Chris Benoit

How do you think wrestling fans would react to the distribution of a Chris Benoit toy? The world might learn the answer to that question, if wrestling’s PR specialists take the same path as baseball’s PR specialists. Can you picture the visage of wrestler Chris Benoit sitting atop a small bobble head doll?

At a number of baseball parks, a team’s home games invite the creation of a series of theme days. Can you picture a similar occurrence in the world of professional wrestling?

Can you picture a wrestling match with a Chris Benoit theme?

What chance do you see for the distribution at some future time of a Chris Benoit shirt? Do you think that wrestling fans would flock to shops that had put such shirts on the rack? What would they want to see on such a shirt? Would they look for a Chris Benoit “pic”?

What does the future hold for the present-day superstars of WWE? Chris Benoit, Gregory Helms and “The Rock,” what is the likelihood that any one of them might one day be admitted to the Wrestling Hall of Fame? What would wrestling fans hope to find in such a Hall of Fame?

Such questions, no doubt, fill the head of those who strive to lay the foundation for a terrific wrestling PR campaign. Such PR specialists face an uphill battle. That battle has nothing to do with disinterest among the fans. The fans love to watch the wrestling stars perform, both from a ringside seat and from a seat in front of the TV.

The most stalwart fans have carefully studied the Chris Benoit “bio.” Some fans have a Chris Benoit photo on the wall of a room at home. A few fans collect and trade special cards, some of which carry a Chris Benoit picture.

Why then does a wrestling PR specialist face an uphill battle, when he seeks to develop a image-changing PR campaign? Unfortunately, too few people can see much potential in the effort to follow the televised wrestling competitions. Too many people, especially those in authority, think, “Where will it get you?”

Even today, when Americans have seen a wrestling superstar become the governor of a state, a large number of people continue to downplay the value of watching professional wrestling. Some people continue to have the mentality of an elementary school principal, one who spoke with a concerned mother at the midway point of the last decade of the 20th Century.

The principal asked the mother, “Does your son have any interests?”

The mother pondered a bit, and then she responded, “Well, he likes to watch wrestling on TV.”

The principal then said, “Wrestling! Well there’s not much future in that.”

What does the future hold for professional wrestling? Does it promise a day when fans will witness the distribution of a Chris Benoit toy? Maybe one day even wrestling, like baseball, will acquire support from a writer with an undiluted passion for the crazy moves made by the professional wrestlers.