Poor Commentary Work Is Seriously Hurting WWE Product

WWE has faced a real hammering over the last 24 hours as fans have aired their disappointment with the Tables, Ladders, Chairs...and Stairs pay-per-view.

The company's last big show of the year came up short for many, especially given the almost universal praise for the week's other special event, NXT Takeover: R Evolution.

This criticism seems bizarre given the quality of the in-ring content at TLC, which was far from terrible. In fact, a lot of the work on show was well above average, particularly in the opening Ladder match between Luke Harper and Dolph Ziggler.

However, there is one notable way in which the WWE main roster consistently falls short of NXT: its commentary.

The main roster announcers—Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler and JBL—represent wrestling's past rather than its future. Cole and Lawler have both been a distinctive part of WWE's commentary setup for several decades, and their work is quickly beginning to stagnate.

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Cole often fundamentally fails to perform his duties as the play-by-play commentator. Whole matches go by without his drawing attention to anything other than finishing moves and the odd signature maneuver. 

A prime example from TLC occurred during the pre-show bout between The New Day and Gold and Stardust. Cole failed to draw attention to a hot tag because he was distracted by the picture of Flintstones character The Great Gazoo he was showing to Lawler and JBL on his phone.

He failed to perform his job because he was playing on his phone. In any other workplace, that'd be grounds for some sort of discipline.

Even during his days working with Tazz as the announce team for the SmackDown brand, Cole never impressed with his play-by-play work. Often it would be the former ECW star who actually described the wrestling moves on show.

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Cole isn't the only offender, though.

Jerry Lawler and JBL seem completely uninterested in the action. Often, they will spend almost the entire match discussing a different storyline and will barely show any excitement as the match reaches its finale.

For instance, the main event of TLC culminated in a sequence in which both Bray Wyatt and Dean Ambrose kicked out of their opponent's finishing move. On both occasions, neither of the three announcers chose to make any comment on how unique an event that was and failed to inject any passion into what they were saying.

Compare this to the work of Jim Ross, generally considered to be the greatest play-by-play commentator in professional wrestling history.

In many of the huge matches he called, his words and passion on commentary are just as famous as the match itself. Mankind's iconic fall from the top of Hell in a Cell at King of the Ring 1998 cannot be imagined now without JR's impassioned response.

Michael Cole doesn't really have an equivalent moment.

However, there's help on the way from a new generation of announcers. The likes of Tom Phillips, Byron Saxton and Renee Young show that the future is full of promise.

Down on NXT, there's also a prime display of how commentary should be done. The trio of Rich Brennan, Alex Riley and Corey Graves really sold the importance of the main event match and focused entirely on the events within the ring.

The effect of commentary on televised professional wrestling cannot be overstated. Generally, if the voices behind the desk are excited, the audience will be too.

If the people who are calling the match sound bored and uninterested, how are the audience expected to get involved?