Earlier on in the season, we here at the Let’s Get Ready to Talk Schmoedown Podcast had a valid discussion on the championship belts. Why would anyone want the belt when it seems to only be hurting your faction because you weren’t allowed to join the tournaments? Mike Kalinowski actually made the decision to drop his chance at the title just so he could join a tournament. Hindsight being 20/20, we all saw how that was not a very good decision because he ended up being involved in one of the biggest upsets of the year. Any moment you have a guy decide not to go for a belt isn’t good overall. A belt should mean more and be one of the most important things to obtain in the Schmoedown.
I say all of that to say that after Kristian Harloff laid out the new points format it shouldn’t be a problem anymore. For one, just with the new pay-per-view format, champions are going to get way more opportunities to make points for their factions. Also, with the points format that just got rolled out to us (which you can check out [along with all the other announcements] here), it means that the Schmoedown has put more emphasis on the title. Even in regular championship matches, you can earn big points, starting at seven points for a win.
So let’s take the Mike Kalinowski situation and apply it here. You would have to win three tournament matches to just barely get ahead of the points for winning one championship match, which in turn makes it a bigger gamble to enter the tournament. So much so that it isn’t worth it anymore. You may feel as a competitor that you could win your first or second match pretty easily, but it would be very difficult to say you can run off three wins because at that point of a tournament you are going to face some of the best of the best.
This, I think, is one of the best changes for next year. The belts are going to become one of the most, if not the most. important thing, which is what they should be and always should be. Now when you wear that belt around your waist or place it on your shoulder, the weight of it means something to both you and your faction. It’s very fitting because this season is WAR, so let the nerves and the tears, all of the emotions, flow all season as everyone tries to obtain the belt in each division.
