THEY fucked your push up

[HarmonicGenerator]

The opposite of tom's 'You fucked your push up' thread .

 

Sometimes, a wrestler can be really good, and sometimes they can be pushed, or they should be, and it fails spectacularly, not through any great fault of their own but due to incomprehensible, illogical, just plain bad or even complete lack of booking, storylines and support around them.

 

The two most obvious modern examples are Rey Mysterio's first title reign, in which the World Champion not only never won a match but lost the vast majority of them clearly and decisively, and Randy Orton's Shane-derailing in 200(9?).

 

Quite a few people might point to Stone Cold's heel run in 2001 - and especially his bit as leader of the Alliance - as very damaging to the character, and maybe even the start of a downward motion that Austin's character never totally recovered from. But I liked it; I never found Austin likeable anyway, and the heel stuff gave him some of the best matches of his WWE career, loads of hilarious backstage bits, and the brilliant gimmick where he listened to what his watch was saying.

 

Sandman on RAW is another one. Anyone else remember that Battle Royal for the GM-ship where he got massive reactions? Instead of capitalising on that... they released him. Odd. I'm certain something could have been made of that - he was never a long-term investment but you could have got a few months' worth out of him campaigning for a chance to be GM, fighting and rebelling against Regal, maybe taking over RAW for a night... but it was not to be.

 

There's been plenty of other examples over the years, I'm sure.

 

(But let's not mention the Invasion. We all know how that argument goes by now.)

[Dr.PeterVenkman]

I never understood why anyone knocks Austin's run in 2001, his character was stale as fuck by the end of 2000 so he was reinvigorated in that respect plus he managed to have a character that was funny as fuck and still taken absolutely seriously in the ringPlus how many other World Champions would have let Spike Dudley batter them on the announce table?On topic, can't think of anyone off the top of my head

[tiger_rick]

Sean O'Haire always comes up in stuff like this. Those great vignettes had a lot of people looking forward to his re-debut and then out of nowhere, they stuck him with Piper and he went down like a lead balloon.Dunno who you'd blame for someone like Nathan Jones? Personally, I'd blame whoever came up with more ingenious vignettes without realising that the guy couldn't work a jot.Looked forward to Kane without the mask. The dreadful mascara incident was strike 1. Setting a guy 5 stone too light to be Jim Ross on fire was strike 2. then someone booked that feud with Shane, shane, expose the business again. Dire.

[JLM]

The O'Haire thing is a funny one. It always feels like a huge missed opportunity because the vignettes were one of my favourite things they've ever done and O'Haire has a fantastic look and can do some spectacular stuff in the ring for a man his size. All of that said, with O'Haire I think it falls apart when he actually wrestles matches and has to do anything unscripted because I don't think he's very naturally charismatic and wrestles in the same unengaging style as a lot of his fellow later Power Plant graduates.I agree that it felt like they didn't even try though, and that perhaps they didn't know themselves where to go with it once the vignettes were done. Perhaps he wasn't actually the right man for the role. I bring this up every time it gets mentioned, but I'd have loved to see James Mitchell do a similar gimmick because for me it's better suited to a non-wrestling character who could lead wrestlers astray with his subversive ideas and play them off against each other.

[Loki]

The Pope, definitely. He had SUCH an aura about him when he first arrived in TNA, and if they'd kept the faith with him as a street-wise face and given him the push they gave to Anderson, they'd have a bona-fide homegrown(ish) main eventer now.As it is, the heel turn and the Samoa Joe feud cut his legs out from under him, and this painfully long Devon feud has turned him into one of my least favourite characters.

[tiger_rick]

Great shout from Loki. Probably the best example in the past 5 years. There was absolutely no way on earth that the Pope wouldn't become a genuine main event star for TNA. No way whatsoever it was a given.

[LaGoosh]

Sean O'Haire always comes up in stuff like this. Those great vignettes had a lot of people looking forward to his re-debut and then out of nowhere, they stuck him with Piper and he went down like a lead balloon.

They had to cancel his big push mainly because the guy kept getting into fights everywhere he went. He was a liability.

[PowerButchi]

Didn't they lose a load of faith in Sean O'Haire after he proved hugely unable to do a half decent promo in front of a crowd at a TV Taping as well?

[tiger_rick]

Thinking about it, I've heard Butch's story before. Thought the shitty behaviour came after. I'm still going with it. They could've booked around the flaws. And even if they couldn't, they should find that stuff out before they produce a load of vignettes, similar to Jones.Thought Matt Morgan looked like he had potential. Whoever suggested he should stutter was a madman.

[Magnum]

I never understood why anyone knocks Austin's run in 2001, his character was stale as fuck by the end of 2000 so he was reinvigorated in that respect plus he managed to have a character that was funny as fuck and still taken absolutely seriously in the ringPlus how many other World Champions would have let Spike Dudley batter them on the announce table?On topic, can't think of anyone off the top of my head

I think the only credible criticism I've heard for this was that they could have maybe left it until after the Invasion angle was done and dusted to turn him. I think that's fair enough, although there's no telling how effective that heel run would have been considering how fucked he was physically by that point. Like you, I'm just glad we got what we got out of the heel run he did have - it was certainly the most entertaining he'd been since about 1998, arguably ever. I'm sure there were plenty of idiots who'd have preferred him to just do the anti-authority/monster truck/beer bath schtick ad infinitum for the remainder of his career, but I'm glad he got the chance to show his versatility again before he retired. Austin April-November 2001 is possibly my favourite 6/7 month period of any wrestler ever.Anyways, the answer to this question is Randy Orton in 2009, innit? Maybe not a spectacular fail, but so much less than it could have been due to having to sell for Shane McMahon and be buried by HHH just when he looked ready to take off. If you're looking for more modest pushes that were unreserved failures with no redeeming features, then DDP's arrival - not that he was ever suitable for a WWE main event run, but his potential as even an upper-midcarder was dead in the water even before he jobbed to Taker's wife.

