Can They Be Champ? 03.02.08: The Other Four MitB Participants

Posted by Mike Minotti on 03.02.2008

WrestleMania 24 is less than a month away, and we only have four people announced for MitB 4. Inside, Mike gives his picks for who should fill in the other four spots. He also does a little ranting on No Way Out's EC matches and the sad state of WWE heels.

Well, it looks like the WM24 card is finally shaping up. We have seven matches announced so far, and I'm still expecting some sort of McMahon, JBL, Finlay, and Hornswoggle match to be announced. We might also get an ECW title match, although with CM Punk fighting Chavo for his title next Tuesday, I'm not sure where things are going to go. If, say, they don't have that match, I'm guessing we'll see Punk in the MitB ladder match. Chavo… well, if he's still champion, I hope they wouldn't put him in a match where the goal is to get a shot to become a champion. Of course, they already put him in the Royal Rumble, so who knows.

I find it a bit odd that after announcing three people for the MitB ladder match the first week after No Way Out (Jeff Hardy, Mr. Kennedy, and Shelton Benjamin), that we only had one new entrant announced this week (Chris Jericho). I hope they get around to announcing everyone involved in this match sooner rather later.

Speaking of which, that leaves us four empty spots. Wouldn't it be fun if I tried to predict who would fill those spots?

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By the way, I noticed some strange Spanish wrestling site stole my image. Take a look here. Should I be upset, or flattered?

Anyways, we have four spots to fill. So far we have three Raw guys and one ECW guy. I think it's important that we get a Smackdown guy in there. Who should it be? I think MVP is a logical choice. He still has a firm spot on the upper-mid card, despite not actually winning any of his matches lately and being made to look like crap in the EC match at No Way Out. Would it have hurt them so much to let MVP eliminate one person? You know, that's the reason why I liked the Raw EC so much more than the Smackdown one. Everyone in the Raw EC looked good (well, JBL didn't exactly look amazing, but he didn't look terrible). Umaga was on a path of destruction that was only stopped after he got hit by EVERYONE'S FINISHING MOVE! God, I love finishing move montages. I'm a total mark for that stuff. SWEET CHIN MUSIC! CODE BREAKER! PEDIGREE! SWANTON! My whole living room was jumping up and down like crazy. Also, don't correct me if I got the order of the finishing moves wrong, I assure you I'm not claiming to remember exactly how it went down.

My point is that it took a lot for them to take Umaga out, and even before he did he was looking like a monster. I still remember that sick spot where he bashed Jericho's head through one of the pods. Jericho looked good because he got to start the match with HBK, and he also got to pin Umaga. HBK looked good because he, again, started the match and went a long way. Hardy got to kick out of the pedigree. I also marked out for that big time.

On the Smackdown side, however, the only two guys who looked good were Batista and Taker, who both started and ended the match. Thank god we're keeping Batista safe for his high profile match against Umaga at WM24. I don't know, maybe I shouldn't complain. We did get that cool tombstone piledriver reversal. And, at the end of the day, maybe that's all that Undertaker matches are about. Cool reversals into tombstones. They'll be thinking of new ways to pull those off long after my hollow words have disappeared from this net.

Ok, that was a bit of a tangent. My point is that MVP needs to be in MitB, and he needs to look strong in it. I mean, what is the other option? Have him defend his US title? I don't see who he could defend it against, unless Matt Hardy suddenly came back. The problem there is that Hardy would surely be booked to win that match, and I don't think a victory over MVP is going to mean that much unless we make the character look strong again.

You know what the problem with so many WWE heels is? They all have this "lot of talk but can't back it up" thing. Randy Orton had that problem for a long time until he was finally turned into a big threat again (thanks to all the head kicking he started doing last year). Mr. Kennedy has that gimmick. MVP has that gimmick. Hell, even Edge, our freaking WORLD HEAVY WEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP, has to depend on cheating to win just about every single high profile match he's in. Come on guys, we really can't let Edge beat Rey Mysterio cleanly? Even when you know he has to look strong for an upcoming feud with Taker? I mean, really guys? Why can't a heel who isn't a "monster" be dominant in the ring anymore? I'm tired of it. And then they wonder why they have such a hard time getting people like Kennedy to the main event. Their solution is always to have him be apart of some elaborate angle. "Hey, let's make Mr. Kennedy McMahon's murderer/accomplice/son, and then he'll be over!" I have a crazy idea! Maybe if Mr. Kennedy racked up a lot of wins, he would get over! Kind of like that one time when he beat five former champions on Smackdown, which gave him momentum all the way to winning last year's MitB. Oh, and wins against Super Crazy and Brian Kendrick don't count. Val Venis, too. God, Val Venis in a MitB qualifying match…. God. Let's not even go there.

Alright, maybe I should finally fill in MitB spot #6. Well, I think we should have at least one more ECW guy. Now, assuming that CM Punk and Chavo are having their own match, I think John Morrison would be a great choice. He's shown that he can hang in ladder matches before, and he definitely has a high spot on ECW's card. I think it would be a big waste to not have him be a part of WM24, and this seems like the most logical place to put him. Hey, you know what else? If John Morrison made it clear that he wanted to win so he could have a shot at the ECW Title, we may even actually increase the value of that decrepit belt!

Let's get another Smackdown guy in the match. This time it's going to come down to "who doesn't have anything else to do, but should be in WM". I think this qualifies Kane. Besides, I'm not even sure who else from Smackdown to put in the match. Kane has been in this match before, and when motivated he can still perform well. I mean, he has to do better than he did at last year's WM. Speaking of which, I know Khali doesn't have anything to do at WM24, but please don't put him in this match. Please….

Ok, we have one more spot. We have three Raw guys, two Smackdown guys, and two ECW guys. Well, Smackdown is a more important brand than ECW, but besides maybe Chuck Palambo, I can't think of anyone decent to put in this match. A sad sign of Smackdwon's troubled mid card. I think ECW can offer better choices. Since we already have Morrison in the match, I say we go ahead and add the Miz. If we don't, he'll look like the weak half of the team. Besides, I think being in a big match like this can really benefit Miz. It also means we can that tag team "will they or won't they work together?" thing going on. Good stuff.

Alright, that does it. I've added MVP, John Morrison, Kane, and Miz to the match. There are our eight participants. What do you guys think? Who would you add in the match? Did I add someone you want to stay the hell away from MitB?

That'll do it for me. Have a good week, everyone.