WWE Career of Mickie James: Part 4 

Mickie James received her push at the end of 2007 after the injury of Candice Michelle. She was the most credible face option to work against Beth and keep her fresh. Mickie James ended up being more than that. The "story" of this feud soon became that Mickie James could not defeat Beth Phoenix. The televised match before their PPV title match, Beth Phoenix pinned Mickie. Without gaining any momentum before the PPV title match, Mickie lost again. Mickie lost to Beth several times after this. The WWE had Mickie James cry and act upset about her inability to defeat Beth. This was done to help Beth look stronger and fresher for Candice\'s eventual return. Mickie James could not take the title from Beth, but could Candice? This would not be the last time they used the tears of Mickie James. Had the WWE pushed this idea consistently, I would be arguing that this all really was done just for Mickie\'s sake. The WWE has underdog stories like this all the time. Problem is, they did not push Mickie James against Beth consistently.

In a tag match, Mickie teamed with Kelly Kelly to face Beth and Victoria on Raw. Mickie James pinned Victoria to get her first victory against Beth in any type of match for the first time in 2008. Mickie looked re-energized, like she would be closing in on Beth\'s title after that. Next week on Raw? Mickie James is not seen at all. Candice Michelle, however, makes her return to Raw to cost Beth a match. Mickie James was put back on Heat. Mickie James remained off of Raw until after Wrestlemania, while the WWE pushed "Bunnymania" between Maria and Candice (later replaced by Ashley) as the faces and Beth and Melina as the heels.

Fans wanted to know what happened to Mickie James. Enter the dirtsheets. They said Mickie James was being punished for saying in an interview that the WWE should treat their women more like TNA treats their women. Back then, when I was a little more naive, I bought it. In retrospect, do you know what it sounds like to me? It sounds like Beth Phoenix is pregnant. It sounds like the WWE is in love with Alicia Fox just because she is holding the title at the same time they sign her sister. It sounds like Eve will be a part of a triple-threat match at Summerslam with Alicia and Melina. It sounds like something I might as well flush down the toilet. The real reason Mickie James was depushed? The centerpiece came back. This is how you know the WWE wanted Candice to have the spot. They push everything else aside going on with Beth, putting the two in the same picture again, the day Candice returns. Mickie James really was meant to just hold things down. She did her job, they gave her a trivial win, and they tossed her aside.

Candice got injured again before Wrestlemania. Did they bring back Mickie James to compete at the big PPV? No. Although she is the most credible face diva and was just involved in issues with Beth before Candice returned, they wanted to push Playboy. Ashley gets Candice Michelle\'s spot in the match. Mickie James remains on Heat, acting as fodder for the heels in the match.

In a meaningless aside, I remember a certain topic in a message board I posted in at this time. The topic creator asked who your favorite diva was on each show. He even counted Heat as a show, even though it was primarily a place for Raw jobbers to get matches. He chose Mickie James as his favorite "Heat diva". A few others did the same thing. That is what the WWE would have liked to have done with Mickie\'s importance.

With Candice once again injured, and the WWE not yet at the stage where they would give the title to someone like Maria or Ashley, they once again push the woman they used when Candice got injured in 2007. With not many fresh options to work with Beth to keep the belt on her until Candice returned again and Beth not getting over with the title on her, not to mention the fans\' support of Mickie James not breaking during her disappearance from Raw, Mickie James won her fourth Women\'s Championship in England.

I will skip over most of what happened during the actual reign itself. I have no huge complaints or see any great evidence that the WWE was madly in love with Mickie during this reign. It was still a good reign. However, Mickie\'s romance angle with John Cena led to many rumors that the two dated in real life. So many other rumors against Mickie James have been built on this. For now, I will only say that I am still waiting for a credible, impartial, direct source to confirm any of it. But I will bring it up again. It looks like one of the main reasons for the angle was just to give Mickie something to keep her busy while Melina turned face and feuded with Beth. Like every other angle Mickie James has ever gotten outside the title scene, this romance angle failed. WWE stopped pushing it. It never elevated Mickie James up the card. WWE just used it to push the idea that Mickie was trying to sleep around and keep it secret. Was that supposed to be the payoff, WWE? It accomplished nothing lasting for Mickie\'s WWE character.