[FLips]

Sandman on RAW is another one. Anyone else remember that Battle Royal for the GM-ship where he got massive reactions? Instead of capitalising on that... they released him. Odd. I'm certain something could have been made of that - he was never a long-term investment but you could have got a few months' worth out of him campaigning for a chance to be GM, fighting and rebelling against Regal, maybe taking over RAW for a night... but it was not to be.

The problem with Sandman is that he's the utter shits, as a lot of ECW talent was. ECW had a lot of really rubbish talent that got mentally over because they were booked extremely well and had most their weaknesses hidden. As with nearly 100% of the "proper" ECW talent that went to WWE (Sandman, Sabu, Balls Mahoney, Super Crazy, etc) there was no chance they were going to last because they weren't cleverly-booked small fishes in a tiny pond anymore, they were small fishes in a massive pond who didn't have Paul Heyman behind them and had to get by on talent and ability they didn't actually have to begin with.Yeah the fans went mental for him at first, but a lot of those fans were ECW fans that had either stayed since the Invasion days, or came back when ECW was revived. I can almost guarantee that the women, kids, and men who had never seen ECW just didn't care about people like The Sandman, and why should they care about overweight garbage wrestlers?.I think unless you jumped from ECW when it was still there like Rhyno, The Dudleys, and Tazz did, or were over for actual ability like RVD then you had no chance. It's one thing to be "a guy who was in ECW" but it's another to be "an ECW guy".

[HarmonicGenerator]

Sandman on RAW is another one. Anyone else remember that Battle Royal for the GM-ship where he got massive reactions? Instead of capitalising on that... they released him. Odd. I'm certain something could have been made of that - he was never a long-term investment but you could have got a few months' worth out of him campaigning for a chance to be GM, fighting and rebelling against Regal, maybe taking over RAW for a night... but it was not to be.

The problem with Sandman is that he's the utter shits, as a lot of ECW talent was. ECW had a lot of really rubbish talent that got mentally over because they were booked extremely well and had most their weaknesses hidden. As with nearly 100% of the "proper" ECW talent that went to WWE (Sandman, Sabu, Balls Mahoney, Super Crazy, etc) there was no chance they were going to last because they weren't cleverly-booked small fishes in a tiny pond anymore, they were small fishes in a massive pond who didn't have Paul Heyman behind them and had to get by on talent and ability they didn't actually have to begin with.Yeah the fans went mental for him at first, but a lot of those fans were ECW fans that had either stayed since the Invasion days, or came back when ECW was revived. I can almost guarantee that the women, kids, and men who had never seen ECW just didn't care about people like The Sandman, and why should they care about overweight garbage wrestlers?.I think unless you jumped from ECW when it was still there like Rhyno, The Dudleys, and Tazz did, or were over for actual ability like RVD then you had no chance. It's one thing to be "a guy who was in ECW" but it's another to be "an ECW guy".

Yeah, that's fair enough, but Sandman had been in WWE for two years at this point, looked in better shape than he possibly ever had, and had just been moved over to RAW - which, unless it was part of some elaborate scheme to prove your point and show he didn't belong on the A-brand, must have meant someone thought they could use him for something.I don't remember where the GM Battle Royal took place, and if it was in a former ECW stronghold I'll rescind my point, but the majority of the crowd seemed quite hyped at the fact Sandman could have won. I wouldn't have asked for him to be shoved into twenty-minute TV matches every week but there was a lot of room to capitalise on and potentially sustain that one-off reaction through skits, promos (which wouldn't have been good, but position Sandman and Regal as polar opposites and you'd have a nice little clash of styles) and the odd short match, and a 'Sandman for GM' campaign angle would have been a reasonably entertaining piece of undercard for a few months.Hell, I know they went the serious (and brilliantly so) route with GM-Regal, but they could have stuck Sandman with him as an odd-couple. I'm not saying the possibilities were endless for Sandman, nor that he should have been main-eventing, but they could have made something out of that rather than just releasing him.

[Cobra1000]

this may be a controversial one, cnsidering he's now a two-time WWE Champion but I'm gonna say Alberto Del Rio. The move to Raw completely ruined him for me combined with the loss to Edge at Wrestlemania. Say what you will he's one the title twice, but he hardly looks credible doing it, or looked in anyway (apart from in the ring) a main eventer. Ricardo Rodriguez was getting more heat than him.I think that had circumstances been different he could have beaten Edge at Wrestlemania, stayed on SD, defeated the likes of Show, Orton etc and make himself a star there, which he was definately heading for. Instead they couldn't wait to hot-shot him over to Raw where he delivered lacklustre promos to mainly apathetic audiences, which is a shame cause i reckon he could be a top tier main eventer someday.

[ColinBollocks]

I'm still miffed how people managed to fuck up the Goldberg formula. It really isn't hard.

[Sheffbag]

I'd put Christian on his return to the WWE in this. If the rumours are correct he was supposed to come back at the Rumble but McMahon decided that too many people nkew and threw Matt Hardy into the mix instead just to show the WWE Universe that he had to "shock" them. Cue his return on ECW just walking out onto the stage when he should have been at Mania against Jeff Hardy.Crowd were behind him and Vince decided not to push him.