Is Triple H pushing or punishing talent?

Paul Levesque, better known as Triple H, has been with WWE for close to 2 decades now and has gone on from being one of the most popular stars in the history of the company to his current role as a backstage heavyweight in charge of talent relations and onscreen as the COO of the company. Forever a polarizing figure, most of the internet wrestling critics believe him to be the undeserving hotshot who has always had it easy.

Right from riding the coat-tails of Shawn Michaels into the main-event to getting married to the boss’s daughter and calling the shots, Hunter has always had it easy is what the internet pundits seem to think. The word is that he even managed to keep a few deserving contenders down the ladder on his way up and has the propensity to do that even today, which is a major worry given how much of a pull he has now as the heir-apparent in the WWE.

Does all of this sound familiar? Well, it has been going on for years now and objectively speaking, Triple H gets more than his fair share of flak, just because of his positioning backstage as the husband of Stephanie Mcmahon. What people tend to forget that even if he was afforded the opportunities he got by illegitimate means, had he not delivered everytime, he would have fallen flat on his face and wouldn’t have become ‘The Game’. Hunter doesn’t get enough credit for how good he is as an old-school wrestler who understands the psychology of the business and puts that knowledge into good use in every aspect of the game.

With his current run as the onscreen COO, based on his real position backstage, Hunter has his critics all up in arms again, watching his every move and scrutinising his every action and word to see if he isn’t out to ‘bury’ their favourite guys. The last time he was onscreen as the power-in-charge, it was back in 2011 and he got a lot of flak for riding on the popularity of Punk and trying to make it all about him, even inserting his good buddy Kevin Nash into the picture.

But, it wasn’t for long and he proved that he is willing to take a step aside and let the younger guys take up the spotlight. CM Punk, John Cena, Daniel Bryan, Dolph Ziggler, etc have all gone on to become bigger stars since then and today, when he seemingly has put even his part-time wrestling boots away, he seems poised to be doing the right thing for business.

While it’s very McMahonish to see an authority figure insert themselves into a program, it’s also obviously a lot more interesting thing to happen. Compare Triple H’s involvement in the present Bryan – Orton saga with the Teddy Long part in Punk – Undertaker program back in ’09. What? You don’t remember it? Well…exactly my point. That’s what Triple H brings to the table. As a proven time-tested draw, he has a good feel and idea as to what would work and which approach needs to be taken to draw heat for a program.

It’s easy to watch episodic television on a weekly basis and nitpick on faults, but how many times have we seen that a low-key buildup leads to an intriguing climax where we all pop and go “Holy s*%t, didn’t see that coming!”. That’s the power of story-telling and at present, both Triple H and Stephanie McMahon have a great deal of say in it and have been delivering a good product so far, case in example being the title match and the aftermath at Summerslam.

In his promos, there have been numerous times when he has belittled and poked fun at by other wrestlers and a lot has been made about how Triple H is out for himself. But we all conveniently forget that it’s what all the guys do….right from the Rock to Punk to Cena to Vince himself. So, let’s just cut the EVP of talent relations a bit of slack and watch “The Game” run things at the helm for a bit. In John Cena’s absence, a king needs to be anointed and with a bit of faith, ‘The King of Kings’ might just get us to start believing in the happenings again.