Is Michael Cole burying the talent?

By Carlos M Reynosa

                In recent weeks Nodq.com has reported that “World Wrestling Entertainment,” (WWE) commentator Michael Cole’s character is hurting the roaster. With bias commentary towards the younger talent such as World Champion Daniel Brain and WWE champion CM Punk, the WWE are afraid that he is discrediting their abilities. One can assumed that the sudden interest in Cole’s behavior is due to the recent ratings lost in the seconded of Monday Night Raw.  However, if there is a problem with the commentary, then one would believe that it is because the majority of the commentary is being done by one person.

Traditionally it is the color commentary who are opinionated towards the talent of the company, and it’s the professional journalist that focuses on the facts and gives equally amount credit to both opponents. This is done to allow the fans to create their own opinions of a certain wrestler and to entertain them with their disagreement.  A good example would be Jim Ross (JR) and Jerry “The King,” Lawler as their combination of wrestling knowledge and sarcastic remarks gave the fans much excitement to watch throughout the Attitude Era.

The problem with Cole is that he is the journalist commentatr behaving as the color commentator. The color commentator is usually a former wrestler who is has a lot of charisma and Mic skills; they can perform as baby faces (Good guys) but are often preferred as Heels (Bad guys). The reason why is because so they bully the other commentators and voice their opinions more.  Unfortunately because the other commenters either lack confidence or experience in wrestling information, fans can only hear Cole’s commentary. If the WWE would look back in the past they would realize that they had this problem before when Jessie “The Body,” Ventura did the commentary. Because of Ventura passionate commentary towards Hulk Hogan, Hogan felt that Ventura was intentionally discrediting him.   

However, like the fans of the past that discarded Ventura’s commentary, the fans of today discards Cole’s commentary because it’s basically one opinion. Another possible reason why most fans discards Cole’ s commentary, is because they never enjoyed his commentary weather he is playing a character or not. If the WWE wished to put the blame on the recent ratings loss, perhaps they should blame the constant promotion of John Cena over the years and the lack of promotion for others. With the possible marketing opportunities and potential successful story lines given to one person, it’s no wonder that there a sudden interest loss in the talent. An argument could be been made that the recent loss is due to football season. But a company like WWE with the longest running show should have been more prepared for that.

Whether they should tone down Michael Coles’ Character or not makes no difference, because if the talent are getting buried it because they don’t have a strong commentator to defend them