Defending Mr. Warrior

[TheUltimateWarriorWasGood]

Damn it! Im gonna do it. despite the chance of being condemend, perhaps even tarred and feathered.
Im gonna... im, im gonna Defend the Ultimate Warrior.

Thats right, deal with it. All you haters.

I think the mans gotten a bum rap for years. In every aspect you can imagine.
For his abilty, for his promos, thats hes dead(how many warriors? 4?5?).
im willing to bet that most of the hate is from former "Little Warriors"
Once cheered for him and bought all his merch, dressed like him for halloween.
I did.

Why the change? Its almost like Michael Jackson was for me growing up (born 82)
When I was young, MJ was the Man. It was uncool NOT to like him. Then one day, it
became very uncool. what happened? *This was BEFORE the child abuse stuff

I assume that kids watching today, having never expierenced the Warrior in his true
hayday just hear what others say, or watched the damn destruction dvd and just
out of instinct and ignorance go along with all the hate.

He wasnt the worst wrestler ever! Come on! he was limited, he wasnt great or spectacular
neither was Hogan or any WWF superstar back then, the good ones like Dibiase and Roberts
they dont get belts. The ones with that have "It" get the belts. Warrior had "it"
it cant be denied, he didnt end his career strong which may be why he gets some much slack.
Watch WM6 with Hogan or 7 with Savage, Both great matches.

Promos, can someone please tell me what they think a character called The Ultimate Warrior
is supposed to sound like? Whatever he said, it worked for the character. It was unique,
and if you really try to understand him, its not as crazy as it seemed.

With all the crap wrestling that has existed over the last 40 years, I just cant accept that
a former WWF champion, one who carried both World and intercontinental belts at the same time
is so commonly shit on.

[Fox Piss]

Warrior was just a a shit Renegade.

[air_raid]

thats it, bring on the flame...

 

Flame baiting.

 

Reported.

[TheUltimateWarriorWasGood]

thats it, bring on the flame...

 

Flame baiting.

 

Reported.

Erm, my fault.

Didnt even realize the implication there. ill Edit that part.

[air_raid]

Just japing.

 

Behave yourself, or I'll be forced to start a "Defending Mr TheUltimateWarriorWasGood" thread.

[pshango]

Have to say that I always liked the Warrior as a performer, regardless of his very limited in ring skills.This guy had charisma.The Self destruction of The Ultimate Warrior DVD the WWE produced has to be one of the most pettiest forms of revenge by Vince McMahon against a past employee.

[PowerButchi]

What a superb thread.

[Jason Mayhem]

Loved Warrior as a kid and still find his stuff entertaining when watching it back.

 

I think the reason why people don't like him is because he demonstrates the point that wrestling that appeals to the masses doesn't have to resemble a sporting contest. People want to see larger than life characters and there were few larger than THE ULTIMATE WAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!! (Snort).

 

Much like other things is wrestling, he was very much of his time and I think you have to have been watching wwf at the time to fully appreciate warrior.

[Barrington]

I haven't watched the DVD and I didn't watch WWE until about late '97. But the clips I have seen have been amazing. There's something about him. I've seen one match I think and I still love the guy. Ther rest I have seen are various insane promos. This guy had your undivided attention the whole way through. He had an energy that I think is unmatched. When the superstars do their promos you watch but might not really care, when Ultimate Warrior speaks you damn well listen. As well as finiding them hilarious I get what he's doing. His nonsense is so intense it comes across that he really wants to win, he really wants to fight. Scott Steiner did a promo talking about the peaks on the worlds axis or some shit. It didnt make sense but it was amazing. Therefore nonsense is sense. Even Phil Collins can confess to talking nonse sense

[The King Of Swing]

Warrior may (or may not) be a twat but he takes a lot of undeserved abuse as a wrestler imo.

[JakeRobertsParoleOfficer]

Funnily enough, it is 3 years ago this month that warrior returned to the ring after a 10 year hiatus.

 

I actually loved the warrior and from what i read he was WWF's second highest merchandise seller from 88-91 second only behind Hogan. Very clever bloke. Probably wrestled 10-15 matches between 93-2008 and made HUGE money on every occassion he came back, 96, 98, and 2008.

[Carbomb]

You can like Warrior and still think/realise he wasn't particularly good - it all depends on what you reckon he was good at.

