For the better part of the past two months, the most intriguing storyline in the WWE has been that of the anonymous General Manager of Monday Night Raw. This whole storyline began when Bret Hart was fired as General Manager on June 14th by Vince McMahon. The following week, McMahon announced that there was a new anonymous GM, and he would send his messages through a laptop located near ringside. Whenever there is a new message, there is a loud beeping noise and Michael Cole reads the message. There have been great speculations to who this anonymous person actually is, and no one knows for sure yet. In this article, I look at five candidates that could end up being named as the anonymous GM:
Michael Cole: This is the person most people think will eventually be named as the anonymous GM, as he gets booed for the most part and could turn into a great heel if given the power. He is the one who reads the General Manager’s messages. How do we know if he actually receives an email and doesn’t just make up his own lines? He never looks like he is actually reading the screen, but reading a piece of paper on the keyboard. Cole has the power because whatever he announces is what actually takes place later that evening, whether it’s a match or a big announcement. More and more, every week he is turning into a heel commentator, rooting on people like The Miz and putting down the faces. Could this be a transition into being named the anonymous GM?
Triple H: Our second candidate to who the anonymous GM could be, is the “The Cerebral Assassin” Hunter Hearst Helmsley. Triple H has been out of action since being injured by the hands of Sheamus at the Extreme Rules PPV, which happened in April and he hasn’t been seen in the wrestling ring since. During his current four month hiatus, there has been speculation that he could be named as the new General Manager and become a heel again. There has also been word that he could be named as the secret leader of Nexus. Triple H is expected to return in a few months, but is “The Game” ready to be in a wrestling role, or will he first take a non-wrestling role as the GM?
The Rock: While this may be a stretch, our third candidate is The Rock. Since his retirement in 2004, he has made only a few appearances in a WWE ring and on the titantron, his last one being at the 10th anniversary of SmackDown episode, where The Rock appeared in a pre-recorded video. He made headlines earlier this year, when he said that he would return to the WWE in the summer for more than just a one-time guest hosting gig. The summer has come and gone and still no signs of The Rock coming back. He had said that he would want to entertain the fans in a way that they have not been entertained in years. Could this be possibly leading to The Rock being named as the anonymous GM?
Vince McMahon: The fourth candidate is WWE’s owner and Chairman of the Board, Vincent Kennedy McMahon. He is the one that announced that there would be an anonymous GM on June 21st, and that same night, he was taken out by the Nexus. He has not been seen on television ever since. Most people think that McMahon is not the anonymous GM because the General Manager is likely to side with Nexus, and McMahon was taken out by Nexus, not to be seen again. One of the reasons we can’t count him out, is because it would be a huge swerve if he was named the anonymous GM, as almost no one would see it coming. McMahon has been synonymous with swerves, especially in the attitude era, and did the opposite of what fans expected him to do. An example of this was when Vince was revealed as the “higher power” in the Ministry of Darkness storyline. Does McMahon have one last swerve left in him?
Stone Cold: Our final candidate is the one and only, Stone Cold Steve Austin. While Austin retired from wrestling after WrestleMania 19 in 2003, he has made multiple appearances since then. Austin also has experience at being the GM, when he became co-General Manager of Raw later that year. Austin’s latest appearance in the WWE ring came on the March 15, 2010 episode of Raw, when he was the show’s guest host. That episode did exceptionally high ratings and it could be smart to bring in Stone Cold as the General Manager once again, to get viewers interested in the product once again. Stone Cold has said in the past that he will return to the WWE soon and that he even might have one last match in him. The anonymous GM has teased that Austin could be the culprit with lines such as: “That’s the bottom line because the GM says so!”and “If you wanna see some action, gimme a hell yeah?” These were two catchphrases that Austin used a lot in his career. Could “The Texas Rattlesnake” have one last run in the WWE as the anonymous General Manager?
Some other candidates that did not make my list, that could end up being named as the General Manager are Jim Ross (could work storyline wise because he was snubbed for the announcers position, Ross denies being the General Manager on his blog), Shawn Michaels (retired after WrestleMania 26 but could come back in a non-wrestling role, has said he wants to stay retired), and Abraham Washington (one of the candidates to become General Manager after Vickie Guerrero quit, but hasn’t been seen in the WWE since ECW ended).
