They have NEVER had wrestling skills on TV wrestling period. If you want to see real wrestling go to a high school tournament. If you want to see combat wrestling watch Pride Fighting. If you want to see a joke - Watch the WWF or whatever.
If you are in the Louisville, KY area, or visit the area, you need to check out IWA Mid-South Wrestling. They wrestle every weekend (some Friday nights, but mainly Saturday nights) right across the river from the Louisville skyline, and right under the Colgate Clock.
WWF (or WWE as they are now called, since losing a court battle against the World Wildlife Fund) is definitely a joke. IWA is everything WWF is not. It is local, low-key, hard workers making very little pay, putting their bodies on the line. IWA is similar in style to the old ECW out of Philadelphia. Ian Rotten runs IWA, and he wrestled with Axl Rotten, his mentor, in the old ECW. In some matches, they give blood and guts in the crowd (literally), in others they give you high flying acrobatics, and in others they give you scientific amateur wrestling. Just this past weekend, Chris Hero and C.M. Punk wrestled a scientific match that lasted 92 minutes !!
I beg to differ.
If you haven't seen some of the more recent talent on WWE's Smackdown show (thursday nights, UPN), then you're missing out on some real honest-to-goodness wrestling.
Guys like Kurt Angle, Chris Benoit, Rey Mysterio, Charlie Haas, Shelton Benjamin, and Brock Lesnar actually come from amateur wrestling backgrounds. Angle won the Gold in the 96 olympics, and Lesnar and Benjamin are both former National winners.
Since they've split the shows into two different divisions, there's beena huge difference in the quality. Their Monday Night RAW is more gimmicks and drama, while Smackdown is dedicated to actual wrestling ability. Check it out some time, you may be impressed.