WWE RAW Play-By-Play: The Michael Cole Hole And Other Problems

The WWE has obviously decided to take a new direction with its play-by-play. Whereas in the past they would use former wrestlers and big industry names – Jesse Ventura, Gorilla Monsoon, Mr Perfect, Roddy Piper, the list goes on – they now use guys like Todd Grisham and company and even the former wrestlers they do use, such as Jerry Lawler and Matt Striker, seem to have been told to tone down their heelish personas. (The latter, while still with a long way to go, has improved greatly since the travesty that was the broadcast of the last Wrestlemania).

This move was undoubtedly intended to extend the WWE’s appeal beyond a hard-core fan base. They are the ones who'd really appreciate a former wrestler behind the mic, whereas newer fans might be put off by the same. That is fine, but wrestling play-by-play has a specific function that will never change and when a broadcaster is not up to the job, the product suffers.

Michael Cole is not up to the job and his broadcasting detracts from the WWE’s product. So to a lesser extent does Jerry Lawler’s conversion into a sober, neutral commentator, but I’ll focus on Cole here.

Great announcers add an extra layer to a match and help great wrestling talents tell their stories and advance their careers. Think of Bret the Hitman Hart, and how Gorilla Monsoon would build him up in the early days, giving him the name the “Excellence of Execution”, and singing his praises in those early days when whether he would make it as a singles wrestler was anyone’s guess. Or think too about Stone Cold Steve Austin, and the integral role that Jim Ross played in building him up – “The rattlesnake has struck” or “He stomped in a mud hole him in him and is going to walk it dry” leap to mind when we think of Stone Cold’s wrestling career.

Now contrast that with the Michael Cole equivalent – his uncomfortable (for the viewer) fawning over the Miz, seemingly unconnected to anything else related to whatever persona it is Michael Cole is trying to create. Going way back, I can recall Jesse Ventura singing the praises of the Macho Man, but that fit in well with his personality and made sense from a storyline perspective. Michael Cole’s Miz worship seems just arbitrary by comparison, especially when he is for the most part a neutral, milquetoast announcer in all other respects.

Building up wrestlers is an important part of what a good broadcaster can do, but the bulk of the job involves creating interest in and, to paraphrase Jim Ross helping wrestlers "paint their pictures”, i.e. calling the matches in such a way as to keep viewers captivated and communicate the story of what’s going on in the ring. Michael Cole fails miserably in this regard.

As an example, I wrote down a couple of observations from Raw’s 900^th broadcast.

This show should have been terrific. It was not, and the poor quality of the commentating (along with many screwball endings) was one of the major reasons why.

First, the show opens appropriately enough with Bret Hart. Appropriate as he was there in the early days of this programme and this is a retrospective show. I can’t fault the Hitman/Kane/Taker bit. That was all good and it was about time that someone (Kane) addressed the fact that Hart is no longer able to wrestle, but Cole says as the Hitman is out there, “Some would say he’s stealing the limelight.” And then nothing. He does not follow up or elaborate and Lawler doesn’t comment on it. So why make the comment? From whom is he stealing the limelight? Cole again shows a remarkable lack of consistency with his character.

Then there’s just plain sloppiness on the part of both Cole and Lawler, who also seems to have forgotten he's there to call the match rather than given a ticket to have a good time. When the Undertaker, after being beaten up by Nexus, tries to sit up, he falls back down. As this is a rare instance of the Undertaker failing to get up with his classic recovery motion, you’d think it would bear comment. Dead silence (pun intended) from the commentators. Sloppy.

When Alberto Del Rio comes out, Cole can be heard to say, “There he is. I love this guy. Great men drive Bentleys. Blah blah blah.” Rio only made his Smackdown debut the week prior and had yet to appear on Raw. Many people would be wondering who the heck he is, but it’s only after Cole’s ranting that the King identifies him. Again, just sloppy.

When CM Punk had Stone Cold’s music played, Cole proved that those who can’t innovate imitate instead, saying “As JR would say, ‘Stone Cold! Stone Cold!”

In the main event, when Cena goes for his first tag, he looks to Orton first but chooses to tag Sheamus instead. The announcers don’t remark on how that might have been due to Cena getting an RKO last week. They are again silent, and lose the opportunity to help improve the drama in the ring, and possibly fuel what appears to be a likely Cena/Orton feud in the future... indeed it will be the main event on the next RAW.

And he misses simple moves. Play-by-play means calling what happens in the ring. For example, Sheamus has Slater up for a backbreaker, Gabriel pulls him off. This simple move was ignored.

Throughout the entire broadcast, Cole repeatedly broke the flow of conversation and any chance to draw people in by saying the same phrase again and again, “Welcome to the longest running episodic programme in television history”. It would seem he’d been told to underscore that point throughout the broadcast, but couldn’t he have worked it in more seamlessly and been creative enough to think of different ways to say the same thing?

Having Lawler there really underlines how little chemistry these two have compared to the times when Jim Ross was behind the mic. If the reason for Cole’s ascension to this, the most important broadcasting job in “sports entertainment”, was him having more of a “TV face” than JR, that is truly sad and counterproductive. The real work of the wrestling broadcaster is done during the matches, not for the few fleeting minutes they are seen on screen, and for me, Cole is a real failure there. I guess at the end of the day, you vote with your feet, and as compelling as the current WWE product is, I might just cast my ballot on this lamentable broadcasting by turning off RAW. Or at least hitting the mute button.