Vince returns from the ‘dead’ with hope of boosting ratings

Vincent Kennedy McMahon’s explanation was pretty much as we expected as he told fans his self-directed fiery demise was brought about by his need to see how much fans would miss him. Actually, his appearance on television Monday night had two very real reasons, neither of them having to do with his need for appreciation by the fans.

First, RAW took a ratings dip as of late as the insurgence of Lashley and Booker T into the roster have been no replacement for the loss, at least temporarily of Triple H and the Heart Break Kid Shawn Michaels. And, McMahon knows this drop in ratings comes just before the annual dip in ratings which always happen with the return of Monday Night Football in a few weeks which pulls away a lot of that 18-40 male demographic which WWE depends on as their core.

I have to admit as a big-time wrestling fan, the shows have been a bit stale as of late despite the talent shift to RAW which have depleted the other brands. Even Smackdown is doing a rating close to RAW as of late which is good news for Smackdown but bad news for RAW.

With the return of McMahon we have the return of a major character to RAW. Although he rarely wrestles, McMahon and his son Shane McMahon are major entertainers and players when it comes to making RAW a better show. I expect to see an immediate ratings bump which should continue to climb with the return of Triple H at SummerSlam late this month.

The second reason for Mr. McMahon’s return is something he mentioned during his TV time Monday night, that being the inquires into wrestling by Congress. The death of Chris Benoit and his family have turned a spotlight on wrestling with the mainstream media seizing on the alleged abuse of steroids and growth hormones in professional wrestling. And, we need to remember just over a decade ago McMahon was up to his eyeballs in steroid allegations which even brought him to trial on criminal charges, a trial in which the government tried to use Hulk Hogan as a witness against him.

With this in mind, McMahon, I believe, is seizing the bull by the horns and making a preemptive attack. He knows congressional hearings on steroids in wrestling are coming so he’s going to be doing damage control, using his time on television to go on the offensive against congress itself. After all, the entire interest being shown by congress about steroids in wrestling is all window dressing too, being used as yet another election year publicity stunt. In this case McMahon is smart enough to use congress’ waste of time to help build up his business. What’s next, congress investigating professional baseball? Oh wait, they are. Maybe they can launch a fact finding study into the evils of underwater basket weaving next and waste more of our money.

As for us missing the ‘McMahon murder’ payoff, there was no way the angle could go forward with the Benoit tragedy seeing that would have been in bad taste even for McMahon. Word is, had the angle played to the end, McMahon would have basically done the same thing, showing up at SummerSlam or maybe even later at Survivor Series, laughing about how he had fooled us. What we missed is some of the major wrestlers being accused of killing their old boss kind of in the vein of ‘who killed J.R.’ until Vince showed up telling it was all a prank to see how much he would be missed. He would have likely used his return to give a major heel or two the rub, saying Kennedy or maybe Orton were in on it the whole time.

As to whether the ‘Vince is dead’ storyline would have been entertaining, we will never know, although there were already mixed reviews on it when Vince pulled the plug right after the Benoit tragedy. Actually, in the end, had the storyline played out, ratings may have dipped even lower since only the truest mark believed Vince was dead.