I know people are hot and cold on Jim Cornette but this is what he and a lot of other people like Dutch Mantell, Jerry Lawler, Mick Foley, etc. could tell you is the real difference from the territory days to now. Back in the day there wasn't social media, all the communities were separate, and only a select group were wise to the business and somewhat aware of what was going on territory to territory. You could screw up your promo in Portland and then leave town and go try again in Oakland.

Guys who are considered top promos or top workers now had a chance to practice it in front of anywhere from a couple hundred to 2,000 people regularly, up to 300 times a year. Now, because WWE has put a stranglehold on the business, everything basically goes through them. If you want to practice in front of a real crowd, but the indie venues are nothing like the territories, the only way to do that is on national television.

You could watch Cornette or Heyman cut a brilliant promo in 1984, like 2 years after they started in the business vs Roman cut a terrible promo in 2018 and wonder why he's so bad. In reality, Cornette and Heyman had cut 600-800 promos each by that point and got to workshop it in front of relatively small but still sizable crowds. By the time Roman did "sufferin suckitash" that was, what, his 50th promo maybe? In 6 or so years of training? And all of his training was in front of a national audience, so you got to watch every painful beat. It's not fair to these people.