Last thread has well over 10,000 replies. Its body is breaking down like The Undertaker's. Seeing as we might have crossed the threshold into a new era in the business, here's a fresh new thread.
Originally Posted by otherstar:
Wow...those same folks wouldn't have been fans 30+ years ago with that kind of attitude. When I started watching wrestling, ripped wrestlers were rare. Local KC favorite/hated wrestler Bulldog Bob Brown is a case in point.
Bulldog didn't have a body to speak of, and his work rate was so-so...YET he could get a crowd to hate him quicker than anybody I've ever seen (before or since). Yet, because of Bulldog's ability to work a crowd, he held the Central States NWA Title 19 times -- which is still the record. Harley Race didn't have a great body either, but he was gold on the mic and a tremendous worker. Guys like them would be hated by today's fans.
EDIT: fact of the matter is, guys like Owens, Zayn, Styles, Zayn, are Bray Wyatt actually more in the mold of old-school wrestlers than most on the roster these days.
If you want to talk about guys with everyman bodies being able to work a crowd, a great more current example is Bubba Ray Dudley in ECW. He could get a crowd almost to the point of a riot with his mic work and he was a complete fatass at that point. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Swanman:
If you want to talk about guys with everyman bodies being able to work a crowd, a great more current example is Bubba Ray Dudley in ECW. He could get a crowd almost to the point of a riot with his mic work and he was a complete fatass at that point.
Mick Foley may be the greatest example of this... Foley could make multiple personas work and whether it was the Undertaker or some spare jobber, he could make that match work and get the crowd into a frenzy. [Reply]
Forget physical look or match style, if there's anything turning viewers off at this point, it's 5 hours of wrestling on Monday and Tuesday and several months each with 2 major shows. They've completely oversaturated the airwaves with their own product, to the point that very little feels special or can't miss. And that's without even going into anything on the network. There's just too much.
I know this personally because I regularly tune out for weeks or month at a time, come back and it's like I missed absolutely nothing. They've done a good job sparking interest with their push of women's wrestling, but that's only going to last so long as a novelty (I'm not saying women's wrestling is a novelty, I'm saying the so-called '(re)volution' in women's wrestling is a novelty; the newness will wear off).
At this point I watch Raw and/or Smackdown when the recaps make it sound interesting, and I watch very few of the ppv's outside of the big 4. This from someone that actually has the network.... [Reply]
Originally Posted by otherstar:
Wow...those same folks wouldn't have been fans 30+ years ago with that kind of attitude. When I started watching wrestling, ripped wrestlers were rare. Local KC favorite/hated wrestler Bulldog Bob Brown is a case in point.
Bulldog didn't have a body to speak of, and his work rate was so-so...YET he could get a crowd to hate him quicker than anybody I've ever seen (before or since). Yet, because of Bulldog's ability to work a crowd, he held the Central States NWA Title 19 times -- which is still the record. Harley Race didn't have a great body either, but he was gold on the mic and a tremendous worker. Guys like them would be hated by today's fans.
EDIT: fact of the matter is, guys like Owens, Zayn, Styles, Zayn, are Bray Wyatt actually more in the mold of old-school wrestlers than most on the roster these days.
I don't follow wrestling anymore, but I used to love it. I had to google the folks you listed here. Bray Wyatt if Mike Rotunda's kid and Blackjack Mulligan's Grandson. Those guys were popular when I was watching. [Reply]
Originally Posted by raybec 4:
I don't follow wrestling anymore, but I used to love it. I had to google the folks you listed here. Bray Wyatt if Mike Rotunda's kid and Blackjack Mulligan's Grandson. Those guys were popular when I was watching.
Originally Posted by Swanman:
If you want to talk about guys with everyman bodies being able to work a crowd, a great more current example is Bubba Ray Dudley in ECW. He could get a crowd almost to the point of a riot with his mic work and he was a complete fatass at that point.
Very true. Bulldog was the same in his day (he never had a body), but he'd have the crowd spitting on him, trying to stab him and the like. I never watched ECW (which I now regret), but much of their roster were smaller, more ordinary, weren't they? [Reply]
Originally Posted by otherstar:
Very true. Bulldog was the same in his day (he never had a body), but he'd have the crowd spitting on him, trying to stab him and the like. I never watched ECW (which I now regret), but much of their roster were smaller, more ordinary, weren't they?
Eh to some degree but guys like Benoit, Guerrero, Jericho and Raven went through there they gave Mysterio and other mexican dudes exposure but for the most part they weren't a promotion full of little guys. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Mecca:
Eh to some degree but guys like Benoit, Guerrero, Jericho and Raven went through there they gave Mysterio and other mexican dudes exposure but for the most part they weren't a promotion full of little guys.
Thanks, I didn't know. I've watched a few documentaries about them, but otherwise didn't know. I know that Mikey Whipwreck isn't very big, but I'm not too familiar with their roster other than him and a few others. [Reply]
Originally Posted by otherstar:
Thanks, I didn't know. I've watched a few documentaries about them, but otherwise didn't know. I know that Mikey Whipwreck isn't very big, but I'm not too familiar with their roster other than him and a few others.
They had a mix, but if you were a smaller guy, you had a much better chance of making it in ECW as opposed to WWF or WCW at the time. Some of the examples of "littler" guys that did really well in ECW were:
Justin Credible
Lance Storm (borderline, he was Jericho size)
Spike Dudley
Stevie Richards (tall but skinny)
Jerry Lynn
Taz
Sabu
I am sure there are tons that I was missing. They also had WWF-sized wrestlers like Shane Douglas, Chris Candido, Bam Bam Bigelow, Balls Mahoney, Dudley Boys, Pitbulls, Rhino, Steve Corino, etc. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Swanman:
If you want to talk about guys with everyman bodies being able to work a crowd, a great more current example is Bubba Ray Dudley in ECW. He could get a crowd almost to the point of a riot with his mic work and he was a complete fatass at that point.
" we got a mother in the front row who taught her daughter how to suck dick" [Reply]
Originally Posted by Swanman:
They had a mix, but if you were a smaller guy, you had a much better chance of making it in ECW as opposed to WWF or WCW at the time. Some of the examples of "littler" guys that did really well in ECW were:
Justin Credible
Lance Storm (borderline, he was Jericho size)
Spike Dudley
Stevie Richards (tall but skinny)
Jerry Lynn
Taz
Sabu
I am sure there are tons that I was missing. They also had WWF-sized wrestlers like Shane Douglas, Chris Candido, Bam Bam Bigelow, Balls Mahoney, Dudley Boys, Pitbulls, Rhino, Steve Corino, etc.
Tajiri and Super Crazy as well. Their series of matches were fantastic. [Reply]
