Is there trouble in TKO paradise?
Yesterday, social media was flooded with the news that BG James, the former Road Dogg from the Attitude era heyday, was fired from his position on the WWE creative team. A few hours later, Mike Johnson, the most accurate reporter of the pro wrestling business, provided clarification that James, who was brought back to the company in 2014 and had a slew of different roles behind the scenes during that time, had actually resigned for the promotion, citing frustration with the creative direction of the product.
Usually, I’d take anything reported about the sports entertainment industry on the internet with a grain of salt, but if Mike Johnson says it, it’s probably true. Since there are dozens of writers on the creative team, it’s doubtful that Road Dogg would individually get the axe since that move itself wouldn’t truly shakeup the creative direction of the WWE brand.
That’s one of the reasons that I put a level of credibility in the notion that he probably quit the job as opposed to being released.
If that was the case, it provides some intriguing insight into the backstage environment of the WWE machine, which has been the subject of rumors surrounding the sluggish ticket sales for this year’s Wrestlemania in Las Vegas.
It’s important to note that a position on the WWE creative team, especially for an accomplished in-ring performer, can be a good spot, in terms of job security. Even founding Freebird, Michael Hayes has managed to keep a job for a few decades as a part of the scripting process. Road Dogg was away from the company for several years and didn’t speak kindly of management at a time when he was dealing with substance issues. Thankfully, Brain James cleaned up his life and landed in the previously mentioned role of the booking team, a position that many probably wouldn’t of guessed when he lashed out at the company years earlier.
Still, for Road Dogg to throw in the towel on the creative process more or less signifies that there might actually be some chaos around the current status of the organization because of the lackluster WM 42 sales. As I’ve said before, there are peaks and valleys to everything, and given that the fans already saw the peak of the current era with the championship coronation of Cody Rhodes two years ago, it might be something as simple as a natural dip in momentum more than a flaw in the creative process. Also as I wrote prior, the fact of the matter is that the astronomical ticket prices for this year’s Wrestlemania are just too expensive for most of the fan base to realistically afford. When the cheapest ticket in the building is $350, bringing the total cost for the two-night event to over $700 just to get into the venue, a significant portion of the WWE demographic is priced out of attending the show. Furthermore, it doesn’t help the selling point for the traveling crowd when the pay-per-view is in Las Vegas for the second year in a row because they already had a chance to see the city if they attended the PPV last year.
However, it makes you wonder, what might’ve been the point of contention, if any, that led to this resignation?
Outside of Cody, we’ve seen WWE brass, specifically during the latter years of Vince McMahon’s tenure, cater to the part-time former stars, which took away opportunities for younger talent to be moved up into the positions as potentially money-drawing stars. Vince often took the less risky, but very stagnant approach of automatically yielding to Brock Lesnar, Bill Goldberg, or the original baby face super push of Roman Reigns that flopped. Keep in mind, we saw the Roman/Brock match-up numerous times on pay-per-view, including three Wrestlemania main events, in a relatively short period of time. Brock and Roman are big stars, but they aren’t on the same level of Austin/Rock or Undertaker/Michaels for there to be a demand for multiple Wrestlemania main events.
There are key periods of time when a talent is at their peak in terms of popularity and that’s the point when to run with them to make them the biggest star possible. If the office missed that peak, or fumbles their popularity, it becomes a missed opportunity. Let’s be honest, there was a reason that there was a demand for an alternative when All Elite Wrestling was launched in 2019 because the fan base had become disenfranchised with the Vince McMahon approach to sports entertainment. Speaking of 2019, there was a point that Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff were added as the head writers of Raw and Smackdown respectively. Heyman was well-known to assist in the direction of the talent that he worked with anyway, and Bischoff was brought back to the organization to provide something new to the blue brand. Obviously, this was done to appease the shareholders after there was a noticeable amount of criticism toward the direction of the product. Of course, it was lip service, as Vince still made all the decisions, and the entire process was nothing more than an artificial way for the corporation to give the impression that it brought back two of the creative forces of the boom period of the late-90s. Bischoff lasted about four months until he was sent home, and Heyman went back to working solely with the talent that he was booked with on-screen.
There wasn’t an attempt to truly change the creative process, and the former WCW boss probably didn’t get a fair shake. The point being, the clash of ideology isn’t anything new for the creative process of pro wrestling, but when someone walks away from the table, it implies that they’ve hit a brick wall in terms of what they can advocate for as far as the direction of television. Since he quit, you’d have to assume that Road Dogg wanted to take a different path than the road that the shows are on right now, which have garnered a lukewarm WM build at best.
CM Punk is a major star, but almost 50, Roman Reigns held the championship for four years, and the Drew McIntyre/Cody Rhodes match has already happened a handful of times. What is new or fresh ahead of Wrestlemania 42? Sure, Bron Breakker got hurt, but he wasn’t in the plans for a main event spot, even if he should’ve been. Jacob Fatu is money, but as of this writing, he’s not anywhere near a potential main even spot.
It’s easy to see why someone could be frustrated trying to spin all the plates in an attempt to serve all the master of the publicly-traded corporation.
Reportedly, Road Dogg suffered a heart attack in 2021 so this might be a situation where the stress of the job isn’t worth the impact on his health. His real-life brother, the superb and extremely underrated, Brad Armstrong died of a heart attack at the age of 50 in 2012. Considering that BG James is 56, it would be a lot easier to work the convention circuit to sign autographs and pose for photo-ops or work as a backstage producer for AEW than have to script the countless hours of WWE TV each week.
What do you think? Share your thoughts, opinions, feedback, and anything else that was raised on Twitter @PWMania and Facebook.com/PWMania.
Until next week
-Jim LaMotta
Email [email protected] | You can follow me on Instagram, Facebook, & Threads @jimlamotta89
