Hello everyone, long time no see, so to speak. It’s the weekend after WrestleMania, the time of year where things transition back to normal. The hangover from WrestleMania Week is over, the special shows are done for a few months, and it’s a feeling of almost sadness. Sadness that status quo could be returning to us. Now could this be status quo in the shape or form of weekly WWE shows that were unbearable or pointless to watch? Or, and this is where it gets fun, or is it a return to the status quo of old? Now you’re probably asking yourself what is he talking about? How can status quo be old? Well as you’re about to see, it’s an exciting time for WWE, a time where everything old is new again. The status quo of yesteryear returning new and polished for a new generation, and by that of course I mean: The Brand Split.

If you’re a weekly listener to my podcast Main Event Madness, alongside Marc Madison of TJRWrestling.Net and TheRichest.com, you’ve probably heard in recent months about my clammoring for the return of WWE’s brand split. The Brand Split, such an idea that those very words generate anxiety, excitement, anger, or intrigue. Alas, for those of you newer to WWE, the brand split was a time in WWE in which they had purchased both the companies and talent of WCW and ECW. As well as beginning to breed their own talent in their “farm system” of Ohio Valley Wrestling. As a result the WWE’s roster was inflated, was massive in size. Now on one hand you may think that is an amazing problem to have, and to an extent it is. However for a juggernaut company like World Wrestling Entertainment, to have, then, two weekly two hour shows devoted to a massive single roster was impossible. Thus, and derived from an old idea of running Raw as WWF(WWE) and SmackDown as WCW, WWE decided to split the roster into two separate brands, or different companies almost under the WWE banner. Those brands were WWE Raw and WWE SmackDown, kind of like WWE’s AFC and NFC, and I’ll ignore the horrible irony in that statement.

Alright so now that the history lesson is out of the way, as mentioned, I have been clammoring for months for WWE to bring this idea back and fine-tune it. WWE’s current roster is among the most talented in professional wrestling history. Now this is where my connection to the brand split comes into play, in 2006 I became a wrestling fan again and it was right in the thick of the original brand split days, and it used to create compelling tv. Not only did you have to watch Raw and see the storylines of your favorites on Monday Nights, but you had to tune into SmackDown and see your favorites on Friday Nights, sprinkle in the rare Tuesday for ECW, but my point stands nonetheless. The brand split was beneficial for a number of reasons, and I will get into all of them, but mainly, the ability to create stars. WWE had a breeding ground, mainly on SmackDown, but on both shows to create new stars and add them to their shows of mega stars and super athletes and only enhance the world of WWE. Stars ranged from big to small, tall to short, names like John Cena, Edge, Randy Orton, Batista, CM Punk, Jeff Hardy, Rey Mysterio, Rob Van Dam, Bobby Lashley, and more were able to come up from being the new rookie to become massive stars in their own rights. However this wasn’t limited to younger stars coming into their own, as several aging veterans were able to have career renaissance, names like Chris Jericho, Shawn Michaels, Kane, The Undertaker, Big Show, and even Triple H were able to have successful runs as the face of their respective brands.

So fast forward to 2016, the brand split ended 5 years ago and what’s happened? Well, to be honest, nothing very good. The shows are cluttered, and have only increasingly been since Raw became 3 hours in 2012, the championships are worthless, and ten years later, WWE has only just began to create new stars to rely on, as until 2014 WWE had still relied on company veterans John Cena and Randy Orton to be the flag-bearers if you will, mustering up a staggering 27 World Championships between the two. An insane number if you think about the talents WWE squandered in that time, names like John Morrison, Dolph Ziggler, Drew McIntyre, MVP, Mr. Kennedy, Ezekiel Jackson, Wade Barrett, Evan Bourne, R-Truth, and several others. A brand split, with the new additions this past week on the main roster, and almost certain forthcoming additions later this year, WWE will essentially be in the same problem 15 years after it solved it the first time.

What do you do? WWE has the luxury of the storyline currently involving Shane McMahon, with him “Running Raw” you can easily have The Authority feel left out and “Run SmackDown” as a game of one-ups ensues. Who benefits? I mean on paper, the fans. However then the question of do the wrestlers appear on both shows, or will the differing McMahons/Helmsleys fight over which superstars appear where? Or does WWE do the thing that would inject excitement back into the product, and re-draft the rosters? Vince McMahon could make the announcement that he’s fed up of the bickering over who appears where, and he’s ready to “Shake Things Up Again!” By having the feuding Brand Owners draft their stars similar to the original WWE Draft in 2002. That would create arguably the most intriguing 3 hour Raw they’ve had coincidentally since they abandoned the draft in 2011, having fans tune in to see which show would feature what stars.

The difference from the brand split from 2002-11 is instead of having 2 World Champions, I think WWE should keep the 1 WWE World Heavyweight Champion, and institute a Top 25 ranking or something of the likes where wins and losses actually matter, which in and of itself creates more fan interest who’s wrestling who, and who wins, because they want to see their favorites become #1 on the list, which would be the #1 contender, however, in true sports style, you’d have the #1 face #2, or even do 2 separate rankings, where the #1 from Raw faces the #2 at a pay-per-view to determine who challenges for the championship. To make it fair when a star loses their title they are entitled to the age-old rematch, however if they lose they go unranked for the next PPV, to assure fairness and assure fresh match-ups. Another issue was cross-brand appearances, to fix that it’s simple: If you’re on Raw, you appear on Raw. If you’re on SmackDown, same thing, you appear on SmackDown. There are only few exemptions to the rule, those being the Post-Royal Rumble show, WrestleMania Go-Home and Post-WrestleMania show, WWE Draft (which should alternate between Raw and SmackDown annually), and Season Premieres for shows.

If WWE were to do something of this fashion I think it creates a whole new atmosphere and a new world of competition in WWE, it creates a world where truly what’s old is new again. It would create a WWE where even opening matches, midcard matches, main events, dark matches, they all matter, something as a #25 beating a #10, shock factor in even a small dose like this would work and generate interest in the product and investment from fans in the characters again, something that has been poorly missing over arguably this entire decade. That’s it for this time guys. Hope you enjoyed what you read. Shout out to my aunt and my great uncle for giving me the idea to write again and inspiration to shake off the rust and give this a whirl again. It was fun to share my ideas in this form again, and I think it’s something you may see semi-regularly. Who knows, if WWE does something similar to this, I might actually be almost obligated to write at least a follow-up.

Also don’t forget my podcast, Main Event Madness, airs Every Wednesday at 8pm ET here on Wrestling-News.net. We’re a wrestling talk show, not recap like those other shows. Main Event Madness is basically the coming to life of the idea of: What happens when 2-3 friends go to a bar and talk wrestling. The result is Main Event Madness! So until next time, be happy, be healthy, and be safe, and look forward to seeing you all again soon.