With the news that WWE has signed Pat McAfee to a multiyear contract extension, I received a column request to talk about the different commentators and commentary teams that WWE and AEW are putting out there. It’s not something I talk about very often, and there are a lot of unique options out there, so I decided to jump on it.
It should go without saying, but commentary is an extremely important part of enjoying pro wrestling. When you think back to the many magical moments that you’ve witnessed as a wrestling fan, what do you hear in your head? Jim Ross helping to create megastars in “Stone Cold” Steve Austin, The Rock, Triple H, Kurt Angle, and people from that era? Bobby “The Brain” Heenan being a menace, albeit a hilarious one, to anyone lucky/unlucky enough to be teamed up with him. On the other hand, do you remember how bad WWE programming was when the company was trying to force a heel Michael Cole on us? You had to mute your television just to get through a show because Cole SCREAMED EVERYTHING HE SAID AS HE BURIED EVERY FACE ON THE ROSTER AND YELLED OVER EVERYONE ELSE ON COMMENTARY AND TOOK AWAY FROM EVERY MATCH THAT WAS TAKING PLACE.
With WWE having three “brands” that come with their own commentators, and with AEW damn near having a game of musical chairs with how they utilize their commentators, there’s a lot to discuss. I’m not going to talk about each of the commentators individually. This will be more of a free-flowing discussion, talking about some of the pros, cons, strengths, and weaknesses that I’m seeing. Well, hearing, but you get the point. I want to start with some positives.
Since Pat McAfee is the reason this column is even happening, he’s a good place to start. I’ve said this before, but Pat is the biggest breath of fresh air that pro wrestling commentary has seen in decades. He doesn’t know the names of every move, but he doesn’t have to. As more of the voice of the fan, that level of excitement comes across immediately. It is also quite apparent that Vince McMahon isn’t in Pat’s ear like he has been with every other commentator that the company has seen for the last few decades. The things McAfee says are unlike what you’ve ever heard from anyone under Vince’s thumb, from Jim Ross to Michael Cole to Corey Graves to Bobby Heenan to Jerry Lawler to Josh Mathews and anyone in between. As an added bonus, Pat is someone that, as we’re currently seeing, can step into the ring and be entertaining in that regard, too. Lord knows I have no desire to watch Michael Cole wrestle again. Pat McAfee, though? Sign me up. I’m even looking forward to his match against Bum Ass Corbin at SummerSlam, and I haven’t looked forward to a Corbin match since his infamous brawl with Harley Race over the NWA World Heavyweight Title on that humid night in St. Louis in 1977.
If we’re talking about Pat McAfee, we have to talk about Cole, his commentary partner on Friday Night Smackdown. In my opinion, no other commentator in wrestling history has more mixed reviews from fans than Michael Cole. The best of the best are generally viewed as such, and the same goes for the worst of the worst. Cole has been doing this commentary thing for 25 years now, and it seems like half the WWE Universe thinks he’s one of the all-time greats and the other half thinks he sucks. I’ve already talked about my hatred of Cole’s heel persona, but what about Michael Cole as an overall play-by-play guy package? I think he’s really good as the “straight man” in a duo or a trio. That is wildly evident these days when he works with Pat McAfee. He’s able to just sit and call matches, which is what he does best, and can let McAfee handle the humor and insane levels of excitement over everything. To me, that over-the-top emotion is Cole’s weak spot. Too often, he comes off as someone trying to do a Jim Ross impersonation, yelling and repeating lines in JR’s “STONE COLD! STONE COLD! STONE COLD!” mold. An example of this is at WrestleMania 22, when Cole called Rey Mysterio’s World Heavyweight Title victory by screaming out “HE GOT HIM! HE GOT HIM! HE GOT HIM! OH,MY! MYSTERIO WINS THE TITLE!” but having it sound like he was almost incoherent at points. If, as I said, Cole can simply call matches without all of the phony sounding razzle dazzle, he does a really good job.
Another reason I enjoy the Smackdown duo so much is that exact word… duo. I’m old school. I prefer my commentary teams to have two people. All of my favorite combinations have seen two people at the table. Jim Ross and Paul Heyman. Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby Heenan. Tony Schiavone and Bobby Heenan. Michael Cole and Tazz. Mike Tenay and Don West. There have been some fun trios, sure, but I think that grouping tends to lead to too much talking, too much stepping on each other’s lines, and a general clunky nature. If we’re going to talk about commentary trios, that will naturally bring us to…
AEW.
