The WWE’s annual draft. A heavily hyped 3-hour behemoth of a show. An event that rears its ugly, bulbous head once per annum, looming high overhead like a wayward zeppelin. And once it’s passed by, once the dust has settled, and the shadows have dispersed, is it safe to come out? Is it okay to emerge from your little shelter and gaze back into the grappling world?

Of course it is.

Post-draft, nothing has changed, or to express another cliché, in this column chock-full of them, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Raw is still the Number One brand. That much is apparent immediately, because it’s the show where they’ve put all the big stars, or at least, the “chosen ones”.

The “chosen” few I speak of are the successful, Main Event versions of Vince McMahon’s warped, archaic, and self-fulfilling template to which he wishes he could fit everyone on his roster into. McMahon will never “get” certain people, and usually, they’re the ones that extend beyond his narrow, masturbatory fantasy.

Dave Batista, Randy Orton, Triple H, John Cena, and Mr Kennedy are all on Raw, and they’re all wrestlers who bring a smile to Unca’ Vinnie’s timeless face. I include Kennedy in that bunch; because while the others are certifiable main eventers, and he is not, he is clearly the Mid-Carder Vince most wants to succeed. He’s the boy. The other four however, are already there, and they’re the guys that Vince is going to want to put in the main event of WrestleMania, for years to come. He’s gotta be licking his chops to have them all on the same brand for the first time in years. Add them to Shawn Michaels, a guy who’s been around forever, and you’ve got a lot of star power.

And to make the show more appealing for himself, he’s thrown another big-man on it, The Big Show, another Mid-Carder whom he wants to achieve success… MVP, someone he finds amusing, The Miz, and his favourite job-boy… Matt Hardy.

Matt Hardy getting squished by Triple H? I give him until the second week of May.

Meanwhile, Vince has banished all those I mentioned, whom he doesn’t “get”, to the B-Show, Smackdown.

Rey Mysterio, CM Punk, Jeff Hardy, Chris Jericho, and to a lesser extent, Edge are all guys beyond Vince’s comprehension. Honestly, he’d give you a thousand bucks if you were able to book Koslov to draw a Million buys, and Punk to just simply cease to exist. This is the show for the names who have value, but not to Vince. Sure, Undertaker’s there, but his part-time status would make him a difficult switch, while it’s kind of accepted where he is. There’s talent on the brand that he does like of course, such as Morrison, who will be drafted to Raw next year, by which time, there may be an opportunity for him higher up the card. The other bigger names on the show are the freak-shows, Khali, Kane… Umaga. Vince won’t be breaking a sweat if he doesn’t have enough time to fit watching Smackdown into this schedule, because none of the guys he really cares about are on the show. Hell, he doesn’t even have the abs of DiBiase and Rhodes to look at. Goodness knows why he’s drafted the Unified Tag Champs to Raw, but my cynical instinct tells me that it’s so he can put the straps on Legacy, which will probably leave Carlito and Primo, short-sightedly, in limbo.

But something else has transpired. While nothing really has changed from one angle, from another- we’ve been transported back to 2002. Remember when Paul Heyman booked Smackdown?

I sure do. Workers on the Blue Brand seven years ago, half-destroyed their bodies, every single week on TV, to please Heyman, and in doing so, delivered some of the most scintillating weekly television seen in years. The Guerreros, Chris Benoit, Rey Mysterio, Kurt Angle, Edge, Undertaker, Brock Lesnar…it was an exciting time to be a Smackdown fan. Even MATT HARDY was getting a push, and the underrated Shannon Moore had a job.

Do we need to see a steady stream of injuries? No sir. But we do need an era of exciting, attractive wrestling, and that could well be what we get with Smackdown. Raw may now be Vinnie Mac’s favourite show, but thankfully, many fans do not share the Chairman’s tastes, which greatly increases the chances that Smackdown may now become the show for them to watch. And it’s a mouth-watering roster for wrestling aficionados. CM Punk, Chris Jericho, Umaga, Edge, Rey Mysterio, The Undertaker, John Morrison, Jeff Hardy, Shelton Benjamin, R-Truth…. Anyone? Throw in the best beard in the business, in Mike Knox, and some of the more talented of the glorified enhancement talent (Funaki, Jimmy Wang Yang, Charlie Haas), and you’re onto something.

