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Wrestling legend Dutch Mantell recently pointed out one big issue he had with the current WWE product.
Speaking on the latest edition of Spotskeeda Wrestling's Smack Talk, Dutch Mantell opened up about what he felt was one big issue with WWE today. He said WWE lacks top larger-than-life babyface draws like Hulk Hogan, The Rock and Bruno Sammartino.
Mantell compared it to the formula used by the territories back in the day with top babyfaces like Dusty Rhodes and Jerry Lawler.
"My overriding thought about SmackDown, they got a big angle, they got Roman Reigns. But you know what they don't have? They don't have a big babyface. That's what they are looking for. Now, years ago that was the formula. You kept a resident babyface. Look at Florida, they kept Dusty [Rhodes] and they would bring the heels in. Every six months, you'd have another monster heel come in and Dusty would take care of him. Look at Memphis, it was Lawler, here come the heels one right after the other. In New York, the old WWWF, you kept Bruno [Sammartino] because he was champion there for seven years so he had to have those big monster heels coming in," said Dutch Mantell.
Mantell also touched upon why Sammartino had such a long reign as Heavyweight Champion.
"They did things slower there because the territory area was so big and they had some massive towns - Philadelphia, New York and Pittsburgh and Boston and Baltimore and all those huge towns that drew well," added Mantell. "But they had to have somebody who was, in the fans mind, that had a chance of beating Bruno. That's why they kept the title on his so long, there was no need to change it, because business was so good and the people believed in Bruno."
Dutch Mantell on Vince McMahon role in this new policy in WWE
Dutch Mantell said that WWE not having that one big star who was a draw is no longer a policy because of Vince McMahon.
The wrestling legend did add that this was in some ways a prudent business move by Vince because if anything happened to that one star, it would be a big hit on the business.
"I heard this a long time ago because you had Hulk Hogan, and he was actually bigger than WWE. Then you had Stone Cold and he was bigger than WWE. Then you had The Rock, he was bigger than WWE. When you went to see matches you'd say, "I'm going to see The Rock," not the WWE or "I'm going to see Stone Cold." I'm not going to see WWE, I'm going to see one person. Well, Vince McMahon got rid of that. He wants everybody to go see the show, not one guy and there is a bit of business thought to that because if anything happens to this one person, you're finished," said Mantell.
Dutch Mantell also gave his take on the recent WWE releases during his appearance on Smack Talk. You can check that out HERE.
If any quotes are used from this article, please add a H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling
