Welcome To The Era Of Professional Wrestling

However, for the regular hardcore Professional Wrestling fan like myself, Professional Wrestling is not only a sport draped with diamonds and gold, but something that influences our daily lives. Why is that, you ask? Well, if we finally get permission from our significant others to spend 3-4 hours of our days watching wrestling and it turns out to be a bad show, well.. it’s not going to be pretty. If the ending to a show, is not what someone was expecting, we will go to bed upset and wake up and stay in a bad mood for the entire day. On the other hand, if something unexpected happened or if the hero won his match, we will sleep like babies and be in a good mood for the entire day or sometimes even the week.

Wrestling in society

Professional Wrestling has been around for centuries (started in the 19th century as performance art) and has had its ups and downs. From Gorgeous George in the U.S., el Santo in Mexico, Big Daddy in the U.K. and Rikidozan in Japan, to Wrestling Icons like Andre the Giant, Hulk Hogan, Macho Man Randy Savage and Ric Flair to Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock and John Cena, the Monday Night Wars, ECW, Owen Hart, and the late Vince McMahon years.

Slowly but taking one step at a time, Professional Wrestling has started to attract newer audiences and interests, rising as an important factor in today’s pop culture. For the non-wrestling fan, this might be something new, but for us, the hardcore wrestling fans, we have seen the signs coming for a long time.

• Our favorite wrestlers showing up on movies (The Zebra Kid in The Godfather, Hulk Hogan on Rocky 3, el Santo being a movie cult hero in Mexico, Nathan Jones in Troy, Macho Man in Spiderman, HHH in Blade, Dwayne Johnson in all his latests hits, John Cena starting on Bumble Bee and Batista doing his thing on the Guardians of the Galaxy.
• Professional Wrestlers taking over politics like Jesse Ventura, Antonio Inoki, current mayor of Tennessee Glenn Jacobs and former SBA Administrator Linda McMahon.
• Professional Wrestlers in national/world music tours or appearing at live events like Fozzy (Chris Jericho), John Cena, Lilian Garcia and Jeff Hardy.
• Wrestling in TV Networks like USA, TNT, ESPNDeportes, FoxSports and Spike TV. (Sports media shows like SportsCenter have also included highlights of several wrestling matches/spots).
• Professional Wrestlers in T.V. commercials like Macho Man in Slim Jim and Sting loving Sprite.

I could go on and on, but Professional Wrestling has been slowly taking its grip on society, and now, it is time to evolve, time to welcome a new era of Professional Wrestling.

Why am I saying this? Well….

A New Era of Professional Wrestling

In the last couple of years, several Professional Wrestling promotions have been entertaining people around the globe, but none come close to the multi-billion dollar company formed by Mr. Vincent Kennedy McMahon, called WWE.

WWE has been around for over 65 years and has acquired several promotions to become the giant that it is today. You could even say that the best wrestlers in the world have all been a part of this brand at least once in their lifetime.

WWE has given Professional Wrestling fans everything that they have asked for to fulfill their wrestling needs. It has even provided the opportunity for Professional Wrestlers to be displayed as Role Models:

• Current Smackdown Champion Kofi Kingston – Having paid his dues for over 11 years, not asking for anything, working his heart out, getting a one time opportunity and securing it. Showing that hard work always pays off
• Current Raw Women’s Champion – Becky Lynch – now known globally as The Man, has evolved into a tough, gritty and fighting woman, that made history by headlining the biggest event of the year (The Wrestling Super Bowl), with Ronda Rousey.
• Titus O Neil, who has become a community hero will all of his charity work.

However, as things evolve, so does the sport, and many new wrestling promotions have come to entertain wrestling fans, brands like Ring of Honor, NJPW, MLW, CMLL, Triple AAA, Impact Wrestling, WOW, and the newly formed AEW.

What this means is simple, more athletes are trying to become Professional Wrestlers, and more promotions are needed to provide them with opportunities. (Even Former NFL players are turning into Professional Wrestlers, Ex: Impact Wrestlings Moose, former OT for the Atlanta Falcons, and UFC Fighters like Matt Riddle).

This has also created a ripple effect for Television Networks, as the demand for Professional Wrestling has also increased. Therefore creating a new era for us wrestling fans, a new era of Professional Wrestling.

Catching the New Era of Wrestling

This era, begins on September 18th, as WWE Brand NXT, will be run every Wednesday on the USA Network, for 2 entire hours. On October 2nd, AEW will be another weekly show that fans can watch on TNT. (You could even say that another wrestling war between promotions is on air….. You can also DVR one, and watch both shows). Finally on October 11th, another WWE Brand, Smackdown, will be run on the Fox Network.

For a hardcore wrestling fan, their tv agenda could look something like this:

• Monday: WWE Raw
• Tuesday: MLW
• Wednesday: AEW
• Thursday: NXT DVR Stream
• Friday: Smackdown
• Saturday: Impact Wrestling DVD Stream
• Sunday: PPVs

We will now be able to watch Professional wrestling, every single day of the week. I don’t know about you, but this has got to be an event of historical proportion… when, if ever in your life, would you think Professional Wrestling would be on TV every single day of the week?

So if you need to catch up on your wrestling, I would recommend following or looking up these wrestlers:

• The Undisputed Era
• Brian Cage
• Kenny Omega
• Lucha Bros
• The Fiend (Bray Wyatt)
• Velveteen Dream
• Tessa Blanchard
• Killer Kross
• Kazuchika Okada

You will not be disappointed.

And if you need anything else, you can always find me on twitter @dre2124.

So sit back and enjoy, because the New Era of Professional Wrestling, has arrived.