Biggest Nepo Baby In Wrestling?

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

The word nepotism has been around for ages, nepo baby has been around a couple of years but means the same thing more or less. 

As for Vinny Mac, I don't think he is a nepo baby. Vince Snr sold him the business's he didn't give him it. Had he not sold to Jr he would have just sold ot to someone else,  there were a few others who would have been interested. Had Snr sold to someone else then the course of wrestling would have been very different most likely, but that's for another thread. 

[tiger_rick]

1 hour ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

Had Snr sold to someone else then the course of wrestling would have been very different most likely 

That's "What if Hitler's mother had had a headache?" level stuff. Don't tease us.

[Vamp]

Got to be whichever of Shane McMahon's kids appeared in the video package at WrestleMania XX surely? 

[SuperBacon]

That lad who won the actual tag team titles at Mania with Strowman.

[air_raid]

3 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

That lad who won the actual tag team titles at Mania with Strowman.

?

On 1/9/2025 at 8:22 AM, air_raid said:

Nicholas, obviously.

 

[Carbomb]

3 hours ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

The word nepotism has been around for ages, nepo baby has been around a couple of years but means the same thing more or less. 

As for Vinny Mac, I don't think he is a nepo baby. Vince Snr sold him the business's he didn't give him it. Had he not sold to Jr he would have just sold ot to someone else,  there were a few others who would have been interested. Had Snr sold to someone else then the course of wrestling would have been very different most likely, but that's for another thread. 

I dunno. A quick read of this section of his Wiki suggests otherwise. 

Quote

 

In 1968, McMahon graduated from East Carolina University^[21] with a business degree and after a nondescript career as a traveling salesman, he was eager to assume a managerial role in his father's World Wide Wrestling Federation promotion. In 1969, McMahon made his debut as a ring announcer for the WWWF's All-Star Wrestling.^[26] In 1971, he was assigned to a small territory in Maine, where he promoted his first card. He later became the play-by-play commentator for television matches after replacing Ray Morgan in 1971, a role he regularly maintained until November 1997.

In the 1970s, McMahon became a prominent force in his father's company and, over the next decade, assisted his father in tripling TV syndication.^[27] The younger McMahon was also behind the Muhammad Ali versus Antonio Inoki match of 1976.^[27] He pushed for the renaming of the company to the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) in 1979.

On February 21, 1980, McMahon officially founded Titan Sports and the company's headquarters were established in South Yarmouth, Massachusetts, using the now-defunct Cape Cod Coliseum as a home base for the company. McMahon then became chairman of the company and his wife, Linda, became the "co-chief executive".^[28][29] In 1982, Titan acquired control of the CWC from McMahon's ailing father (who died in May 1984) and his partners.

 

Essentially, it's an opportunity he wouldn't have had if his father hadn't given him a managerial role in the first place.

[air_raid]

I think we give Vince K a pass (in this regard only). Just like you can't say The Rock became what he did only because he was Rocky Johnson's kid, he didn't end up making the WWF what it became, just because his dad got him as far as selling him what it was. We're not plumbing the same depths as the Tamina and Erik Watts types of the world in terms of "fuck off did they deserve anything they got."

[Carbomb]

11 minutes ago, air_raid said:

I think we give Vince K a pass (in this regard only). Just like you can't say The Rock became what he did only because he was Rocky Johnson's kid, he didn't end up making the WWF what it became, just because his dad got him as far as selling him what it was. We're not plumbing the same depths as the Tamina and Erik Watts types of the world in terms of "fuck off did they deserve anything they got."

Oh, absolutely. It was more in address to LOTM's point about him not being a nepo baby at all. 

I don't think he's a nepo baby in the worst way as discussed about George Gulas or Erik Watts, but he would be in the same way as The Rock, Cody Rhodes, or Charlotte Flair.

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

I agree 100% BombCarCarCar that I would be wrong to say Vinny Mc was not a nepo baby but I think that raiders is close to the gist of what I meant. 

I have another question, where do we stand on Jeff Jarrett? Obviously he's not in the Gulas league but there is no way he starts as a 14 year old if his dad isn't Jerry. 

[hallicks]

Isn’t it widely accepted that Vince Jr’s purchase price for the WWF from his dad was ludicrously undervalued? Quite high levels of nepotism, there. 

[Matthew]

[Chili]

12 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:

I agree 100% BombCarCarCar that I would be wrong to say Vinny Mc was not a nepo baby but I think that raiders is close to the gist of what I meant. 

I have another question, where do we stand on Jeff Jarrett? Obviously he's not in the Gulas league but there is no way he starts as a 14 year old if his dad isn't Jerry. 

A lesser version of The Rock or Barry Windham etc. Had a famous dad, got them into the business but eventually he went off and did alright for himself elsewhere and had the actual in-ring talent to be the son of a famous wrestler without the lasting stigma of who his dad was to an extent.

Dustin Rhodes would be a different example, nepo'd in, became an absolute world class performer, but still for a long time with the cloud of his famous Daa.

For me, as I stated at the start, the worst Nepo baby for me would not be who got the most success, because that actually contributes to other positives generally for the business, The Rock made people a lot of money. George Gulas did not and killed an entire territory along with other people's jobs.

[wandshogun09]

I’m not familiar enough with George Gulas to say much but I’ve heard enough stories in shoot interviews and on podcasts to know just enough and @Chili’s post on page 1 sums it up. He’s probably the one, in my opinion.

But when I first saw the thread title, the name that immediately sprung to mind was Erik Watts. I would’ve only been 7 or 8 when his Daddy started inflicting him on me through Worldwide on ITV. I was too young to understand what a good ‘worker’ was but I knew enough even then to know Erik was the absolute shits. I didn’t know what exactly, but I knew something wasn’t quite right about how they were talking him up as some future top player. Thought his look was awful, even on a roster which was regularly featuring the saggy Nans tag team of Greg Valentine and Dick Slater at the time. And he was out there beating Bobby Eaton and getting to the finals of a TV tournament he probably shouldn’t have even been in. As said, there’s no way he gets pushed like that if his old man wasn’t in charge at the time. 

[Chili]

Given a lot of us are more familiar with national companies as opposed to territories and our age range, Erik Watts would be the popular go to choice. He's so painfully bad in that WCW run and you can almost sense and see that he doesn't feel he deserves it either, but imagine saying that or having to deal with his nightmare of a dad.

I'd excuse Mike Von Erich as well as he didn't have the talent of the three older brothers, but he was pressured and put into a real shit situation, again, it's mad Dads for you.

Edited January 10, 2025 by Chili

[wandshogun09]

Yeah to be fair to Erik, he was in a tough spot where he clearly wasn’t anywhere near ready but was probably desperate to please his old man. And even just aside from that, he probably felt like the opportunity was too good to pass up. Being so young and being pushed and put over the likes of Eaton and Hayes in your first few rookie months, then being scheduled to feud with Arn Anderson (resulting in that hilarious car park scuffle), he probably thought it was gonna last forever. Can’t blame him. Didn’t make it any less painful to watch though. To think they had a young Brad Armstrong on the books in 92/93 and they did little with him, he barely ever made it onto PPVs or Clashes back then. Yet Erik Watts was being given the hot prospect treatment every week on TV.