Professional wrestling is a work.
Bill Watts, the hard-nosed promoter of Mid-South Wrestling for several years is probably spinning in his grave with how exposed the business is today, and he’s not even dead yet. As a traditionalist, it makes me cringe when the industry is so blatantly exposed, mostly because it’s been proves, and fairly recently, that you can still work the audience. The public only knows what you allow them, and even if they know something, that doesn’t mean they have to know everything. The missing piece of the puzzle creates intrigue and that can still draw money because regardless of the documentaries or the star ratings, the building blocks of the industry remain the same. Sure, the business has evolved, and some of the presentation has to be tailored to that to get a level of believability, but the foundation of the genre hasn’t changed since its based on human psychology.
The question of if Seth Rollins was or wasn’t actually injured at Saturday Night’s Main Event allowed for the memorable cash-in at Summer Slam. Again, the fans know what you allow them to know.
Still, we have to face the facts that the audience, more than ever before, knows that the office makes the decisions. If Roman Reigns was the baby face champion with the super push in 1995, it might not have gotten over depending on how it was done, but there wouldn’t have been nearly the amount of rejection that he endured from the audience twenty years later. Unfortunately, Roman took the heat for the crowd’s discontent with the office, not with his skill set, which was proven when he eventually became the top guy when he was organically allowed to evolve as a performer in a heel role. He was given the chance to become the top guy as Roman Reigns, not be forced into the spot of the next John Cena.
The point is, if something scripted for the show is subpar, the audience knows that it was the office, not the performer that made that decision. Dolph Ziggler didn’t get squashed by Bill Goldberg at Summer Slam years ago because the former WCW champion was a “better wrestler,” it was simply the decision that management made for that night. Granted, star power is often measured by successful booking, and that doesn’t always include winning, but again, we’ve reached a point in the evolution of the genre that if someone loses a match, the audience doesn’t write them off as a wrestler that doesn’t have a future in the business.
That’s why the recent story of Nixon Newell, the former Tegan Nox in WWE, and Miranda Alize walking out of an AEW Collision taping because they didn’t agree with the booking of their segment is very puzzling.
The story was originally reported by Fightful Select that the real-life couple left the show because they didn’t want to lose their schedule match against Tay Conti and Anna Jay. Newell refuted that, posting online that the team didn’t want to compete in a match that was only going to be a three-minute segment. The pair lost a very short match on Collision two weeks ago. Since the initial report, Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp has updated the story a few times, with Newell continuing to refute those reports. I take most of what Sean Ross Sapp said with a grain of salt, which has less to do with him and more to do with the nature of pro wrestling reporting. However, PWinsider’s Mike Johnson, who I consider the most accurate reporter in the industry, confirmed that while the pair didn’t refuse to lose the match, they left because they didn’t get the requested amount of time for the segment.
In short, they didn’t want to work a basic squash match, and they have the right to refuse to do so, especially because they aren’t under contract. That being said, it’s also one of the silliest and most narrow-minded decisions that a wrestler can make, especially in the modern era. Keep in mind, we’ve established that the audience knows that the result is scripted so does a short loss on Collision, the show with the lower amount of viewers on the AEW television line-up, really make a difference in the career of Newell or Alize?
More importantly, who are Newell or Alize to think they should be important enough for an entire show to be rewritten based on what they want to do? Don’t get me wrong, Tegan Nox was a decent in-ring performer, but she torn her ACL twice and was more known for being injured during her WWE tenure than anything else. She was also released from the organization twice. This might sound too harsh, but Tegan Nox isn’t truly a known name in the industry that has to be protected booking-wise, let alone Nixon Newell, who only independent fans from several years ago would know of.
The Wrestling Observer’s Bryan Alvarez mentioned that Newell said on a live stream on Twitch that she only planned to wrestle other year or two so maybe that’s why she thought she was too much of a superstar to work a short match on AEW programming? It’s ironic that she took such a hard stance with the second biggest pro wrestling company in the United States because she actually posted on Twitter after her WWE release last year that she was finding it very difficult to get booked on the independent circuit. Maybe there simply isn’t a demand for Tegan Nox on the indy scene? Maybe her asking price was too expensive? Either way, after someone is cut from the WWE for a second time and then can’t get steady work on the independents, it seems rather obvious that they should try to make the most of an appearance with AEW, but that doesn’t appear to be the case.
Newell might plan to be done with wrestling within a year or so, but she might not have a choice either since her remaining options in the business look to be very limited. With the two being a couple, you have to wonder if Miranda Alize has the same mindset to be done with wrestling relatively soon because she will undoubtedly be associated with the negativity of this story even if she wanted to wrestle after Newell retires.
It goes without saying, or at least it should for any talent that want to make a full-time living as a professional wrestler, there’s much more to the career than just when the bell rings and who goes over in the match. Similar to any other job in a capitalist society, is the person reliable? Can the wrestler show up as advertise ready to give their best for the paying audience? Again, similar to any other job, is the person easy to work with? If someone is too difficult to deal with, eventually it’s not worth the hassle regardless of how talented they are. Low Ki would be a modern example of this. It might be considered the next level, but if a wrestler can make the media appearances and be a good representative of the company is also extremely important when a promotion decides to put stock in a talent on the roster. John Cena, Cody Rhodes, and Roman Reigns are examples of performers that conducted themselves as top guys.
This story will probably fade from the headlines rather quickly, as it’s probably the most publicity that either Newell and Alize had in their careers, but it should be considered a lesson in what not to do for talent that want to land a major contract. As mentioned, sports entertainment is a work and if they didn’t want to work a three-minute match, they have the right to leave, but they proved how difficult they would be if they were booked in a bigger spot that actually had an impact on the direction of their characters. Should any promoter trust Newell to be booked in a pay-per-view spot? What if eight minutes on PPV isn’t enough for her?
The answer is exactly what the promotion did, booked another tag team, Hyan and Maya World in the same spot. They did what was asked of them and probably have a better chance of getting a full-time deal because they were easy to work with and did what the job required for that show. Hopefully, Nixon Newell will be easier to work with in her next career.
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
