Less than a week after Corey Graves made headlines for celebrating WWE's new creative direction at the commentary table, with announcers being afforded much wider lanes from which to do their magic, Michael Cole, the promotion's lead announcer and Vice President of Announcing, weighed in on his Premium Live Event booth mate's take in a special interview with Awful Announcement.
*spoiler alert* Cole is a fan of the changes, too, as he's been afforded a chance to really call professional wrestling for the first time in his career instead of having to parrot back Vince McMahon's catchphrases on a short leash.
“It’s a different world. Corey came in at a good time. Under the new regime now, things are looser. The direction’s different,” Michael Cole told Awful Announcing. “There’s a lot more trust in commentators now than there was before. We are having the opportunity to be ourselves. Open up, develop character, call pro wrestling, sports entertainment, the way we want to. Corey was able to jump in under this new regime, and it was the perfect chance to make a switch. This was the time to do it.”
After spending the better part of three decades within the WWE Universe, going from a backstage interviewer role to his current spot as the Vice President of Officiating, Cole has quite literally seen it all when it comes to the commentary booth, with his work largely being panned over the years for being two “corporate.” Fortunately, since Paul “Triple H” Levesque took over creative control and, in turn, gave his head announcer more creative control, that perception has largely changed for the better, with Cole suddenly becoming a fan favorite while seemingly having a blast every week he comes in for work.
What a moment for @MichaelCole & @PatMcAfeeShow! 😂 pic.twitter.com/8tauOedl2R
— WWE (@WWE) March 6, 2024
Revisiting Corey Graves' comments on WWE's commentary changes.
Now for fans who weren't familiar with Corey Graves' comments on WWE's changing its commentary standards, it's worth revisiting his appearance on Short and to the Point, as it really adds important context to Michael Cole's Awful Announcing comments in an interesting way.
“Triple H is another guy that I owe a great deal, if not everything in my career, to. He’s the one that took a chance on me as a wrestler in NXT. I know we’ve had a few conversations since then. Him having to shut me down broke his heart as much as it broke mine. He’s always been sort of silently supportive. He’s always been in the back. If I need something, I’ve never hesitated to go to him and ask. He also is really cool and sort of refreshing in the sense of, he gives us space when he’s in Gorilla, like where the old boss sat. Instead of being told and promoted, ‘Hey, you have to say this, you gotta do it this way, you have to use this verbiage,’ he I think understands that we are all fans and we all love this in different ways, and as the business grows and evolves, you kind of have to let go of the reigns a little bit,” Corey Graves explained via Fightful.
“I still have my guide rails. I just feel like they’re a little wider on each side now, where rather than trying to stay on a particular path and walk in a certain rhythm and do things a certain way, I have a little bit more leeway to be me and develop my own style, as long as all the boxes that need to be are checked, I don’t have to do them the same way that the six guys before me have done, or that Michael Cole does, et cetera.
“I’ve been on TV for I think seven years on RAW and SmackDown, and in the last few months, I think my headsets have been as quiet as they have been, ever [laughs]. I only hear from him if I’m doing something terribly wrong, which, knock on wood, doesn’t happen too frequently, or the other time I hear time from him pretty regularly is if, much like Michael Cole, if a joke lands. If I say something and it gets him, he’ll go, ‘Oh, that was really good,’ or he’ll double down, and he’ll follow up on my joke in my headset.”
Say what you will about Graves' status as a heel announcer or criticize his minor growing pains as he transitions from a color commentator on RAW to the lead voice of SmackDown, but it's hard to argue that WWE's commentary as a whole hasn't been as dynamic as it's ever been over the past few months when compared to literally years of Vince McMahon-isms at the booth. JR's Hell in a Cell call it may not always be, but in the end, few are going to quibble with referencing TNA, Bullet Club, or Sting when it's relevant to the story being told in the ring.
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