Thought of the Day: Gimmick Match Overload Isn’t Anything New
I know people say that gimmick matches dominate wrestling today, but let’s look back to the 80s.Looking at the first few Starrcades, here’s what you have:
1983 – eight matches, two gimmicks
1984 – eleven matches, three gimmicks
1985 – eleven matches, six gimmicks
1986 – twelve matches, six gimmicks
1987 – seven matches, three gimmicks
In the old NWA days, there were two Starrcades with at least half of the matches being gimmick matches. This is hardly a new thing.
It also doesn’t help that gimmicks matches aren’t feud finishers anymore. Instead of a hell in a cell to settle a feud once and for all. We have a hell in a cell because it happens to be October.
Gimmick Matches have always been around, often in abundance. Technically the first 4 survivor series were 100% gimmick matches. I think the reason fans notice it more these days is because gimmick matches don’t just happen at Starrcade, they happen almost every week. I guarantee if you watch Raw, Smackdown and Impact every week you will see at least 1 gimmick match every single week, it wasn’t like that before. In the 90’s you had The Royal Rumble, War Games, Uncensored and World War 3, 4 PPV’s yearly out of 24 that were built on gimmicks, now you got The Rumble, Elimination Chamber, Extreme Rules, Hell In a Cell, TLC, and night of champions, half the WWE PPV’s in a year are built on gimmicks, that’s why people say that.
There have always been a lot of gimmick matches but they weren’t so over saturated as they are now.
It’s nowhere near the overkill it is now. Your going to see at least 5 ladder matches this year. 2 chambers. 3-5 cage matches. Over saturation makes it seem so much less important.
I just don’t like the same gimmick multiple times on the card. Seeing the chamber twice in one night completely deflates the aura the chamber is supposed to present.