FanPost

I Miss Great Catch Phrases

As we routinely do each Tuesday and Wednesday after RAW and SmackDown has aired, I was texting my friend earlier today and posed a simple question:

"Name one popular catchphrase from an active wrestler. (Cena and Brock doesn't count as active wrestlers right now.)"

These are three he came up with:

"Walk With Elias"

"Get These Hands"

"And maybe" he said, "The House That AJ Styles Built"

The first and the last are weak. Braun's "Get These Hands" is pretty strong, I'll admit. But with the size of the roster for SmackDown and RAW, one pretty strong catchphrase is not good.

Compare those to just a few off the top of my head: "Oh, Hell Yeah!" "Austin 3:16 says I just whooped your ass!" "Pimpin' Ain't Easy" "Have A Nice Day!" "Suck It", and whatever The Rock came up with. All of these could be argued for having notable catchphrases that became a part of pop culture at the time.

So, here is one thing that needs to change and which could possibly help the declining ratings: let the wrestlers write and/or improv their own promos. develop and find their character's voice, and create something that could become the next big pop culture catchphrase.

I remember listening to Steve Austin describe how he came up with his catchphrases. It wasn't written for him; it just came to him during his post-King of the Ring promo. He has long attributed the Stone Cold persona to his own, turned up to a 11, and on that night, two catchphrases in one promo luckily stuck. Soon Stone Cold Steve Austin was not just a WWE superstar, but a pop culture phenomenon. His catchphrases were heard everywhere, from school playgrounds to Sportscenter.

It's no surprise the product then had so many eyeballs on it.

Looking at the product today, there are a ton of issues WWE needs to address, and quickly. And yes, it is easy to armchair quarterback about this on a comment board. But nothing could be easier at introducing (or reintroducing) eyeballs to a product like a popular catchphrase.

Two examples:

1) "Oh my god, they killed Kenny!" introduced me to South Park. When South Park hit airwaves, I was in elementary school and I never watched an episode until so many kids in my class were saying this popular line. Because I wanted to be in the know, I asked them about it and suddenly, I was hooked on a new TV series that I tried my best to hide from my mom.

2) "Hit 'Em With The Hein" brought me back to The Howard Stern Show. Even though it wasn't the same show as it used to be, it had something that had me hooked. "HEWTH" is now played out - and nothing new has taken it's place - and now I no longer tune in.

There are many more examples; I think you get the point.

With the size of the current WWE roster, and five hours of TV a week, there is no reason to not get as many performers TV time and have each one try to develop a catchphrase that gains mainstream appeal. It may take time to find one, or like Stone Cold, they find two great catchphrases in one promo. But one thing is clearly obvious: the WWE writers are not finding any.

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