Rob Van Dam and Ricardo Rodriguez do not go hand in hand

Rob Van Dam and Ricardo Rodriguez – Wait, what?

The World Heavyweight Championship sure does seem like it’s down in the hole, when compared to the WWE title. I mean, with the fanfare around Daniel Bryan and the insurmountable odds that surround his ascension to the WWE championship, one tends to forget that not too long ago, he had a lengthy reign as the World Heavyweight champion.

And he is the featured guy on the Smackdown show too, where the title has taken a backseat. The World Heavyweight title is the title of the blue brand and yet, Alberto Del Rio is not the guy with the bullseye on his back. In fact, his reign has been marked with uninteresting opposition in the form of a recently-returned Christian, who has very little fanfare going for him, and got the shot at the title at SummerSlam courtesy of a few lacklustre wins over lower-midcard acts such as Titus O’Neil & Damien Sandow (at that time).

After his program with Dolph Ziggler ended, prematurely in my opinion, the interest in the character of ADR has plummeted due to various reasons, mainly overexposure and lack of charisma/personality/drawing power. He also dumped his long-time manager Ricardo Rodriguez, who brought in so much to the act of ADR as the Mexican Aristocrat.

After the unceremonious parting of the two, Rodriguez has been paired up with the former ‘Whole F’in show’ Rob Van Dam, who will be challenging for the World Heavyweight title at Night of Champions.

On the outside, it all looks good. RVD, since his return, has been one of the most over guys there is on the roster. And ADR could do with a fresh new challenger and with someone as popular as RVD in the fold, the title picture might get a shot in the arm with this feud. But, it’s hard not to overlook the problems with this match-up as it’s one of the most random things to come up in a long time.

It is evident that the reason that RVD is in the title picture is because, he has been paired up with Ricardo. Otherwise, he has looked rusty and quite clumsy at many points during his matches and while that can be attributed to his unorthodox style, it’s not something that you would expect in a contender for the title. RVD has always been a special act, but to be a credible name in the main-event scene, one has to be a lot more consistent and smooth.

Secondly, apart from the mutual hatred shared by the two, Ricardo and RVD don’t even have anything in common. Lilian Garcia does a better job of announcing RVD’s name than his so-called ‘Personal ring-announcer’. Van Dam, for the major part of his career, has always been seen as the free-spirited, non-conformist rebel who always does his own thing.

To see him walk around as the hired muscle for a teenage-looking Hispanic sidekick is quite the weird sight and coupled with his lack of acting skills, it’s hard to empathise with him, when he would be at the receiving end of the champ’s new found ruthlessness. Ziggler & Christian were able to pull it off convincingly, but I have serious doubts about RVD on that count.

Now, it would have been a different case had it been a Paul Heyman espousing Mr. Monday Night. Van Dam is not known for his talking skills and with the history shared with the ‘Evil Genius’ from their time at ECW, this pairing would have got us all popping. But, that’s not the case now and I am curious how well the build-up for the program would be, given the task at hand would have to be shared between three performers, who at best are average on the stick.

Can’t help but think if a Ziggler or a Cody would have made a better fit with Ricardo. That sort of promise seems to be missing with the present pairing, but only time will tell.