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| Edge – The Caretaker Champion |
Matt Barnes |
Adam Copeland, AKA Edge. A three-time World Champion, but have you ever noticed how WWE never intends him to hold a title, and only gives one to him when somebody gets hurt or falls out of favour? Matt Barnes looks at the caretaker champion…
When the annals of wrestling history are finally etched in stone, few will remember those that we call ‘transitional champions’. In the last two decades, several gifted grapplers have held the gold in a caretaker role: Stan Stasiak, Andre The Giant, Mick Foley, Kane… and now “The Rated R Superstar”, Edge.
As a three-time World Champion, Edge has held the gold more times than both Bruno Sammartino and Jack Brisco. But nobody will remember Edge’s reigns as great reigns, because his victories were not the result of well-planned title chases or bloody ring-wars; they were born out of necessity. He’s the backup, second-choice champion that WWE can call off the bench whenever it needs someone to fill in – and, in the case of his most recent title win, he wasn’t even the first choice for second choice. Yet every time he’s been given the ball he’s run all the way to the line with it, so how can the title reigns of such a fantastic young performer be but a footnote in the history of the sport?
F-U
When Edge made his WWE debut in the late nineties as part of Gangrel’s vampire group, The Brood, few could have imagined the impact he would ultimately have on the business. Going from strength to strength with each passing year, he gained confidence both in the ring and in front of the cameras, and grew from a trenchcoat-wearing Goth to a gangly comedy performer to a stellar main-eventer. In 2007, Edge is a man in a peculiar spot; over with the fans, boasting bags of charisma and with shedloads of main event appeal, you’d think he would be a dead-cert for a long and illustrious title reign.
Indeed, with SmackDown’s dipping numbers over the last couple of years, there would have been no better gap for the young Canadian to bridge but, alas, it was not to be. Despite dragging a red-hot feud out of John Cena during his initial run as champion, Edge was soon left behind in favour of the more muscular, military model and went on instead to plough all his energies into the excellent Rated RKO tag team, alongside Randy Orton. The duo enjoyed many top line battles before imploding and then, just as the trigger was about to be pulled on the much-teased feud, Kennedy and The Undertaker got injured and Edge was despatched to SmackDown to mop up the leftovers.
As nice as it must be to be granted a title run and to know that the company feels it can rely on you in its hour of need, Edge must have been miffed that his hotly anticipated programme with Orton was down the drain, all for the sake of propping up the B-brand while waiting for the real headliners to return. As much as Edge can and will bring to the role of World Champion, the harsh reality is that, as soon as Kennedy and Taker return, he is going to be in search of a meaningful uppercard role once again.
REEKING OF CHAMPIONESS
Unlike members of the other two MVP teams of the halcyon TLC days, Edge and Christian have both gone on to achieve headliner status. It was never going to happen for Team 3D, whose sole focus and appeal lies in being a table-breaking tag team, but most anticipated that Matt and Jeff Hardy would have joined wrestling’s elite by now. It may still happen, but with every month that slips away it looks increasingly less likely. Meanwhile, of course, Edge and Christian parted ways and went on to win the top brass in separate companies.
While TNA is clearly a small fish next to WWE, the NWA World Heavyweight Title that Christian wore has massive importance (despite a very dubious lineage and TNA’s best efforts to devalue it); having been held by such luminaries as Ric Flair and Harley Race, it is a belt that really matters. But, while WWE’s gold may have had its shine diminished somewhat by the company having three major belts in its midst, you can bet your bottom dollar that everybody in the locker room still wants to fasten them around their waist. And Edge, as a true wrestling fan at heart, wants to wear the gold as much as anybody.
Every time he has picked up the gold, Edge’s title celebrations have shown real, raw emotion – these are the belts that his heroes held and they clearly mean the world to him. As such, as a champion himself, he has been determined, driven and, in truth, immense. Who can forget him taking an F-U off the top of a ladder through a stack of tables in dropping the WWE title to John Cena at Unforgiven 2006? In fact, ever since he was first afforded main event status, it is hard to name a single bad Edge performance. He’s not always having five-star matches – who could, with the opponents he has been handed – but he’s been consistently good and is fast reaching a par in terms of performance level with fellow Canadians Bret Hart and Chris Benoit: guys who never have bad matches.
Indeed, his Rated RKO partnership with Randy Orton – a team that emerged soon after Edge’s Unforgiven title loss – was a revelation. The duo could do no wrong in the ring, were great as a cohesive unit and were fantastic on the stick – and almost immediately became the premier tag unit on Raw. If management had hoped that some of Edge’s good behaviour would rub off on Orton, however, it was not to be. With his partner constantly in hot water behind the scenes, Edge led from the front and drove the team forward, and quickly they were the two most hated heels on any of the WWE brands.
ROLL THE FOOTAGE, CHUMPSTAIN!
No two ways about it, Edge is a phenomenal heel. He has the look, he has the attitude and he has all the ability in the world. Moreover, he instinctively knows how to make a crowd hate him. When the fans boo Edge, it isn’t because his match is slow, he looks lazy or because he can’t wrestle, it is a genuine, stomach churning hate – and that has become increasingly rare in the modern age of wrestling.
In the good old days, guys like Rick Rude and Ric Flair could routinely command that kind of anger and loathing from the fans thanks not only to their arrogance, but also to the fact that they talked the talk and they could damn well back it up by walking the walk in the ring, too. Nothing makes the fans hotter than cockiness in a main event wrestler and Adam Copeland’s Edge has it in droves. But, unlike Flair and Rude and many others before him, Edge has something a little different up his sleeve, too – madness.
When Edge prepares to hit a spear, there’s a look of utter insanity in his eyes. He slaps himself, we see the whites of him eyes and then – boom! – his victim goes down. As an emotion-grabbing in-ring talent, Edge is up there with the very best of them. Of course, he’s not afraid of playing the traditional cowardly heel, too, from time to time and, naturally, this is another element that he has down pat.
In short, Edge is everything that a company would want in a champion. So why the short title reigns? Does Edge not light up the arena whenever he walks down the ramp, have gravestone-sharp teeth and cut an awesome promo? Does he not carry any opponent he needs to and take the biggest risks imaginable to get important matches over? Moreover, does he not truly care about what he does and is he not constantly improving in the ring, even after reaching such a high level? Perhaps the answer is simpler than it appears…
For the rest of this feature, check out issue 16 of FIGHTING SPIRIT – available at WH Smith and all good retailers. (For US readers we are now carried at Borders, so check for local availability or click here to subscribe.)
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