On any given AEW program, you’re likely to witness up to 146 people at the table calling a match. It’s hectic, for sure, but a lot of it works. I wouldn’t say any of it is all-time great, but it’s still adding to the product. Excalibur is an absolutely incredible play-by-play guy. He’s the glue that holds any of the company’s commentary groupings together. It seems like there isn’t a move, hold, submission, counter, reversal, backstory, or achievement that he doesn’t know. No matter who is in the ring, he can tell you that they faced each other one time in 2005 at a farmer’s market in Stuttgart, Germany. This type of encyclopedic knowledge takes a ton of pressure off of Tony Schiavone and Jim Ross, who would normally have total play-by-play duties, but can now add their own flavor to the mix instead of having to do the heavy lifting. That, of course, leaves Taz, who is insane. In a good way. Taz has brought his own unique style of color commentary work to the business for over 20 years now. Like Excalibur, he has a great knowledge of the moves that are being performed in the ring. Also like Excalibur, he’s a former wrestler himself, so he can also tell you WHY moves are being performed and the strategies that are behind everything.
It feels like AEW has a million different lineups for their commentary team. You’ll see different teams do different hours on their television shows. Sometimes, Jim Ross will only do an hour of a pay-per-view. The YouTube shows have different pairings. As chaotic as that can be, I think I like it. I don’t know if it would work for other promotions, but they make it work. It provides each program, and sometimes each hour of a program, with its own identity and something “fresh” to listen to.
I do have a minor complaint about AEW commentary, though.
Actually, it’s more of a major complaint, and it’s pretty specific to Excalibur, although I think it has more to do with directives from Tony Khan and/or any other members of the AEW production team than Excalibur himself.
Everything moves too quickly. There’s no time for anything to breathe.
If you watch AEW, you’ve seen it a million times. Some major event will happen (a title change, a debut, a return, a face turn, a heel turn, etc.), and then commentary will IMMEDIATELY throw it backstage for some unrelated promo or segment that lasts 20 seconds, and then it will be thrown back to ringside, where introductions for the next match will already be taking place. Then, later in the show, Excalibur will be responsible for giving the rundown of what will be taking place on the next episode, so he spits out what seems like 20 matches and just as many other segments at 175 miles per hour. Nothing in this paragraph is beneficial to anybody. Major moments get treated as if they’re just some run-of-the-mill things, and any exciting matches and moments on the next show get lost in what is bordering on word salad gibberish.
As I said, though, I don’t think that’s Excalibur and the other AEW commentators doing it on their own. It’s pretty clear that this is the production and the presentation that Tony Khan wants and desires. I just thought this was worth mentioning since we’re talking about those folks.
What do you think, ReaderLand? I’m looking to see your thoughts and opinions on pro wrestling commentary. Are you a fan of what WWE and AEW are giving us in that regard? You can also chime in about any other promotion that features any sort of commentary, including promotions that no longer exist. As always, hit me up in the comments section below, or on Twitter (@HustleTheSavage), and let me know what’s on your mind.
Weekly Power Rankings
- Eddie Kingston vs Konosuke Takeshita: Really fun match. Hard hitting action throughout. I just have one complaint to make. Can we get Takeshita some televised wins already?!? His AEW record is 7-0 when he’s wrestling on their YouTube shows, but it’s 0-5 when he wrestles on television. I’m not saying he should win the World Title next week or anything, but Jesus Herbert Christ, there are 8,293 men on the AEW roster right now. You’re telling me that he can’t beat ANY OF THEM on Dynamite or Rampage to get some actual momentum to go with the buzz he’s receiving?
- Paul Heyman: He is going to go down as one of the best “talkers” in the history of the business. The man has been given nothing to work with for a long time as the company runs in circles with everything Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar have been doing for the last couple years, but he continues to cut some tremendous hype promos. He has worked on both sides of this feud, and has done great work for both Reigns and Lesnar. Now, if only we could get off this merry-go-round and move on to something else for everyone involved.
- Wardlow: It’s not the World Title like some have hoped it would be, but he’s the brand new TNT Champion, winning the belt in a dominant effort. This poor title continues to be passed around, though. Counting an interim reign, this is now the sixth TNT Title reign in 2022, and we just hit the halfway mark in the year. To make that worse, there was a seventh reign that took place in the final week or so of 2021. In total, we’ve seen eight reigns in the last nine-and-a-half months, which is asinine. You have to think… with fingers crossed… that Wardlow is just the type of wrestler that is going to keep the title for a long time. I’ve jinxed this title a few times in the past, so now that I’ve said that, expect Wardlow to be cheated out of the title in a week or two, or to have him vacate it so that he can go after the World Champion instead.
