Letter continued

I said it was a big idea but let’s think about it before dismissing it as too big.

By ‘break up’ I don’t mean ‘shut down’ or ‘dismantle’ but I do mean breaking up the massive touring groups that RAW and Smackdown have become and turning them into smaller groups covering specific area of the country; in other words: territories. I recommend breaking both RAW and Smackdown into 3 groups each, making six regions in all. Speaking very generally, this would probably break down into the NorthEast, Mid-Atlantic and Midwest for RAW and the Pacific Northwest, Texas (Southwest) and Mid South for Smackdown. What about ECW? I would suggest moving it to Canada. Since you now own many of the old territory names, perhaps some of those could be reused. Texas could be WCCW, perhaps the Midwest referred to as the AWA, maybe Canada as Stampede and so on. While this would not be necessary, it would be a nice nod to the past and could stimulate DVD sales for footage of the original territories.

I would recommend a separate booking committee for each territory that would be based in that area. You have many individuals on your payroll that used to work these territories when they last existed and have some understanding of the variations of interest in each area. Place Dusty Rhodes and Ric Flair in charge of the Mid-Atlantic region, Roddy Piper in the Pacific Northwest and so on. All these groups would report back to the main offices in Connecticut and would get their general guidance from there. Picture the challenge: trying to keep six (or seven) territories running separate storylines while still building them all to a common storyline.

Common storyline? Of course we can’t dismiss the big four Pay Per Views as they are there for a reason and they rake in the biggest buy rates. The storylines begin to build themselves for some of these shows: tournaments challenging to qualify for the few spots each region gets to send to the Royal Rumble, qualifying to send a team to the Survivor Series and so on.

Let’s follow this concept through a year. Let’s say Mr. X is a mid carder in the Midwest region. He wins a tournament to qualify for the King of the Ring tournament to be held at Summerslam. He doesn’t win but does make it to the finals. He returns to his region elevated enough to challenge for belts and is encouraged to assemble a team for the Survivor Series. He is seen observing many matches he doesn’t participate in before selecting a five man team which includes Gran Kuma, a man that defeated him the week before. One of Mr. X’s friends, Rappin’ Red Smith, is offended that he wasn’t selected for Mr. X’s team so he assembles a team of his own, jockeying to take the Survivor Series position. Battles between the teams culminate in a Survivor Series preview match, which Mr. X’s team wins. At the Survivor Series, Mr. X survives to the Final Survival Match. He doesn’t win but Gran Kuma does. This provides the region with an advantage in the Royal Rumble, guaranteeing that one of the Rumble qualifiers from that region will receive a low number entry (somewhere between 25-30, if we specify 30 it would shutdown storytelling in the other regions). Struggling to qualify for the Rumble begins almost immediately, highlighted by Mr. X and Gran Kuma battling. Both qualify for the Rumble. In a ceremony at the PPV, Mr. X pulls number four whereas Gran Kuma receives twenty-eight. As normal, the Rumble is a long battle. Mr. X and Gran Kuma are in the final four. Mr. X eliminated Gran Kuma and goes on to win, earning a shot at the WWE World Title at Wrestlemania. Gran Kuma accuses Mr. X of cheating to win and manipulates events so that Mr. X is willing to put his title shot on the line in a match. Mr. X wins, finally decisively defeating Gran Kuma and earning his respect. Mr. X goes onto Wrestlemania knowing that winning the title will mean touring the world, defending the belt in region after region until he is defeated.

Obviously every region would have different main storylines and each region would probably have a number of smaller storylines running through them. This is just A general storyline path idea.