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But this is the pROHfile, so let’s talk some ROH! Today I’d like to talk about Tyler Black, who is somebody a lot of fans are really behind, and he was one of the brighter points of the last year or so of the Gabe Sapolsky Era, putting together a great streak of matches which built more and more fan support each time out. In Gabe’s own words in the shoot interview he did, Tyler was supposed to end 2008 by beating Nigel McGuinness for the ROH World Title at Final Battle 2008. However, Sapolsky got the boot, Adam Pearce was brought in as booker, and not only has Tyler not won the ROH World Title, but he’s spent most of 2009 out of the title picture and bogged down in feuds with Jimmy Jacobs and Austin Aries.
Now, a conspiracy theorist might say that he’s being buried because he was Gabe’s guy and Pearce wants to go in his own direction with his own guys, and the way Tyler’s been booked this year could be interpreted that way. I don’t buy into that theory, though. I think Adam, and probably Cary Silkin, probably realize that Tyler’s not ready for that top spot, and they’ve pulled him back to give him more time to develop into the wrestler he needs to be to carry that title. The more I watch Tyler, the more I’m also starting to believe he’s not ready.
I know this is going to sound like blasphemy to some people, but just because he’s had some great matches doesn’t mean he’s ready to carry the top title in the company. If it were that easy, Dean Malenko would have spent his career as a World Champion. In Tyler’s case, look at the guys he’s had those matches with: Bryan Danielson, Austin Aries, Davey Richards, and Nigel McGuinness. These are four guys who have a proven track record of carrying people to better matches than they would ever be capable of on their own, and that’s not to say that Tyler’s a bad wrestler because he’s not, but I don’t see him having blowaway matches with Jimmy Jacobs, and I think that speaks to part of the problem: he’s been programmed almost exclusively this year with the four guys I listed above. What happens when you get him away from those four and expect him to produce on his own? Can he have the same quality of singles matches with someone a step down like Erick Stevens, Claudio Castagnoli, or Brent Albright? This is something that would be a major factor in giving him the title, because as champion, he’ll be counted on to carry others to good matches and I don’t know that he can do it. There’s only so many times he can defend the title against Nigel, Danielson and Aries, eventually they’re going to have to move on and if he can’t lead the dance, he’s screwed.
There’s another problem with the way Tyler works: most of his best matches portray him as the underdog. The reason they come off as great matches is that he comes in appearing overmatched, and the crowd pops when he kicks out of 7000 lariats from Nigel or escapes 20 submissions from Danielson, and then they pop when he hits one of his big moves that come ever so close to him getting a win, but don’t. Once he’s the champion, he can’t wrestle like an underdog anymore because title matches in their most basic form are constructed to make the challengers the underdogs. When that happens, people are going to be holding their breath to see if someone can beat Tyler, not the other way around. It’s the New Age Outlaws Paradox: people knew they were the underdog, but they tuned in to see what new creative ways they could come up with to win matches and to see if they really could luck their way to the WWF Tag Team Title. Once they did, all the interest in their wrestling was gone and it was all about the catchphrase. Tyler needs to be able to wrestle like a champion to be one, and I’m not sold on his ability to be a dominant champion who people work their butts off to try and beat but just can’t.
Here’s another thing to think about: he’s got a lot of fan support because of, once again, the people he’s been programmed with. Fans pop for him against Nigel because they hate Nigel, but Tyler has good matches with him. They pop for him against Aries for the same reason. When he was teaming with Jimmy he got some boos, but they mostly cheered him because he had great matches and the fans didn’t want to see him bogged down with Jimmy and wanted him to break out on his own. But when he gets matched up with Danielson, while the match gets pops because they always have great matches, the actual fan support is pretty split, and if either of them has a slight edge it’s Danielson. Samoa Joe got a way bigger pop when he came back for that one shot deal to work Tyler last year. What’s going to happen when you put him in the ring with other ROH favorites? Will he really get cheered over Colt Cabana, Necro Butcher, or one of the Briscoes? What if Paul London comes back and works a match or two with Tyler? What if he has title matches with Danielson, who already gets slightly more cheers when they wrestle, but will probably get more in a title situation since the fans probably want to see Danielson get the title back more than they want to see Tyler get it period? He’s okay for now because of the people he’s working against, but if he does get the title, they’re going to have to be very careful who they book him against and how they do it, otherwise he might end up getting more boos than cheers for much of the time.
But maybe that has something to do with his charisma, or lack thereof. Okay, he’s not Roderick Strong bad, but he has no real zing to him, he’s very bland in his delivery, with most of his promos sounding something like “I want to be the ROH World Champion, and you’re standing in my way. Tonight, I’m going to beat you.†Okay, that’s the right mindset for his character, but the delivery stinks. He has yet to come close to cutting a promo that really grabs the fans and pulls them in. I know that ROH is supposed to be the company where workrate counts the most, and it’s all well and good that he has good matches, but the three best champions in company history: Samoa Joe, Bryan Danielson, and Nigel McGuinness, were all fabulous promo guys as well, and all three knew how to cut promos that spoke to the audience and got them emotionally invested in what they were saying, and whether they were face or heel, they got some of the biggest reactions in company history. Now compare them to a couple of the less steller ROH Champions in Xavier and Jerry Lynn. Both were more than good enough workers, but neither exactly set the world on fire with their title reigns and neither lasted long with the belt because neither of them were able to draw in a crowd with their promo skill.
At this point, Tyler’s riding the wave of great matches he may or may not be getting carried to, and that’s good enough for now. Once he’s the champion, though, he better be able to carry matches or people are going to notice that his matches aren’t as good as they used to be. He better learn to cut promos or people are going to realize that his opponents are way more entertaining talkers than he is. If he hasn’t improved in either area and he starts getting thrown in the ring with guys the fans really like because they’re good at both, it’s going to be painfully obvious that he wasn’t ready to get the title. If all that comes true, the fans will turn on him. ROH is a company that’s become notorious for turning on nearly everyone to strap that belt around their waist, and I think they may turn even more so in Tyler’s case because they wanted it for so long that if he gets it and he hasn’t improved, they’re going to feel ripped off and go “wait, this is what I’ve been dying to see for the last two years? Screw this guy.†I’m glad he didn’t get the title back at Final Battle 2008 because he definitely wasn’t ready to do it then, and even after seven months of grooming, I’m not convinced he’s ready even now.
It’s been mentioned many times on commentary over the last year or so that Tyler has a ton of potential that he has yet to fully realize, and I’m not sure he’s realized it yet. Granted, ROH is in a tough spot because he’s somebody the fans are clearly very behind and are impatient that he be given the title, but they can’t haphazardly strap the belt around his waist just because the fans cheer for him because as I’ve pointed out, there are many other considerations. But on the other hand, if they wait too long then it’s the Rob Van Dam or Scott Steiner argument, where by the time they finally got the title, the fans stopped caring a long time ago. In fact, I think they’ve already gone well down that road in Tyler’s case. ROH is really caught between a rock and a hard place with Tyler, but I agree with them erring on the side of caution because putting him in a position he’s not ready for and seeing him fail would be a lot worse for business than leaving him where he is for the time being. When we’re talking about it in those terms, I’m all for giving Tyler time to develop into the wrestler he needs to be before giving him the title, and hoping he doesn’t get signed away before that happens.
But you don’t want to totally disappoint the fans either. However, it’ll be tough to figure out how to get the title on Tyler and not have him fall totally flat after winning it, because that’s something that has happened to certain past ROH World Champions whose road to the title told a great story, but the story ended there. (see Lynn, Jerry and Cide, Homi) I don’t like to fantasy book (even though I seem to do it every column), but since the fans have wanted Tyler to win the title for so long and he’s lost so many opportunities that the air has started to come out of those sails, I would have Aries lose the title to another big babyface (like Danielson if they want to risk putting the title on him for a few months), and then build to a big, climactic title match at Final Battle where Tyler comes really, really close, but loses again. After this loss, the fans are all pissed off, but Tyler snaps and brutally attacks Danielson (or whoever) and beats them within an inch of their life. From there, Tyler adds a new violent streak (think Claudio 2008) to his already good wrestling, and have him beat everyone thrown in his path and injure most of them before finally getting the title at the 8th Anniversary Show. Then once he has the title, you then book him to go out and beat all his former conquerors (Danielson, Aries, Nigel, and whoever else) in brutal fashion that makes it look like he’s as interested in ending their careers as he is in retaining the title.
I think this would really connect because everybody in the world has been frustrated, and everybody’s felt like there was something they could attain in their life if only one particular person or group of people weren’t standing in their way, and there are people who have gotten so frustrated with Tyler failing time after time to win the title that they would almost be living vicariously through Tyler if he turned heel on the company and started crippling the people who stood in his way all those months. I’ve been saying for years that the best way to be a babyface in the post 80s wrestling world is to act like a heel, and I think that holds true here because as long as Tyler plays the boring guy who wants to do things in a sportsmanlike manner, the fans will eventually turn on him, title or no. Even if you don’t go in this particular direction that I’ve mapped out, he’s going to need some kind of edge to stay over, and I think that if he can improve his wrestling and his promo ability and learn to carry matches on his own, this would be the final ingredient to making Tyler a very successful ROH World Champion. But if they put the title on him right now, I have no doubt that he would crash and burn.
Thank you for reading, and I’ll be back later in the week with a preview of this weekend’s events in Toronto…Ontario, Canada. Until then, don’t take any wooden nickels, show respect to your elders, and I’ll see you in a few days!
Stu Carapola can be reached at stupwinsider@yahoo.com.
