Monday, August 13, 2012

Who's more deserving of being a Weasel?

Here's an interesting conundrum.

A couple of weeks back on Monday Night Raw, talk show host-turned manager Abraham Washington, or, A. W. for short, wearing a live headset microphone, made a wisecrack referencing basketball star Kobe Bryant's alleged rape in a Colorado hotel room during a match involving one of his men. The timing was just way off, coming as it did days after the "Dark Knight" massacre in Aurora, Colorado.

11 days later, Washington (real name: Brian Jossie) was dismissed by WWE for making those remarks and some others. Reports say that there are those in the WWE locker rooms who felt that the firing was unjust, but, again, with the company's former CEO, Linda McMahon, campaigning for a US Senate seat out of Connecticut, the last thing Vince McMahon wants is to give his wife's opposition fuel to further slam the company and the campaign. Jossie took to Twitter to take shots at the company's PG-rated content. Mere days before, he issued an in-character post pledging his support to Mrs. McMahon's campaign.

This was Jossie's second go-round with the big club, the first being in 2009-10 on ECW with the aforementioned talk show, designed as a parody of late night yakkers such as Jay Leno and Arsenio Hall. It took too long for McMahon to discover that the joke wore thin way too quickly, and Abraham Washington found himself upstaged by his sidekick, Hall of Fame wrestler-turned-stooge Tony Atlas, whose forced laughter went over bigger. After ECW was, shall we say, retired, 2 1/2 years ago, Jossie was sent back to Florida Championship Wrestling, where he split his time between managing, announcing, and actually wrestling a few matches. He was recalled earlier this year, and his ring name shortened to A. W., now presented as the owner of All World Promotions. The headset mic, I felt, was eventually going to get this guy in trouble, and it did.

Now, Dave Meltzer, of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, has raised the issue of whether or not WWE should bring back the A. W. character, preferably sans microphone. I don't think so. Since Jossie's Twitter rants went public, it sounds to me like the man has already burned his bridges with the company, but then, there have been others who did and later were welcomed back. We'll know later tonight if he's another that was invited back with a mea culpa.

So, then, who's the weasel? Is it Jossie, whose remarks as A. W. weren't scripted, allowing him to ad-lib, despite the prospect of damaging words being spoken? Or is it Vince McMahon, for pulling the plug, some say too early, in an effort to protect his wife's political aspirations? While I get the rationale in either case, what I can't figure is if it's fair to bestow the Weasel ears on one or both or neither man? Feel free to offer your opinions.

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