- Bobby Lashley & Riddle vs Seth Rollins & Theory: Another good match involving the hodgepodge of top guys on Raw, although the biggest piece of news here wasn’t the match itself, but more on that later. Riddle continues to look like someone who is going to be WWE/Universal Champion one day in the future.
- Jon Moxley vs Brody King: While Brody King isn’t the biggest name that could’ve been in this match to face Jon Moxley, he may have been the correct choice. He’s big and bad enough that he can handle anything Moxley dishes out, but can also dish it out himself. On top of that, he doesn’t exactly get hurt by a loss here. You could even say that he gains a bit in a loss because of how he was able to hang with someone at the very top of the company.
- Orange Cassidy vs Tony Nese: It sure does seem like we’re in the early stages of another big push for Orange Cassidy, doesn’t it? Live crowds would love that. Time will tell if anything comes of it, though. People thought we were going to get something big for him when he beat Chris Jericho twice in the span of three weeks back in 2020, but then he was unsuccessful in three attempts to become the TNT Champion, so we’ll see.
- Apollo Crews vs Giovanni Vinci: Two of the best overall athletes in all of wrestling, both possessing a freakish combination of speed, strength, and athletic ability. The Artist-Formerly-Known-As-Fabian-Aichner has himself a pretty stupid gimmick, with an even worse presentation, but this was still big for him. Crews is, after all, a former United States and Intercontinental Champion, which makes this the biggest singles win for Vinci since he beat Shane Strickland to win the EVOLVE Title in 2018.
- Dolph Ziggler: A face turn? In this economy? Sure, it could be some sort of swerve. Hell, this is WWE we’re talking about here. We might not see Dolph on television again for several months, with no mention of this happening at all. However, it’s still a newsworthy happening that is getting people talking. If my math is correct, this is the first time Ziggler would be working as a face since January 2017, so there’s a lot of potential for some fresh matches and feuds if WWE continues down this road.
- Rey Mysterio vs Finn Balor: This really should’ve been a bigger deal. Mysterio might very well be the greatest Cruiserweight-style wrestler of all-time. Balor can claim to be the best Cruiserweight-style wrestler of the last decade. Both of them were able to overcome their lack of size to reach the top of the WWE mountain. This was the first time they’ve ever faced each other in singles competition. It ended up being a throwaway match on a random episode of Raw, but it was fun while it lasted.
- Mandy Rose vs Roxanne Perez: Against all odds, Mandy Rose continues her reign as the NXT Women’s Champion, holding the title for 260 days as of the date this column gets posted. However, the curse of horrendous booking when it comes to the WWE or NXT Women’s Tag Team Titles continues. Everyone and their mothers knew Cora Jade was going to turn heel on Roxanne Perez. I have no problems with that at all. In fact, I think it could work out well for both women. With that said… what was the fucking point of giving Perez and Jade the Women’s Tag Team Titles if you’re just going to split them up a week later?!?!? The reasoning behind the heel turn would’ve been EXACTLY the same without the Tag Title victory. Cora wants to go after the Tag belts together, but Roxanne Perez is focused on her shot at the NXT Women’s Title, so Cora turns on her, calls her selfish, and so on. Stupid. Very stupid.
This Week’s Playlist: “sTraNgeRs” by Bring Me The Horizon… “Times Like These” by Five Finger Death Punch… “Don’t Pray For Me” by Within Temptation… “No Hope ‘Til Now” by The Veer Union… “Rest Your Head” by Left To Suffer… “Shine On” by The Dead Daisies… “You Had It All” by Descape… “Sittin’ At A Bar” by Rehab… “It Don’t Matter” by Rehab… “Lost” by Gorilla Zoe & Lil Wayne… “No Problem” by Lil Scrappy… “XO Tour Llif3” by Lil Uzi Vert… “Only One” by Yellowcard… “Turn Your Lights Down Low” by Bob Marley & Lauryn Hill… “Silhouettes” by Smile Empty Soul… “Man Of The Year” by ScHoolboy Q… “Move That Dope” by Future, Pusha T, Pharrell Williams & Casino… “Oh Sherrie” by Steve Perry… “Foolish Heart” by Steve Perry… “Red Room” by Offset… “It Would Take A Strong Strong Man” by Rick Astley… “Cry For Help” by Rick Astley… “Heartless” by The Weeknd… “Still Fly” by Big Tymers… “Ralph Wiggum” by Bloodhound Gang