Smackdown suddenly has a fresh roster. And even better, there’s room for upward mobility. Rather than queuing for the 12b behind Triple H, Batista, John Cena, Shawn Michaels, and potentially Mr Kennedy and MVP, CM Punk suddenly, only has Undertaker, Jeff Hardy, and Rey Mysterio ahead of himself in the babyface stakes. Jericho and Edge meanwhile, can be considered equals on the other side of the coin, and okay, so as far as I can tell, CM Punk is beginning a heel turn (and may cash in Money in the Bank sooner than you’d think…), but that’s for another time. For now the point remains- the brand has much opportunity for younger guys to strut their stuff, and the great thing for us, is that it’s not constant retreads.

Getting away from young uns’, is anyone aware of how unfamiliar Chris Jericho and Undertaker are with each other? Phil Lowe and I discussed this yesterday, and I was shocked (by the wrestlers, not by Phil’s conversational skills…) because there have been opportunities along the way, since 1999. But these two have NEVER faced each other in a PPV match-up. That’s pretty impressive. They’ve always managed to avoid one another, by hook, or by crook. They avoided each other for much of 2000-2002 through being on the same side of the heel/face divide, and then ended up on separate brands in 2003, once Jericho returned to Raw. They remained as such until Jericho departed the company in 2005.

I can’t even recall a television match of any sort between them either, although I’m sure there’s been one along the lines. But if it did occur, I doubt it had a conclusive finish, and it certainly wasn’t a part of an on-going storyline. The only exchange of any sort I can recall is that the two were on opposite sides of a tag match once, when Kurt Angle teamed with a heel Jericho. This could be THE feud of 2009.

Raw does not have this aura of newness. Look at Raw’s potential headline scenarios. Batista versus Triple H. Yawn. They had three successive PPV Main Events in 2005, and sure, while they were largely pretty good- does anyone want to see a combined weight of nearly 600 pounds of injury-prone muscle, collide again?

Likewise, HHH/Orton has been done to death (even before last month’s dismal Mania main event) and Cena versus Hunter, lacks zest. Sure, a confrontation between those two is big news- but it’s nothing new, and didn’t set the Great American Bash on fire last year. Batista/Orton, or Batista/Cena have more appeal because Dave’s been out on the bench, but there’s a limit to how much you can do with the guy, and while those two rivalries could offer big rewards, will they provide the goods in the ring?

I always go back to WrestleMania when I’m thinking of brands, of line-ups, and whether the balance of new and old is appropriate. If we woke up tomorrow, and it was suddenly next March (unlikely, I know…), what the hell would Raw promote for the show? Michaels vs. Hunter (again?) Orton vs. Cena Part 12 or Orton vs. HHH Part 33? Again, Shawn Michaels has collided with Randy Orton, and John Cena repeatedly, and an ongoing storyline with Dave would probably require a heel-turn. They’re big names, but they’ve all been big stars for so long now, that there’s little to amuse us long-term fans, and beyond a couple of novel combinations, nothing new.

So for me, Smackdown by far, benefited the most from the Draft, because it’s the show that looks most likely to provide entertaining television. Raw may well be the more star-studded of the two, but it’s a product of an out-of-touch man who will never realise where he’s going wrong until it’s far, far too late. Raw has become a potential allegory for everything that is wrong with the structure and development system in place in the WWE, while Smackdown, could, potentially, be the shining example of what could have been.

Wait, there’s a third Brand? What’s that called then?

Thanks for taking the time to check this out. I welcome any and all feedback and I can be contacted at www.myspace.com/michaelwrestlingetc or simply by emailing me at Michael@ifight365.com. I look forward to hearing from you, and will be back soon!