UKFF Awards - errors and omissions

[RedTwoster]

I've been reading the UKFF Awards - History thread (I'm a bit sad like that) and it's pretty remarkable to see that the forum has pretty much got it spot on every year - there are very few eyebrow raising equivalents to Crash winning the Best Film Oscar. 

Having said that; with the benefit of hindsight, where do you think the Forum got it wrong, and who/what should have won instead? Pitch an alternate winner for any year/category of your choice.

In addition to that, who hasn't yet won a UKFF Award that you think should have? 

To be clear - this is about the wrestling awards only, not the awards for Forum users or the MMA Awards. Also 'Chris Benoit, because he went on to kill people' doesn't count, although feel free to pitch a different winner for that year if you really do think they deserved it. 

From my side: 

THE ERROR: 

Best Heel (2003): Triple H/Chris Jericho - This one surprised me more than most. In 2003, Triple H was in the middle of his reign of doom. He was part of Evolution, which was good, but his matches and feuds were kind of boring - and often just plain bad. At the start of the year, he feuded with Scott Steiner. From there, he would face Booker T (the match was decent, even with the uncomfortable racial undertones to the feud) then Kevin Nash. He would go on to feud with - and drop the title to - Goldberg. On the whole, he did not have a good year. Jericho, on the other hand, had a decent - if unspectacular - year, with the high point being a feud with Shawn Michaels. He would essentially finish the year as a babyface, with the romance angle with Trish Stratus. I think there was an obvious choice for best heel that year, and it was...

WHO SHOULD HAVE WON

Best Heel (2003) - Brock Lesnar - Brock started the year as a babyface, and I imagine that hurt him when it came to winning the award. However, his heel turn and subsequent heel run was so good that I'm really surprised he didn't walk this category. First, there was the masterful execution of the heel turn: 

Terrible quality footage - but what a great moment. He would then go on to face Kurt Angle in an Iron Man match on Smackdown - arguably the best Iron Man match ever, and one that resulted in Lesnar winning the WWE title. 

He would then go on a fantastic run as a terrifying monster heel, absolutely nailing the promos and destroying wrestlers in a way that was worthy of your nightmares. He was also brilliant on the mic - something he rarely gets credit for. But the way he destroyed Zack Gowen - both in ring, and by tossing him down a set of stairs - was worthy of the award alone: 

So yeah, I think Lesnar should have won that year. 

Next up, the omission...

Best Women's Wrestler - Bayley - I find it a little surprising that Bayley has never won this award (while Britt Baker has) - you could look at individual years and ask 'when should she have won it, then?' - and to that, I'd say - fair point, but it is a bit surprising that one of the most successful female wrestlers of the last decade hasn't been recognised in this category in the UKFF Awards. I guess it just goes to show how fierce the competition is in this elite annual ceremony!

[I Bent My Wookie]

I feel like there was a market at one point for Lucha Underground to have won best TV show one year. 

Hokey? Yes. Gimmicky? Yes. But always a fun watch and made me interested in people I previously wouldn't have cared less about? Absolutely. 

It was colourful and bright but also dark and dreary, the bad guys were proper bad guys, you wanted the underdogs to win and at times it was more confusing than Lost. 

Maybe due to its TV drama aspect it got overlooked to the NXTs of the time but it absolutely could and should have won at least once. 

[RedTwoster]

1 minute ago, I Bent My Wookie said:

I feel like there was a market at one point for Lucha Underground to have won best TV show one year. 

 

That's a brilliant shout - season 1 of Luca Underground aired in 2015, when NXT won best TV show. NXT was always more about the premium live events than it ever was the weekly television show, and it's a real struggle to think of any stand-out television moments from NXT throughout its history. I guess there was the feud between Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn in 2015 which was good, but I think, on reflection, it's pretty hard to argue in favour of NXT that year compared to the genuinely innovative Lucha Underground - which surely ended up inspiring some of the cinematic matches we'd see during the pandemic. 

