What/who do you miss in wrestling that you will never see again?

[PunkStep]

Steroids.

 

Word.

 

 

Also, the wrestlers having their websites advertised underneath their names during their entrances.

 

EDGE

www.wwfedgechristian.com

I forgot about this until I watched an old Wrestlemania last week, and I think they had one for the APA. Were they actual websites, or just linked to their wwe.com bios? They should do the same now but with a link to their Twitter. Seriously, I am surprised they haven't done it already.

[Super Cena]

^ I think that nearly every act that was over at the time had their own site, though I'm sure that it was just a 'bio' sorta thing on the WWF site. I had the world's slowest Freeserve dial-up connection back then and the WWF homepage would load up before I'd managed to make a cup of tea which shows just how primitive the site was back then.

 

It's funny you should say that about them advertising their Twitter accounts though because I was just thinking about that.

[air_raid]

I also miss the words wrestler/wrestling.

 

I'm probably not eloquent enough to sum up what I'm feeling, but here goes.

 

It's been so important in subtle ways that you probably don't even realize it. Linking back to another thing I miss - just the general more serious presentation - I used to love when they would talk about a match in terms of "X might be the better wrestler, but Y might be the better fighter" and so on. Or how Bret Hart put over Stone Cold by referring to him as "the best wrestler in the WWF today" - simultaneously getting in a jab in at Shawn Michaels, the Champion at the time. From the same feud, JR came out with the line "He aint no clown. He aint no trashman. He's a wrestler. And so is Steve Austin." Just like that, a picture painted of the war that was about to ensue. "Sports Entertainer" or "Superstar" just wouldnt have told the same story.

 

So much of what goes on nowadays it feels like there aren't stories being told, either in the ring or on the microphone. That serious presentation just doesnt seem to be there any more. Maybe it is the commentary, maybe I miss JR being good, or Monsoon explaining why a particular hold does damage and so on. Just feels like there are sound bites now - "pound and ground offence," "controlled frenzy," "vintage WHATEVER," and it all feels so disposable, generic and throwaway. If I hear Michael Cole say of Randy Orton "he's starting to hear voices in his head" one more time, I may scream.

 

And I miss the word "fans" in place of "universe." I cringe at WWE Universe. It wants so badly to be cool, but it isn't. At school, it would get its lunch money taken then thrown in the bins.

[Max Power]

1. Non-scripted promos. I truly believe that the previous era where guys like the Rock and Austin were relied upon to develop there own promo styles and characters were much more beneficial to the product than some washed up hack from Seinfeld writing the speech for the entire undercard.

The Rock never developed his own promos. The Rock's the standard which they set as to why they feel scripted promos are the way forward. Brian Gewertz, Vince Russo and Ed Ferrera wrote all the Rock's material. You can even see it on Beyond the Mat, where Rock is relaying his script word for word with Ed Ferrera and Ferrera even says the last line for him. The Rock's promos were filled with songs and catchphrases. You dont come out with them off the cuff. He was brilliant, but he's the most obvious scripted promo in the business.

 

Ah but, In The Rock's book he mentions how creative would give him the base of the promo, but how he would put the meat on the bones. He says that Ferrara would say "Austin/Rock, Wrestlemania, 2 weeks away", and leave him to it. I imagine that Rock would have to clear it with creative first, but a lot of the stuff was his own.

 

He also mentions how we would carry a pen with him and write down promo ideas on napkins or envelopes or whatever was handy.

[steve rayson]

These guys:

 

(well i don't really mind about saturn)

[IANdrewDiceClay]

The Rock's book is full of shit though and he wasnt likely to put over Ed Ferrera in 2000 was he? John Cena says in interviews that he came up with all of his raps on the night they were aired. They dont want you to think all this stuff was written for them. The Rock was WWF's pet project. He was signed in 1996 to become their next big thing. Thats probably why he's done well in movies, because all of the years he was with WWF/WWE, his shit was written for him. I dont think anyone has ever argued the point that the Rock's stuff wasnt created by him. That wasnt his thing anyway. His delivery and timing is what made him so good. Not his creativity.

[Max Power]

The Rock's book is full of shit though and he wasnt likely to put over Ed Ferrera in 2000 was he? John Cena says in interviews that he came up with all of his raps on the night they were aired. They dont want you to think all this stuff was written for them. The Rock was WWF's pet project. He was signed in 1996 to become their next big thing. Thats probably why he's done well in movies, because all of the years he was with WWF/WWE, his shit was written for him. I dont think anyone has ever argued the point that the Rock's stuff wasnt created by him. That wasnt his thing anyway. His delivery and timing is what made him so good. Not his creativity.

 

Of course its full of shit - its probably the worst WWF/E book out there, half of it was written in character for Christ sake. Perhaps it is because he was so good, that a lot of it looked as thought it was improvised. I remember reading in Foley's second book, how he and Rock would improvise a lot of things; specifically the This Is Your Life Segment, where you can see flashes of inspiration hit Rock's face every time he comes up with the next line.

 

You're probably right though about the majority of the promos but I think that on occasions, stuff must be created by the wrestlers themselves. Otherwise segments like the one mentioned above would run like clockwork - didn't they run over the TIYL segment by a fair while, and got a bollocking for it from Vince; until he saw the Nielsons for the quarter it was one?