History repeats itself. I said before that I would argue that the WWE intended for Candice Michelle to be a centerpiece because she was a model who became a credible wrestler under their watch, had a very strong build to the title, and most blatantly, had things pushed aside for her benefit when she returned from injury in early 2008. In August, having already lost momentum on the Raw before the PPV, Mickie James lost the Women\'s Championship back to Beth. Losing a PPV match to Beth Phoenix after not having momentum going into it? History really does repeat itself! Before the end of the month, Candice Michelle, not surprisingly, once again made her triumphant return to Raw. It is no coincidence that the title was put back on Beth, Mickie James received her "gold watch" victory, and Mickie was starting to be depushed again. The WWE were finally going to push Candice against Beth again. Mickie James was no longer that important to them. In fact, when Mickie James did finally get her rematch, the WWE had Candice Michelle sitting at ringside. They announced that whoever won between Beth and Mickie would face Candice. Could they have done anything more to make it obvious who would win? While Beth and Candice are busy looking at each other and laughing it up, Mickie James wastes her time trying to act like a focused challenger. Beth retained the title.

Let me go back a step. Candice Michelle made a fool of herself in her return match. Raw was taped, so most fans never saw the part edited out. This is not one of those instances where the opponent messes up his or her part, making the person executing the move look bad. Candice was not as solid as she used to be. This is the start of the WWE giving up on Candice Michelle as the centerpiece. That is the thing about centerpieces, they do not change like the seasons so trivially. A person has to really mess up for the WWE to really stop pushing them as a true centerpiece. In one year, Candice Michelle got injured, returned and got injured in her first televised match back, and returned and performed poorly against a solid performer, Beth Phoenix, in her first televised match back. She did not regain the WWE\'s confidence in the time before her title match. She lost and never got a second shot at Beth.

Does that mean the WWE pushes Mickie James hard against Beth again? If Mickie James really was the centerpiece they wanted, and there is already enough of an argument that she was not, she would have gotten that push. Her previous push against Beth was blown off easily in favor of Candice. Mickie James got one title shot, without any build to it, and did not win the title. She was once again just being used as fodder during this period. Since TNA\'s Awesome Kong was strong in 2008, the WWE continued pushing Beth hard as an answer to that. They had already bought out Gail Kim. Who would be the main face they push against Beth? They would stall until Melina returned from injury.

The WWE did not reinvest in Mickie James. They mainly treated her as a face diva on the same level as Candice and Kelly Kelly on Raw. They did place Mickie in the storyline between Jamie Noble and William Regal and Layla, but what did that do for her? She never got mic time, did not get adequate focus on her or her real involvement in the feud, and most surprisingly, their was never a televised mixed tag between these people. The feud just got forgotten as William Regal went on to win the Intercontinental Championship. Another failed angle for Mickie James. The WWE did not care to develop her, elevate her, or even keep her that fresh.

Despite being in the midst of this depush, Mickie James won the 2008 Cyber Sunday costume contest. Fans chose her two years in a row. She won over Women\'s Champion Beth Phoenix and her monster push, Diva\'s Champion Michelle McCool, Candice Michelle, Kelly Kelly, Maryse, and other women, some of whom the WWE had invested more into in 2008. Speaking of depushes and fans choosing anything, the WWE had a poll on their website for an event they made up called "All-Diva\'s Day" in early 2008, prior to Wrestlemania. Fans voted for their favorite divas throughout the day. At the end, the final three left were Maria, who was in the midst of her Playboy push, Kelly Kelly, who had gained attention from dancing on ECW, and Mickie James, who was off Raw and exiled on Heat at the time. Mickie James won that poll too. My point? The WWE has no excuse. They knew how over Mickie James was. Nevertheless, they pushed her only when they had to in early 2008, depushed her when the person they were high on came back, then use Mickie James as just an extra body for tag matches and jobbing for the rest of the year. You want to tell me this is the woman they were in love with?

There you have Mickie\'s fourth title reign. It is clear that she was not the first choice for the push. She was not the intended centerpiece. If she was, she would not have been depushed as she was the two times the same woman returned to Raw in 2008 to claim a title feud against Beth Phoenix. If she was, she would have regained the feud, not necessarily the title, after Candice was depushed. If she was, and since the WWE knew she was over, they would have invested more in elevating her or keeping her fresh outside the title feuds. All she got were angles that never saw a finish and created rumors that damaged her character. It didn\'t matter. Mickie James was already very over before her title reign in 2008, meaningless rub from Cena, and in between all these attempts to bury her.

Labels: Beth Phoenix, Candice Michelle, John Cena, Melina, Mickie James, Raw, WWE

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