[TildeGuy~!]

I remember Baker winning it, I voted her as worst wrestler that year, I think a lot of members vote based on gimmicks and promos or at least used to anyways, I’m not a weekly watcher of wrestling but every match I saw her in she was just very kicky punchy and I remember watching her title win live on TV and Shida trying to drag her through the match and they just ended up stiffing each other out of frustration.

[LaGoosh]

53 minutes ago, RedTwoster said:

guess there was the feud between Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn in 2015 which was good, but I think, on reflection, it's pretty hard to argue in favour of NXT that year compared to the genuinely innovative Lucha Underground - which surely ended up inspiring some of the cinematic matches we'd see during the pandemic. 

WWE TV was so bad at that point and had been for so long that I think just the fact that NXT were putting out back to basics, simple and logical TV at that time that it felt genuinely fresh and exciting and people went nuts for that even though in hindsight there was nothing special about it at all.

[JNLister]

IIRC, Shelton Benjamin getting rookie of the year in 2004, having been on WrestleMania in 2003 was such a weird one the category had to be retconned as Breakout Star.

[RedTwoster]

1 hour ago, JNLister said:

IIRC, Shelton Benjamin getting rookie of the year in 2004, having been on WrestleMania in 2003 was such a weird one the category had to be retconned as Breakout Star.

That's my favourite category to look back at - it's astounding to me that Pac won this category back in 2006; not because he didn't deserve it (I don't know what his 2006 was like, so I can't comment) but because I find it hard to believe he's been around for that long. It's a shame it wasn't going between 2018 and 2022, I'd be fascinated to see who might have won in those years; particularly from 2019 onwards, when AEW formed and the NWA (briefly) became a bit more prominent. 

Edited September 11, 2024 by RedTwoster

[Lorne Malvo]

It always seemed odd to me that Sami Zayn won Best Babyface a few years back when he had spent all year as a heel. I appreciate he was a heel who was getting bullied and gaslit by the Bloodline, and they were doing a slow-burn thing, but he was still a prick who cost other faces the WWE title and used cheap tactics in his own matches. I think it was the month after he won best Babyface that he actually officially turned face.

My memory is terrible though so I've no idea who should've won it instead! Let's just say Orange Cassidy.

[HarmonicGenerator]

1 hour ago, RedTwoster said:

That's my favourite category to look back at - it's astounding to me that Pac won this category back in 2006; not because he didn't deserve it (I don't know what his 2006 was like, so I can't comment) but because I find it hard to believe he's been around for that long. It's a shame it wasn't going between 2018 and 2022, I'd be fascinated to see who might have won in those years; particularly from 2019 onwards, when AEW formed and the NWA (briefly) became a bit more prominent. 

2006's when Pac started to get booked by the bigger/better known UK promotions - not sure when his first trip to PWG was, but it might not have been very long after.

[RedTwoster]

1 hour ago, HarmonicGenerator said:

2006's when Pac started to get booked by the bigger/better known UK promotions - not sure when his first trip to PWG was, but it might not have been very long after.

I just googled him to see what he looked like during that time, and the physical transformation is remarkable. He looks like a different person. 

1 hour ago, Lorne Malvo said:

It always seemed odd to me that Sami Zayn won Best Babyface a few years back when he had spent all year as a heel. I appreciate he was a heel who was getting bullied and gaslit by the Bloodline, and they were doing a slow-burn thing, but he was still a prick who cost other faces the WWE title and used cheap tactics in his own matches. I think it was the month after he won best Babyface that he actually officially turned face.

My memory is terrible though so I've no idea who should've won it instead! Let's just say Orange Cassidy.

I'm one of the people who voted for him back then, and I had the same uncertainties at the time as to whether he deserved to be categorised as a babyface or not - he was getting babyface reactions though, and people were ready for that inevitable turn. I considered him to be a babyface who didn't actually realise he was a babyface - and that got him my vote.