I don’t watch a lot of reality TV, but I do watch Hell’s Kitchen.
In Hell’s Kitchen, 18 competitors (previous seasons included 16 or 20, but it’s always an equal number of women and men) compete to win the head chef position at a Gordon Ramsay owned or sponsored restaurant. The show features the teams separated by gender while they compete in competitions as well as trying to run dinner service. In the end, a losing team picks two chefs to nominate for elimination and Ramsay decides who goes home. This happens until it is paired down to just one team, until there’s finally just two chefs left for a winner take all final episode.
This isn’t revolutionary or unique and is actually similar to how WWE Tough Enough has been run in the past. This year, Tough Enough has been announced to have two winners, male and female, while featuring 10 men and 5 women. They will likely have their competitions and learn how to wrestle in front of television viewers. They might even have their own Gordon Ramsay in Chris Jericho as the host, who sports a similar blonde top to the British hot head.
But Tough Enough has always had a lot of high potential but rarely achieves it. A big reason to this was the reliance in the past on completely green workers. You weren’t supposed to have a name in the business or much wrestling experience. The Steve Austin Tough Enough included some three and four year veterans but was still angled to men and women lacking experience. They did bring in Matt Cross, now better known as Son of Havoc on Lucha Underground, but it seemed more to make an example out of him. Here’s a veteran who hasn’t made it in the WWE yet when he’s good friends with CM Punk? Get out of my show!
Hell’s Kitchen doesn’t feature a who’s who of quality American head chefs across the country. This season features line cooks, a food truck owner and even an amusement park chef. There are only three executive chefs in the competition. But it still does have executive chefs, as well as banquet chef’s. There are experts in this competition among the people at the bottom. This creates a real sense of tension. Are these executive chefs in their positions because they are the best or because their mommy and daddy bought them a restaurant? What happens when a line cook makes a better dish than a banquet chef? That’s tension!
Tough Enough should take a few cues from Hell’s Kitchen in this regard. Take the men for example, with a clean number of 10 competitors. Two or three of them should be veteran pro wrestlers. We’re talking 10 year veterans, maybe even former WWE talent. Think of guys like Johnny Gargano, Anthony Nese and Chuck Taylor competing in the competition. These are seasoned veterans. These are your executive chefs. Next you have your athletes. These are power lifters, amateur wrestlers and former football players. These are guys who could learn quick and maybe surprise a veteran. They might also have the look and pedigree that a long time veteran wrestler wouldn’t. They would also be easier to mold into a WWE style than a guy like Nese, who has been wrestling for 10 years on the independent circuit. Next you add a few guys who might not have a lot of wrestling experience, or any, but have good looks and good personalities. These are your long shots, the line cooks. They might get eliminated early or look bad against a seasoned veteran, but they might also surprise. At this point, you should have 8 or 9 quality men for the show.
But now… you throw in the wrenches. These are your trouble makers. This isn’t a seasoned veteran or a two sport athlete. This is someone with a little or no wrestling experience but a huge ego. Whether it be a smart mark bodybuilder or just Jersey Shore wantabee actor, the whole point of this person is to disrupt, interfere, agitate and infuriate the rest of the wrestlers. Their role isn’t to win but to get further than anyone wants to see them get. My personal favourite from Hell’s Kitchen was always Sabrina, a loud mouthed blonde who Gordon Ramsay always seemed to ignore her mistakes as she survived elimination after elimination getting under your nails. This season was Monique, a line cook who just got angry at everyone and acted like she knew how to cook better than executive chefs. You need these people to make the show run. You need that agitation.
There serves an actual purpose for these people. In the WWE, you’re going to meet these people as fellow wrestlers or staff members (ask Alberto El Patron). The way you handle them is going to be the difference between a wrestler that’s going to stick or a wrestler that’s going to have a nervous breakdown and quit. One of the favourites in this years Hell’s Kitchen in Meghan almost quit because she was tired of being held responsible for the losses of her teammates. Had she quit, the show might have lost their best potential head chef but it would have also proved she wasn’t going to take the heat of the head chef position. You need to keep your cool in Hell’s Kitchen, and you need to prove you can be Tough Enough physically and mentally.
The final element to be added is the host. The rumour is Chris Jericho, or possibly even former Tough Enough head trainer Taz, recently departed from TNA Wrestling. Stone Cold Steve Austin would have been great in returning but the one element missing from Austin was being hard on the wrestlers during training. Gordon Ramsay is absolutely brutal to the chefs during competitions and has no issue with showing his anger and rage during dinner service. This is how the next Tough Enough trainer needs to be at all points in the show. He needs to emotionally drain the talents, especially those who are veterans or athletes. He can ignore the agitator, at least until it’s impossible to. One might say hey, isn’t that what Bill DeMott was doing in NXT? Sure, but he wasn’t playing a character. He was just Bill DeMott, a disposable waste of human garbage. The Tough Enough head trainer needs to be brutal but fair, not brutal to protect themselves. Hardcore Holly’s need not apply.
Either way, Tough Enough needs to improve its record. Just listen to the winners rolecall for Tough Enough: Maven, Nidia, Linda Miles, Jackie Gayda, John Hennigan, Matt Cappotelli, Daniel Puder and Andy Leavine. The Miz was the runner-up or his year while John Hennigan, now Johnny Mundo in Lucha Underground, probably achieved the most as a winner of Tough Enough. That’s not good enough. This competition should be creating future stars, the launching pad for big names. By relying on untrained athletes without massive potential or three year developmental rookies that weren’t making any impression in the WWE development (Leavine), you shoot yourself in the foot on the potential of something like Tough Enough. You need more than Austin mocking someone with limited wrestling knowledge. You need to create the next WWE Superstar.
It’s also possible I just want Gordon Ramsay to be the head trainer of WWE Tough Enough. Don’t put it past me.
