A.J. Lee and Vickie Guerrero: What's Next in the Battle of Current & Former GMs?

Last week on Raw, WWE laid the foundation for a battle of the GMs.

Per the storyline, a frustrated Vickie came out to the ring to vent her anger at the state of the Raw product—and demanded Raw GM AJ Lee, whom she has been feuding with, come out to the ring.  

Vickie, who has served as GM of both Raw and SmackDown in the past, considers AJ too erratic and unhinged to run WWE’s flagship show properly and feels a replacement GM is necessary—preferably her.  The two women had a feisty catfight earlier this week over their various issues.      

AJ eventually complied and a tense confrontation between the two followed. After some stalling, AJ finally admitted that she had been repudiated by the all-powerful WWE Board of Directors for her actions as of late.  A shell-shocked AJ then noted that they had banned her from laying a hand on any WWE superstar or employee—or else.  She also had to apologize to Vickie.

A gleeful Vickie promptly responded by taunting and mocking AJ, then viciously slapping her in the face after getting the apology. Poor AJ could do nothing, except throw a massive, furious tantrum after Vickie had left. Throwing things around, screaming at the fans…hey, maybe AJ should have sent herself to Dr. Shelby’s anger management classes, not Daniel Bryan and Kane.

 

So, where is all this going, exactly?

Well, it’s difficult to say. One scenario is that it will lead to AJ getting replaced in her role as GM by Vickie. On paper this makes sense.

While AJ hasn’t been a total disaster as Raw’s main authority figure, she hasn’t been a success either.  While she has a perky, quirky charisma as Daniel Bryan’s crazy girlfriend, she lacks any real spark or zest in her boring office role.  By going corporate, she seems to have lost what made her special in the first place.

Her storyline rivalry with WWE Champion CM Punk—Punk thinks AJ is out to get him after he rebuffed her advances—hasn’t really gotten off the ground either, or helped establish Punk as WWE’s top heel. Fans aren’t really getting behind her and look to be as firmly supportive of the WWE Champion as ever.

Not to mention the basic logic loophole of why Vince McMahon, and the board of directors, would ever hire someone with such a history of wild and crazy behavior to run their flagship show.  

So overall, AJ has not been a success in the role. No doubt Raw’s fledgling ratings aren’t helping her case either, especially since she’s been all over the show.  

It’s not all AJ’s fault, of course. She’s been stuck with muddled, inconsistent writing and a wildly-veering character direction. Plus she didn’t ask WWE’s booking team to put her in every other segment, leading to overexposure.

Of course, AJ's dismissal may not happen after all. Maybe the end result of this will be AJ turning the tables on Vickie and securing her position as GM.  After all, WWE seem to be as high on her as ever, and it’s hard to believe her massive push would get dropped so suddenly.

It nearly goes without saying that AJ/Vickie will probably not be a classic feud—nor will it lead to any great matches. And it remains to be seen whether fans are willing to sit through yet another authority figure feud. 

Regardless of how it turns out, the AJ/Vickie programme appears to be yet more time filler on the new three-hour Raw show. But, hey, if it’s any consolation, this looks to be like most feuds on WWE’s flagship show these days.