Time To Make Knight A Face After WWE Caught Piping In Boos
As the WWE superstars departed for Saudi Arabia to do Night of Champions, their Smackdown episode was taped, during the event the WWE were caught piping in boos for LA Knight when he battled Rick Boogs, which has left many fans bemused at the idea that the WWE are trying very hard to make him a heel without noticing that he’s very popular with the fans, as seen by their social media ‘Yeah Movement’ to try and get LA Knight pushed harder up the card.
Currently LA Knight is going well with fans getting many cheers, however it seems that the WWE really want the fans to boo him, jeer him and hate him. The WWE needs to make the effort to turn him heel, if that’s their preferred alignment for LA Knight. Piping in sounds and expecting fans to automatically catch on and boo isn’t going to get the job done.
It’s not the first time that a wrestling company has piped in fan reactions, nor will it probably be the last time but it’s just sheer laziness if the company is going to rely on generic fan reactions, they’ve created themselves to sell a superstar to the fans. The fans are going to surely tell you if they either like someone, or they don’t, and no amount of fake noise is going to win them over one way or the other.
If the WWE Creative are really sold on LA Knight’s heel credentials, it’s time for them to up the ante with him and push him hardcore as a major heel for the brand. Otherwise, it’s not going to work, the fans are going to keep cheering regardless of how many fake boos and jeers you shoot into the arena.
As much as professional wrestling companies want to tell us fans who we should cheer and boo, sometimes the fans are going to choose who they are going to cheer and boo. This means you either do a heap of work to make them either love or hate the person or you just follow the cheers or boos before you can naturally turn them and get the fans onside with this superstar.
A superstar shouldn’t ever need a to create fake crowd reactions for a superstar, they either have what the fans what or they don’t. If the fans aren’t with someone, you need to make the effort to make the fans love them, the same as when someone is hated you cannot just make them suddenly hate.
It’s sad for LA Knight right now as he appears to be quite a popular face for the Smackdown brand, the WWE should get behind that and ride that until the fans are turned off by him and then they can repackage him into the heel they want him as.
Knight is one of the stars on the current roster who has organically gotten over the fans, it would suggest that the WWE’s idea of him being a heel isn’t going to work, for now and maybe someone in WWE creative needs to look at making him a babyface.
LA Knight could be the next big star, or he could just fizzle out to nothing like some have over the years, but the WWE needs to get behind the popularity that Knight currently has and try and push it forward to bring out the star in him.
The WWE missed the boat on Matt Cardona, the former Zack Ryder managed to create himself a massive following for years within the WWE but was never given the chance to step into the limelight to be the star he should have been. He’s then gone on to make himself a star of the Indies, collecting titles almost everywhere he goes and enjoying every moment of his freedom to be the star he should have been within the WWE walls.
It would be a shame for the WWE if they allowed LA Knight to go down the same path, pushing him as a heel rather than getting behind his potential star power and make him into that star they need.
News Writer. Living in Tasmania Dave is a lifelong wrestling fan, formerly working for Mix It Up Radio’s Wrestling Asylum Radio program, and Wide Bay Pro Wrestling working backstage and writing articles. Podcaster with 15 years of journalism experience across different sports mostly AFL and professional wrestling, photographer for local footy in Tasmania.
