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JR's Blog: JR's WWE TLC Thoughts, Royal Rumble Idea, UFC/WWE Titles, Order JR's Today Online for Holidays!

Posted: Dec 17th 2013 By: CMBurnham

Time is rapidly running out to order JR's products online in time for Christmas. Please visit http://www.wweshop.com, http://www.americansoda.co.uk or http://www.beyondtheropes.co.uk and place your holiday order. We thank you very much. Now...TLC and more talk....

While the Mrs. was watching the Steelers win on Sunday Night Football on NBC, I was in my office watching WWE TLC on my PC. The watching online biz worked just fine by the way. I did not write down any notes but these are the things that stuck in my mind from Sunday's PPV in Houston:

Hot start with CM Punk and the Shield. a creative match with a surprising outcome that kept Punk 'good' and furthered the apparent dissension within the ranks of the trio. This matched challenged the balance of the card to follow them which I love. If I'd had a say this is the match that I would have chosen to kick off the show too. Good call in my book.

The late, Eddie Guerrero was once highly pissed when he had to open a PPV and felt insulted. He wasn't in the main event that night and I had to sit with him and explain his role for that particular PPV. He got it and essentially stole the show and soon found himself going on later in the card on PPV events. Going on first did not affect Eddie's pay and it set the bar for all that followed to attempt to reach.

Next order of business is many fans will second guess the strategy of what seems to be the Shield getting close to imploding. I have no issues with that particular creative matter and no crystal ball to determine if it will be successful or not. My guess is that it is a good thing and should enhance Reigns, Ambrose and Rollins who, in time, are all main event level talents.

WWE TV production personnel did their usual stellar job with the video packages and I loved seeing the champions package and felt that it gave much needed historical info to the viewers. I'd guess that many fans watching today don't even know who many of the greats of the game are and have to be educated on men like Lou Thesz and Buddy Rogers.

AJ Lee vs. Natalya was an extremely solid, Divas match but it should have gone on later in the show IE trading places w/ Brodus vs. Truth. Nonetheless if the Divas strive to be thought of as more than sizzle and support players then having matches akin to AJ vs. Nattie will help their cause.

Big E vs. Sandow was what I thought it would be and I thought it was fine for what it was positioned to be at TLC. Big E winning with his finish was the right thing to do.

Forecast that the Fatal 4 Way might be the sleeper on the PPV and it arguably was. Happy that WWE made it an elimination rules tag bout as I also wrote about in a pre TLC blog. The elimination rules makes for a better story and the elimination of teams makes the match 'cleaner' as it leads to the conclusion. The Rhodes Brothers are the best thing to happen to the WWE tag team scene in a long time.

Brodus Clay vs R Truth followed by Kofi vs. Mix back to back did not work for me nor did it seem to work for the live audience. These men are involved in new stories in new roles that have not yet resonated with the fans. Putting them back to back puzzled me.

Enjoyed the Wyatt Family's 3 vs 1 match w/ Daniel Bryan. No issues with the underdog Bryan eventually falling to the three, much larger men. Would have liked to have seen just a bit more of Bray Wyatt but that will come in time. Bray has that all important 2nd gear which is essential for stars to possess and his eventual one on one matches with Daniel Bryan should be excellent. The conclusion of the match made me want to see more of the Wyatt/Bryan saga for sure. Without question, Bray Wyatt can be special if he continues to hone his craft and maintains his athleticism. Plus, like his grandpa Blackjack Mulligan, Bray has a natural gift of gab.

Sincerely appreciated the hard work from both John Cena and Randy Orton in the unification match to create the first WWE World Heavyweight Champion. TLC sounds great on paper and makes for a sensational video promo but the match stips can be very limiting. Based on today's boundaries, I thought that the two men did all that they could do to utilize the 'toys' that they had to play with but at the end of the day I'd have been just as happy to have seen a straight wrestling match considering what was at stake.

I predicted Orton to win last week here and for no particular reason other than I've always enjoyed various periods of time when there was a villain champion who was being chased by the dogged hero who was striving to be the champion.

It will be interesting to see if any new individuals get inserted into the Championship picture. That should be everyone's goal, right?

With being WWE World Champion comes great responsibility and requires virtually a 24/7 commitment to the role. Closing the shows on which one is booked, having stellar matches on a nightly basis, carrying one's self as the 'top guy' outside the ring and a litany of other behind the scenes matters makes being the WWE World Champion a massively challenging professional matter that contains many life changing elements.

Just a quick reminder, http://www.wweshop.com ships JR's Cookbook world wide with no restrictions of which I am aware. These books have been personally signed by me and have some delicious easy to do, family recipes, grilling tips and tons of wrestling stories from the road and beyond. This is much more than just a book of recipes including the road stories and many photos.

Hmmm, what if the winner of the Royal Rumble decided to challenge the Undertaker at WrestleMania in New Orleans and not the WWE World Champion? Then February's PPV could determine the Title challenger in some sort of competition that is culminated in that one night on PPV? Hey, it's just an idea.

The fascination with gambling lines on WWE PPV bouts is a head scratcher to me.

Building enhanced credibility for the new, WWE World Title is going to be an ongoing matter that will never find its work finished. Nothing should be more important to any WWE talent, friend or foe, than being WWE World Champion. Being the Champion becomes a great story if the title is positioned properly and on a lofty pedestal.

One of the many differences in the UFC and WWE, other than UFC being a main stream sport and the WWE being primarily an entertainment entity, is that the UFC titles have meant more than WWE Titles have meant in recent times.

The door is now open for that to change within WWE including repositioning the IC Title and the US Title.

Why have titles if they are not coveted by all who are eligible to compete for them? Plus, they are not 'hot potatoes.'

The bottom line is that building equity in any title sells tickets and PPV's.

Ask JR, The Q&A section of the site, is updated. Funny how many wrestling websites reprint our material and fail to tell fans how they can order our products. Seems like that is the least that one could do if they are going to use my material. Just throw a http://www.wweshop.com on there and you're done.

Hopefully you will do some timely, online shopping for JR's products and allow us to be a part of your holidays. If you wait, you're burning daylight.

Last that I looked I'm less than 5,000 followers from reaching 1M which was my goal on Twitter @JRsBBQ when the year started. I hope that we make it.

Be well and kind to others and come back and see us.

Boomer Sooner!

J.R. @JRsBBQ