WWE: Time Of Year When Value Of Titles Becomes Important

There won’t be a WWE Raw-exclusive pay per view until the Elimination Chamber in February, and in the months of December and January, the only pay per view besides the Royal Rumble is the SmackDown Live-exclusive Clash of Champions. It’s a dry part of the calendar year, so how will the WWE keep fans interested?

The road to WrestleMania begins during the “Royal Rumble season”, and Michael Cole and the WWE will make sure you are reminded of this. Randy Orton and other superstars will pose, pointing towards the big WrestleMania logo hovering above, and the WWE has even named one of the major pay per views before WrestleMania “Fastlane”. As in, this pay per view takes you on the “fast lane” to WrestleMania.

But until the 2018 Royal Rumble on Jan. 28, the WWE has a lot of time to fill, and I wouldn’t blame some fans, especially those who enjoy other promotions or (gasp) just aren’t that committed to watching hours of wrestling each week, for tuning out.

After all, there isn’t much to build up to. Right now, there is more than a whole month to go before the Rumble, and we only have one pay per view in between then. That PPV is the SmackDown Live-exclusive Clash of Champions, which features just one match that could have storyline ramifications, simply because Kevin Owens’s and Sami Zayn’s careers are apparently on the line.

Meanwhile, Raw doesn’t have a pay per view scheduled until the Rumble, though there will be a 25th Anniversary celebration. That event seems more like a nostalgia-packed affair, but maybe that will be enough intrigue for some.

The WWE has been criticized for watering down its product with too many pay per views. This, in fact, is such a valid complaint that the WWE is aiming to reduce its PPV schedule going forward.

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While this is a good thing, the issue is that the WWE just isn’t very creative these days. Without pay per views to look towards as starting and ending points for their stories or ways to build their programs, everything feels like its stuck in neutral (as it does right now).

Vince McMahon’s favorite way to cheaply drum up interest in his product is to call for a title change, and therein lies a major issue.

This is the time of the year when a title change can be a welcome curveball to fans, causing more speculation about Rumble finishes, the road to WrestleMania, or other possible storylines.

Unfortunately, we’ve seen far too many random title changes in 2017 alone. Remember when Akira Tozawa defeated Neville for the Cruiserweight Championship before losing it back at SummerSlam? Or how about all the shifts to the tag team titles? The mid-card titles have changed hands quite frequently this year, specifically the United States Championship over on SmackDown Live. Thankfully, the WWE has calmed down their incessant hot-potatoing of the Raw Women’s Championship, and both brands have been given stable hands at the top of the men’s and women’s divisions.

That said, the damage has already been done in some respect. If Vince wants to make sure the fans are still invested until the Rumble, he can’t just pull the rabbit out of the hat by switching some of these titles. Fans of the superstar who wins will be elated, but others simply won’t care as much because these title changes just aren’t as special.

Carmella could cash in her Money in the Bank briefcase, Absolution could steal the title away from Alexa Bliss, either tag team title could change hands to a first-time main roster champ, the Cruiserweight Title is up in the air, the United States Championship has an uncertain future, and even the WWE Championship isn’t 100% safe at Clash of Champions (though it is pretty close).

Aside from Brock Lesnar’s Universal Championship, which is never defended and hasn’t been given a built-up feud since Lesnar’s clash with Braun Strowman at No Mercy, the only other title that will surely be held onto for months is Roman Reigns’s Intercontinental Championship. And in Reigns’s case, he’s only been a champion for weeks, meaning that he hasn’t been given time to make the title his.

In fact, the only person (again, besides Lesnar) who has held onto their title for an appreciable amount of time is Bliss, but she is barely on meaningful television segments anymore. And yes, that is a story for another day.

Next: Predicting All 30 Royal Rumble Entrants

So you can see that there’s an issue, and it’s been months in the making. Now, the WWE’s weekly programming is far more intriguing than ever due to the new women’s stables, Matt Hardy’s “WOKEN” character, the elite work being done in both tag divisions, and Reigns’s Open Challenges, but the point remains that any exciting swerves will feel cheapened during a time of the WWE calendar when they need to be impactful.