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It's just been posted on PWInsider.com that Claudio Castagnoli has been offered a contract with WWE. I've only become a fully fledged ROH fan this year. 2006 has marked the first year that I have liked another current wrestling company more than WWE. As such I have never had to go through the experience of my favorite company losing one of its best performers to a bigger company.
Let's be sensible here. Wrestlers leaving smaller companies for larger ones has been happening for decades and its not about to stop happening. Did I expect the entire current Ring of Honor roster to stick with the company for the rest of their careers? Absolutely not. Do I feel that the ROH wrestlers owe it to the company to stay loyal for a certain amount of time? Again, no. I expect ROH wrestlers to treat the company and its fans with respect and to conduct themselves in a manner befitting the company whilst they work for it. That's it. The money they make in ROH is not great. In many cases these people will have families to support and they have a living to make. I genuinely wish any ROH wrestler who gets an opportunity with WWE or TNA the best of luck.
That doesn't mean that I'm not sad though. I already see ROH as 'my' company. I refer to the wrestlers there as 'one of ours'. In a way it feels like losing a friend. Claudio is a great wrestler and has been a fantastic heel for ROH this year. He was a major part of the ROH vs CZW feud. He sided with CZW and formed a tag team with Chris Hero. ROH rightly recognized Castagnoli and Hero as the most talented workers from CZW and added them to the ROH roster too. The two called themselves the Kings Of Wrestling and captured the ROH tag belts a couple of months ago. It is very difficult to make the fans really hate you as a heel these days, especially if you are a good wrestler, but the Kings Of Wrestling do their job extremely well. We really do love to hate them.
Claudio has not yet accepted the offer from WWE, but I would be very surprised if he doesn't. It will almost certainly be more money for him, even at developmental level. He has no guarantees with this offer. He will have to work his way up the ranks before he gets to appear on tv. But it is a shot at the big time. If Claudio can impress, he could go on to become a star.
ROH find themselves in a tricky situation now. The Kings Of Wrestling were primed for a long run with the tag team belts and how they will deal with the situation is anyone's guess. Will Chris Hero conscript someone new to join him as champion? Or will ROH have to switch the belts to a different team? Booking plans will have to be hastily rewritten.
I wish Claudio all the best. In my ideal world we would get to enjoy his performances in ROH for much longer, but I guess that's just the way the wrestling cookie crumbles. To send him off in the way he himself used to shout before he turned heel: Good luck Claudio - Heyyyyyyyyy!
You can write Jon at jonsahir@hotmail.com.
