Yardbarker
x

A push for Heath Slater is a push for America

On the August 15 edition of Monday Night Raw, human volcano Brock Lesnar and his advocate, the inimitably slick Paul Heyman, came out to the ring. They don’t do this every week, what with Lesnar being a part-time performer and all, but it’s a common enough scene. These segments tend to follow a similar trajectory. 

Brock’s music hits and the crowd comes alive. Brock emerges through the curtain and the fireworks, inspiring a bunch of of look-at-that-mother-effing oohs and ahhs. Heyman struts along behind his client, wearing an expression like Bob Baffert might while watching American Pharaoh. Brock leaps up onto the ring apron, setting off more pyro. He stalks the ring a bit before yielding the floor to Heyman. Heyman then delivers a monologue describing the destruction that Lesnar will wreak upon whoever his next opponent happens to be. This coming Sunday at SummerSlam, that opponent will be Randy Orton.

For the past two years—since 2014’s SummerSlam, when he walloped John Cena with over a dozen German suplexes—Lesnar has eschewed virtually every move in his offensive arsenal. He leaned upon his experience in amateur wrestling and mixed martial arts for much of his career, but no more. All that remains is that Bavarian belly-to-back throw and his finishing maneuver, the F-5, with a few malicious elbow and knee strikes thrown in. Lesnar hasn’t won every match since destroying Cena, but he has been booked as far and away the most dominant force in WWE.

Heyman’s role in all this is hype man extraordinaire. He recounts in painstaking detail Lesnar’s past accomplishments, from ending the Undertaker’s WrestleMania winning streak to the aforementioned wrecking of Cena. He foretells how Lesnar will dispatch his next opponent, which is to say, with great prejudice. He refers to Lesnar using terms like “The Beast Incarnate” and “The Conqueror.” Heyman answers the question, What if that giant dagger tattoo in the middle of Lesnar’s torso could speak?

This particular routine has worn thin on some people, and with some reason (and that’s without taking into account how much many wrestling fans enjoy backseat driving). We’ve heard Heyman wax poetic on Brock’s punishing power time and again. We’ve seen “Suplex City” go from an inspired in-ring ad-lib into an organic crowd chant into a cow that’s been milked for all it’s worth. Lesnar’s forays into UFC have driven home the fact that he doesn’t really need WWE, and that rankles some folks. Just as basketball loves its gym rats and football its gritty gamers, wrestling loves the guys who love the business. Lesnar isn’t one of them. He’s like if LeBron only played on Christmas and in the Finals.

Sunday's Orton-Lesnar match has no title on the line, but one could make an argument for it as being co-main-event worthy. Lesnar alone is a unique draw, and this will be Orton's first pay-per-view match since last October. Their match will be the only one on the card pitting a wrestler from Raw against one from Smackdown. (WWE divided its talent between the two brands via draft in July.) 

The two being on different shows, however, plus Orton's recent return and Lesnar's part-time status, made building their match something of a tricky proposition. Orton invaded Raw to deliver an outta-nowhere RKO to Lesnar, and Brock responded in kind by F5-ing Orton on Smackdown. They couldn't go back to that well more than once apiece, however, not if the Raw-Smackdown separation is expected to mean anything.

Enter, of all people, Heath Slater. 

Once a part of the fierce Nexus, the less-fierce Three Man Band, and, more recently, the hashtaggerous Social Outcasts, a solo Slater now bills himself as the hottest free agent in sports entertainment. He went unchosen in July's WWE Draft; the lights were literally turned out while he waited hopefully in the locker room.

He has since lobbied the brain trusts of both shows to give him a contract. He was given a match against former 3MB teammate Jinder Mahal, with the winner getting a Raw contract. Slater lost. He was given a shot at a Smackdown contract against longtime ECW stalwart and current political candidate Rhyno. Slater lost again. He's made impassioned (if knowingly silly) pleas about how he needs to support his kids, the number of which can jump from two to four to seven, yet he's failed and failed. 

On Monday, Slater's frustration led him to interrupt Lesnar and Heyman in the ring. He reiterated his desire to land a Raw contract, pointing to his children as motivation as he approached. This intrigued Brock, who invited the West Virginian to enter his lair. “I feel you,” Lesnar said. "Let’s talk about your kids.” No one's coaxed this much personality out of the Beast in years. Ah, but it was short-lived. Lesnar went on: “I don’t give a shit about your kids.” A short while later, Slater had received two German suplexes, an F-5, and a kick to the floor. 

