating them. Except Brian Pillman Jr, for some reason. But even the humiliations he's endured so far have been mild next to Vince's.