[Your Fight Site]

WCW. And Sting when he eventually retires. Those were the two things that got me interesting in wrestling, this face-painted warrior and other muscle-bound stars chucking each other about Friday nights on Channel 5.

[Tommy!]

Of course its full of shit - its probably the worst WWF/E book out there,

 

You've not read Hogans have you, brother.

 

As I get older I enjoy the rock's promos less and less, both re-watching them and since he's returned, script or no script. I can't really say why. On a similar note it was interesting watching mania really getting into Austin because it felt like it was a real person if you will, while the rock felt like Dwayne Johnson playing the Rock. I enjoyed it but I didn't feel it, if that makes any sense.

 

On promos, I don't know but I'd imagine if they have input into what is put forward to them it must help. That said I remember when I was watching raw regular, a few years back now sadly, my main issue with promos was they all felt the same, both in what was said, how it was put together and how it was delivered. Not much really stood out.

[Rosler28]

The titles meaning something special

[wh1007]

Paul Heyman on commentary:I love rewatching those months when he was sat behind the announce desk.His team with JR seemed so fresh and much of what Heyman said was usually productive to the product as a whole.His pushing of the Gore was somewhat legendary(Gore,Gore,Gore!).The bit where he called ZZ Top Jimmy Valliant on the SD! 9/11 show still cracks me up(Sadly I couldn't find a link )

 

I miss when PPV's had interesting names rather than Over The Limit(?) or bland match specific names like Hell In A Cell and Fatal 4 Way.Gone are the days of interesting IYH taglines like:Good Friends,Better Enemies,A Cold Day In Hell,Revenge of the Taker,International Incident and Mind Games

[Surf Digby]

Molly Holly's bubblebutt ting.

 

Is that all you guys can reduce her to?

 

 

She had a cracking pair of norks too.

 

 

I miss the picture-in-picture pre-match promos.

 

People doing unexpected run-ins without waiting for their music to play.

[The Invisible Boy]

Well the obvious ones would be WCW and ECW. I miss both of them a lot, the Monday Night Wars too.

 

I miss the letters WWF, seeing footage on DVDs with the WWF logo and saying edited, it ruins the history of it all. Then I would say I miss guys like Stone Cold, The Rock and so on, they seemed to be giants of main eventers and could sell anywhere out, get ratings going through the roof (the Monday Night Wars had a lot to do with that too and the Attitude Era), nowadays they have the PG thing with main eventers not near the caliber of those guys.

 

Then I'd say I miss DX in their prime, The Ministry, the Corporation and stables like this, I miss The Undertaker during his Ministry days and although I never saw their first run I miss seeing stables like The Four Horsmen, proper ones who stay together for a long time, not just about a year at the longest. I miss real tag teams, ie The Hardys, Edge and Christian, the Dudleys, LOD, APA etc.

 

The European Title, it was always nice to have a feeling as though their was a Champion of Europe in the WWE. The Hardcore Title, someone gave a very good reason for this above and it always gave jobbers a reason to be around, the matches were usually good too, I loved the roaming around the arena ones, eg. Al Snow and Bossman around 1999, when they ended up in a pub across the road from the arena and so on.

 

I miss guys like Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit, Brock Lesnar etc. I bet if they were still around either alive or still involved in wrestling they'd really help the main event level in WWE.

 

There's still a fair bit of surprises in wrestling too but I'd love to be able to experience real shocks eg. Nash and Hall appearing on Nitro, Vince McMahon as the Higher Power etc. I suppose Nexus' first appearance trashing Raw is up there but there's not nearly as much shocks nowadays as there was back then.

[Mr Posh]

Bobby

[The King of Old School]

The things i miss in wrestling...

 

One WWE Champion - thought it was ok at first, as i thought it was going to be a year or so long storyline ending with a epic WWE Champion vs World Champion bout at Mania 20 or something. The first thing i'd do if i was in charge of the WWE is to unify the titles, two world champions at the moment is a bit stupid.

 

Tag Team Wrestling - Many of my favourite matches growing up were tag team bouts, i can point to the great Midnight Express/Rock & Roll Express matches, The Steiner Brothers throwing 300+ pound guys around like they were babies, the L.O.D being scary as fuck, The Hart Foundation, The Rockers, even comedy teams like the Bushwackers had there place. Tag team wrestling today plain sucks.

 

WCW - Although the WWF was always my fave promotion, i loved the WCW back in its day, i'm even a bit of a sucker for the 2000/2001 stuff, i still have my VCR just to play the old WCW tapes i used to get via mail order (remember them days?). Was never a fan of ECW, and TNA just can't seem to hold my attention and i have really tried to get into it numerous times over the years.

 

The Old Guard I know times change and the guys can't carry on forever, but it really hit home with last Sundays Taker/HHH match that these two really are the last of a generation, when these two pack it in which i presume will be in the next 2-3 years ( I think they will both wrestle at Mania 30) then it really will be a sad day. Who are the people to carry on from these guys? Yes Cena & Orton are established, but who else? The Miz maybe? I'm sure ADR, Barrett & Cody Rhodes have decent careers ahead of them, but at the moment there looks to be nobody else who can break through to Cena/Orton's level never mind HHH/Takers.

 

Apart from that though, it's all good