Smash cut to Tuesday night’s Smackdown Live. Slater happened upon Commissioner Shane McMahon, GM Daniel Bryan, and Randy Orton backstage. He presented the bosses with a fruit basket—the ultimate nod to internet smarks; the r/squaredcircle subreddit once actually sent Triple H the same gift—and came away with a match against Orton. He received an even worse beating than he did against Lesnar, but he won via DQ when Orton ignored the referee’s instructions. McMahon and Bryan were ready to give Slater his well-earned contract, but some punch-drunk shenanigans got in the way.

Look, anyone in WWE could have been sacrificed to Lesnar and Orton. Anyone on the roster could have served as that human measuring stick, the proxy upon which they could one-up each other. But I’m not sure how many lower-card talents could have made anything of it. Would anyone have cared if Fandango got whipped around Suplex City? Would it matter if Orton whooped Tyler Breeze so bad the ref had to call for the bell? Slater has gotten legitimate reactions—Job No. 1 for any wrestler—every time out the past couple weeks. More than that, he’s made both Lesnar and Orton look like a million bucks. He became the unlikely linchpin of the build to their match.

He’s been a comedy jobber, but he’s been a courageous one. Even heel commentator JBL put him over Tuesday night. In or out of kayfabe, you earn respect when you stand toe-to-toe with Lesnar. You earn respect when you take on another main eventer the next night. You earn respect when your actions demand it.

And Slater has demanded it, even as comic relief. He’s dived fully into this role and he’s rightly earned plaudits for it. Crowds have responded. A steady stream of appreciation for him has popped up online. He’s no Dusty Rhodes, but he carries a very faint whiff of the American Dream's everyman appeal. I’d never spent more than 30 seconds thinking about Heath Slater, and now the man has inspired me to cobble together a few hundred words. It’s just wrestling, and thus it’s inherently silly, but it’s still something.

Since much of the fun of wrestling is the constant running subtext of fantasy booking, I got to wondering: Where does Slater go from here? How might he turn this into a more serious storyline? He’s earned it, right?

This could all be moot pending a Slater SummerSlam surprise, but dream with me for a moment. Let’s say he keeps this schtick going for a while. Let’s say he fruitlessly challenges the likes of Kevin Owens, Rusev, and Bray Wyatt. Let’s say he cuts promos about all the things he needs to provide for his nebulous number of children. Let’s say he records a video package about the virtues of aboveground-pool maintenance. Let’s say he keeps getting his ass kicked and keeps being a lovable loser. But let’s also say he keeps coming back.

Eventually, even the silliest clown tires of getting laughed at, and that's when Heath Slater's character can grow some teeth. Somewhere down the line, the time will come for Slater to say that he's not going to take this shit anymore. While some wrestlers have opportunities handed to them and others are content to be low-level players, he took matters into his own hands. He's the one who walked down the ramp to interrupt Brock Lesnar. He's the one who stepped into the ring with Randy Orton. Let him channel his frustrations and mix in some real-world stuff how Dolph Ziggler has in his verbal jousting with Dean Ambrose. He’s Heath Slater, dammit, and he’s not gonna take it anymore.

I know, I know, fantasy booking is dumb by nature. But allow yourself to suspend disbelief and submit to the basic conceit of pro wrestling. You want guys to root for, and isn’t Heath Slater the kind of guy you want to root for? He’s like if Rudy was from West Virginia and fancied himself a rock star. He’s like if Daniel LaRusso had a more aggressive haircut. He’s a little jackass, but I’ll be damned if the kid ain’t got balls, you know?

Simply put, it’s been fun to watch him work. This whole storyline could’ve been nothing, but it’s something. That’s the most heartening part of Slater’s mini-emergence. He took the ball and he’s still running. It’s fun watching a person capitalize on an opportunity. He’s going for it, really going for it, and crowds have been loving it. It’s what wrestling is all about. You watch this stuff, a lot of which is bad, and you hope that somebody makes it worthwhile. Lately, Heath Slater has surprisingly been that somebody. I just hope he keeps it going.

More must-reads:

Customize Your Newsletter

+

Get the latest news and rumors, customized to your favorite sports and teams. Emailed daily. Always free!

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.