Booking Swagger As Champion

The most striking evidence pointing toward a sustained push to legitimize Jack Swagger as a long-term threat to the main event is the construction of the Smackdown roster. The Blue Brand was built in a way that will provide The All-American American legitimate competition in veteran upper midcard/occasional main eventers that have made a career out of making careers.

First, we have Big Show. Since a brief run at the beginning of his WWE tenure where he was showcased as a main eventer, the World’s Largest Athlete has primarily settled into the upper midcard, often serving as a body guard and fill-in main eventer. At his size, it doesn’t take much story-telling or creative effort to convey to the audience that he is a threat to the title. He could eat pin falls every week for months and still be one chokeslam away from calling out the champion for a shot at the strap. That’s what has happened here with his recent program with Jack Swagger. Think back to the days when Brock Lesnar was making his initial run up the card. Lesnar, of course, was legitimized by earning pinfall victories over, to name a few, The Rock, The Undertaker and Hulk Hogan, but don’t discount his feud with The Big Show as an important period in Lesnar’s short, but highly-successful WWE career. Swagger will always be compared to Lesnar to a certain extent. About the same size, similar builds with Lesnar being a bit more muscle bound. They have similar styles due to both being highly decorated amateur wrestlers. Like Lesnar, Swagger is a big guy, much larger than the average member of the WWE roster. Creative could have gone the Sheamus route and attempted to make the audience boo Swagger by having him squash small, crowd favorites like Jamie Noble and Evan Bourne. As evidenced by Sheamus’ lack of heat, this doesn’t work well when we are looking at the main event. To establish a midcard monster, sure, go ahead and throw Hornswoggle against the guardrail. To establish a main eventer as a legit champion, it takes something bigger – insert the Big Show. Swagger will likely only feud with Big Show through this month. I wholly anticipate a clean Swagger victory at Over the Limit where he will look like a bona fide star, allowing him to move on while Big Show gets pulled back into the midcard for some further star-making.

The next contender is lining himself up for a title shot with what should be the final installment of a strong grudge match blow-off at Over the Limit. Ever since their feud began in earnest in January, slowly burning until locking up one-on-one for the first time at Wrestlemania, Rey Mysterio and CM Punk have regularly stolen the show on Friday nights. That said, the pairing has run its course and it’s time for the blow-off, which will likely mean Straight Edge Jesus is losing his hair at Over the Limit. With the victory, Mysterio will be in line for a title shot against Swagger. If given time, these two could really put on some fantastic matches. Now, this may seem counter to my previous stance that Swagger shouldn’t simply squash little guys, however, Mysterio is no little man. As is standard with his ultimate underdog character, he pops the crowd when taking on bigger, stronger opponents that he shouldn’t be able to defeat. Coming off a victory against Big Show, Swagger can laugh at Mysterio’s size, compare him to his previous opponent and use the standard big man – little man dynamic to get the feud over. Considering Mysterio’s perpetual overness, especially with kids, I don’t think this would be too difficult. A two-month feud through June and July, I believe, would be adequate.

This leads to what could be a critical moment in Jack Swagger’s career. It’s already being rumored that the Undertaker will make his PPV return at SummerSlam in August and that it will be for the World Heavyweight Championship against Swagger. As many that have been following the company for the last 10 years, Brock Lesnar’s place in the industry was cemented with a clean victory against The Undertaker at No Mercy 2002. Sure, he had already defeated Hogan and the Rock at this point, but as many know, getting the nod from The Undertaker is the ultimate rub a young wrestler can receive from a man that is generally regarded as the general of the locker room. Undertaker is likely in the last year of his career. It’s possible that it will be strung out for another two so that he can get to a nice tidy 20-0 at Wrestlemania, but for all intents and purposes as an active member of the roster and title contender, he’s finished. If he were to receive another run at the title, it should be used to legitimize a young champion and pass the torch. While the WWE Title has bounced around since the beginning of the year with it changing hands four times since December, it would be a welcome contrast to have a lengthy reign on Smackdown. At this point, with a victory over The Undertaker at the second biggest show of the year, Swagger will be firmly entrenched in the main event scene and capable of becoming a star-maker himself.

While veterans like Big Show, Mysterio and Taker establish Swagger at the top of the Smackdown card, it provides plenty of time for a talent-rich midcard composed of Christian, Kofi Kingston, MVP, Drew McIntyre, Cody Rhodes and Dolph Ziggler along with ever-ready main eventer CM Punk to shake out. Christian-Punk, Christian-Ziggler, Kofi-McIntyre, MVP-Rhodes, Punk-Kofi all could be great midcard feuds to prepare a new rush of contenders for Swagger’s seat at the top of the card.

Many pundits and IWC whiners may have complained about the “raping” of Smackdown at the draft when Edge and Jericho were taken from the Blue Brand, but what their short-sightedness failed to see was the removal of the glass ceiling that was in place with those superstars hogging the title scene. With Mysterio and Big Show in place and Swagger developing quickly, the next year on Smackdown could be critical in determining the next generation of WWE poster boys.