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Missy's Manor: Developing Future Superstars

Posted: Nov 24th 2008 By: CMBurnham

I always try to pay attention to the younger wrestlers on television and indy shows. I always like to keep an eye open to who might be a future wrestling superstar. Unfortunately this has became a very hard crap shoot over the years. The wrestling business has developed in to a television entity of WWE and TNA. There is practically no territories for a younger wrestler to develop their craft in order to be prepared for the big time. Most younger wrestlers have to hustle on small indy shows that are sometimes poorly promoted. Wrestling in empty VFW Halls will get you ring time, but unfortunately it is hard to develop a persona in front of such dismal crowds.

The best way to develop a wrestler is to work in front of a regular crowd that comes back weekly or monthly. It allows the wrestler to work in front of a crowd that is familiar with their personality and program. Unfortunately Memphis wrestling is currently ran on such a small scale. Most wrestlers had previously ventured thru Memphis back in the day. If you couldn't make it by cutting a live promo on Sat. mornings in WMC studios, than your wrestling future was not going to be very long. Wrestlers also had the opportunity to return to the towns weekly. This allowed the wrestlers to work on psychology, since you have to keep things different in front of the same fans. The only wrestling programs on a small level that are currently taping bi weekly for developing talent is OVW & FCW.

I watch RAW & Smackdown regularly. I'm always baffled on how they can take young talent and thrust them on television with a generic name and no personality. This is usually a recipe for failure. I would not use any new wrestler on television, unless they have been practicing their future WWE personality/character on television for several months. The wrestler should be practicing their new persona on smaller shows and on dark matches at the television tapings, it allows creative and the wrestler to make adjustments.

I wish WWE would invest more $$$ in to their developmental system. If you can create two-three new wrestlers that take off big in three years, than you made back your initial investment back and more. Every wrestler that gets over is more merchandise that can be produced and can sell tickets. Debuting 6 generic wrestlers with no personalities is a recipe for a flop.

Eight years ago WWE had the right idea with OVW by using their television and territory to develop their current headliners. They developed John Cena, Dave Batista, Randy Orton, Shelton Benjamin, Victoria, and many other wrestlers on the current roster. Within four years WWE probably could justify their OVW investment just based off of the merchandise that John Cena or Dave Batista sold.

The developmental territory allowed the wrestlers a television platform to practice their promo skills. The territory allowed the wrestlers to get ring time two-three times a week. The wrestlers were given the opportunity to work programs that helped develop personalities, promos, and psychology. The end result is you have a bunch of main eventers for future Wrestle Mania's. This recipe was a success.

The wrestlers usually had their personalities to be similar to their future WWE characters. The wrestlers were more confident in their abilities and did not come across as generic geeks. Unfortunately WWE has been thrusting too many young wrestlers to the main roster that need more ring time or need to develop personalities. This has caused a large failure rate, since many of the wrestlers are not ready for television. There are only so many wrestlers you can discover and invest in, before they fail in the current system.

I seen Romeo Roselli work for Dory Funk years ago. I think he got tons of personality and potential. He just needed to work on a regular basis to get ready for the big time. He got thrown on to television too quickly and creative had no plans for him. The end result was he got released and he has to work even harder to ever get another WWE shot. I don't blame the wrestler at all.

A wrestler can only succeed if they have worked on a full time basis, even if it's on a local level. They also need to be comfortable and familiar with the character that they are suppose to project on television. Practicing that role on WWE dark matches would allow creative and the agents to see if the wrestler/character is suitable for their vision. It beats taking a wrestler and changing his name and costuming, than throwing him on television. Usually the wrestler will flop rather quickly in that situation.

I remember when WWF gave me the Missy Manor segments to conduct at the television tapings in my second year in the business. We taped a whole bunch of test runs to try to work out the kinks. There were so many problems, since I was green. Ultimately the whole idea was scrapped, since I SUCKED at conducting interviews at the time. I was in my second year and I had nobody to teach me how to wrap things ups, hold the mic, and play the role that WWF envisioned for me.

Luckily WWF realized that the experiment was abysmal failure and the tapes never seen the light of day [I have the tapes & I cringe when I watch them]. I'm very fortunate that Dusty Rhodes saved my career by helping me learn how to conduct interviews as his pet project for Jim Crockett's Saturday Night TBS show.

I use remember how every new wrestler had some sort of personality and vignettes to introduce them on television. This made the fans clamor to see the wrestler. It allowed the fan to be familiar with the personality and gimmick. By the time they finally debuted on television, the fans perceived them as stars. Many of the new WWE wrestlers could greatly benefit by being slowly introduced with vignettes.

My opinion would be to reopen relations with OVW or Les Thatcher by making it part of their developmental system. The wrestlers would spend the time working in front of weekly crowds to get their ring time. The television will allow them to develop by working angles and programs. When they are getting ready to move to the next level, than you can send them to FCW. This would allow Dusty Rhodes the opportunity to fine tune their promo skills and personalities. Similar to getting them ready for a masters degree in wrestling psychology by one of the great masters. Than they could focus on the promos and personalities that they want for WWE. I would suggest some of the creative members to put their input and periodically check on the progress. Than I would start using the wrestlers I felt were ready to work on house shows and dark matches. I guarantee that creative would be more satisfied with the finish project.

I would also suggest sending some of the wrestlers to Dory Funk's school in Ocala, Florida to fine tune their wrestling fundamentals on their off days from FCW. This would allow the wrestlers to learn to wrestle a more solid wrestling style. Since you don't want your wrestlers to look green on ring mechanics. If the wrestling skills are solid enough, than maybe Dory can recommend that a particular wrestler can work in preliminary matches for a couple of All Japan Pro Wrestling tours.

The reason I feel so passionately about developing new wrestlers is due to my love for the business. I'm a big fan on watching John Morrison, Miz, Cody Rhodes, Ted DiBiase, Jr., & Evan Bourne break on thru to the next level of super stardom. It keeps the main mix fresh and you might have a future Wrestle Mania Main Eventer in four years. You have to keep developing new talent and elevating them in to the top mix. The superstars of tomorrow have to be developed now

Tags: Missy Hyatt, WWE, TNA, Dusty Rhodes