I see what you're doing there, WWE: Why what happened during the CM Punk/John Cena/Ryback match last night was more important than the match itself

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 SO! While I didn't watch Survivor Series myself, Tumblr let me know what happened during the main event, namely that Seth Rollins, Dean Ambrose, and one of the Rock's millions - AND MILLIONS! - of cousins (seriously, is he related to the entire damn island of Samoa?) named Roman Reigns attacked Ryback and put him through one of the announce tables. Probably the Spanish announce team's. This allowed CM Punk to score the pinfall over John Cena and now I'm going to mark out a little.

*ahem*

OH MY FUCKING GOD, CM PUNK HAS A YEAR LONG TITLE REIGN!!!!

THIS IS THE MOST MAGICAL THING EVER AND NOW I AM GOING TO PUKE A RAINBOW!

*ahem* Sorry. Hit the jump for the rest of the post.


In any event, the appearance of Ambrose, Rollins, and Reigns is actually more important than Punk winning, because we're seeing a major change starting to happen in the WWE roster. I noticed it a few weeks ago while thinking about wrestling stuff and the then-current title holders and then it hit me: the WWE, probably without anyone giving it a second thought, had brought in the next generation of talent and at the same time, they've shifted the focus from the previous gen to them. Think about it for a second. John Cena and Randy Orton - the two biggest stars of their generation - both haven't held either of the world titles in over a year, though there are rumblings that the latter might be getting a title shot soon. Big Show is an exception, since he pretty much deserved a title run. Triple H is probably retired (and may prove to be the savior of the company, but that's another post entirely), and Undertaker is at least semi-retired, so we'll probably only ever see him at Wrestlemanias.

I think it's more than just refreshing the roster with new guys, I think what we're seeing is a major change, a realignment. It happened in the 90s when the roster shifted away from the bright colored, over the top days of the 80s and early 90s and towards a darker, more grittier style. Likewise, in the post-Attitude/pre-PG era, we saw the stalwarts of the previous era (Austin and Rock for example) disappear and replaced with fresh faces like John Cena, Randy Orton, Batista, Brock Lesnar, and others. Now we're seeing another change and while I don't see Orton or Cena disappearing like Rock and Austin. Like I said before, there are rumors of Randy Orton getting another title run, but if he does, it'll be his last. Cena, I don't see getting another run and will probably hang around the main event for a while longer - probably to fight Dwayne Johnson again - before he's shifted down to upper card to feud with up-and-comers. I think part of it is because Cena and Orton are basically used up as world champions. Each man has held the title ten and nine times, respectively, and at that point, it's just hard for people to become enthusiastic.

Still, I think it's the right time for this and I'm actually hyped to see what the next generation of WWE wrestlers brings us. God knows we've probably hit the jackpot on talent. We've got CM Punk, Daniel Bryan, Antonio Cesaro, Kofi Kingston, Damien Sandow, Cody Rhodes, Sheamus, Ryback, Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns, Dean Ambrose, Dolph Ziggler, The Miz, Wade Barrett, and the list just goes on and on, and that's just the men! Hopefully we'll get some a new wave of women to the Divas Division too. It's actually astounding if you sit back and think about it; this might be the single most talented roster the WWE has ever had, or any wrestling promotion has ever had for that matter.

Truly, this is the best time to be a wrestling fan.