 

I thought he was great, with a shitload of energy, colour, presence and natural, physical charisma you couldn't help be drawn by. His popularity rivalled Hogan's to the point where Vince tried to position him as Hogan's successor. It takes something special to achieve that.

 

BUT he was shit in one particular aspect, and it's pretty important: he couldn't hold up his side of a match. I'm not talking about workrate, mainly because I think that's a myth, I'm talking about the simple things of pacing and selling. He was, in essence, a prototype Goldberg: booked outside his comfort zone, he was always going to be exposed and have matches which people would be unmoved by or, at worst, find boring and hokey. The only time he had memorable matches outside his speciality squash was against guys who could get him to calm down a bit and take a bit of instruction as to how to get the crowd behind him, and we're talking masters of their craft like Hogan, Macho and Rude.

 

There's no longevity in that, is the problem. You can't have a top-line main-eventer who can only do squashes forever; that's why the Undertaker's so good - he realised he had to change up his game after a while, and he learned how to do that commensurately with his status. And Hogan's career largely consisted of selling like a motherfucker before finally overcoming the odds (still selling while he overcame, which is also important).

 

I daresay that, if Warrior had learned to step outside the comfort zone, we would be talking about him in the same way we talk about Austin, Hogan and The Rock. He had all the tools to make it, and did incredibly well with those tools - but he didn't finish the job.

[JakeRobertsParoleOfficer]

I truly think that Warrior could have evolved. all his interviews weren't lunatic ramblings:

 

e.g:

 

 

I think that Warrior could have evolved (and to be fair he did, as his Promo's slowed down and did become more legible , after 1991), and think he could have played a part in the attitude era. Sting was HUGE in WCW from 97-99 (and before that obviously, but his evolution enabled him to remain relevant) and i think Warrior could have been the same in WWF. The colours could have been toned down, the promo's slowed down, the hair shortened slightly etc and i think he ould have gone on easily into the early 00's and beyond.

[Van Dammer]

Speaking of the Warrior how generic a name was The Ultimate Warrior? Its amazing it got over really, its not even a name really, its like a description of somebody. Imagine if somebody debuted on RAW next week called An Impenetrable Man and wore colourful tassles do you think he'd got over?

[Taylorslade]

You can like Warrior and still think/realise he wasn't particularly good - it all depends on what you reckon he was good at.

 

I thought he was great, with a shitload of energy, colour, presence and natural, physical charisma you couldn't help be drawn by. His popularity rivalled Hogan's to the point where Vince tried to position him as Hogan's successor. It takes something special to achieve that.

 

BUT he was shit in one particular aspect, and it's pretty important: he couldn't hold up his side of a match. I'm not talking about workrate, mainly because I think that's a myth, I'm talking about the simple things of pacing and selling. He was, in essence, a prototype Goldberg: booked outside his comfort zone, he was always going to be exposed and have matches which people would be unmoved by or, at worst, find boring and hokey. The only time he had memorable matches outside his speciality squash was against guys who could get him to calm down a bit and take a bit of instruction as to how to get the crowd behind him, and we're talking masters of their craft like Hogan, Macho and Rude.

 

There's no longevity in that, is the problem. You can't have a top-line main-eventer who can only do squashes forever; that's why the Undertaker's so good - he realised he had to change up his game after a while, and he learned how to do that commensurately with his status. And Hogan's career largely consisted of selling like a motherfucker before finally overcoming the odds (still selling while he overcame, which is also important).

 

I daresay that, if Warrior had learned to step outside the comfort zone, we would be talking about him in the same way we talk about Austin, Hogan and The Rock. He had all the tools to make it, and did incredibly well with those tools - but he didn't finish the job.

 

This. My thoughts exactly. I loved the Warrior "back in the day" and yes, I bought Warrior merchandise then also. When he was booked in a situation that played to his strengths and positive qualities he could look great, but as it has been mentioned before, as a top guy, you can't really get by on squashes, extremley short matches and run-ins. However, whilst other guys who were similar to him as far as being limited technically but having lots of charisma, he wasn't willing to learn. There's alot of bullshit that goes around in wrestling circles which you can't always believe, but it's well accepted that he was a bit of a prat to say the very least and very disrespectful.

 

He had an incredible physique and if he had been willing to learn a little bit more, and had a different attitude, then he could've had a lot more success than he did.