Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 23 Paid Members Posted February 23 (edited) Ah fair enough then. Haven’t read the book in donkeys years, I only remembered him having a pop. Still, there was a time when wrestlers from that 90s era fairly regularly seemed to take shots at Mero in shoot interviews and stuff and it always felt like sour grapes to me. Probably mostly the guaranteed contract thing from 96 and maybe he also had a bit of heat because he went on a few shows after the Benoit murders and had the audacity to not suck WWE dick. You know guys trying to keep on Vince’s good side because they were hoping for ‘one last run’ or an agent job weren’t gonna take kindly to that. Edited February 23 by wandshogun09 Quote
Chili Posted February 23 Posted February 23 Something that never happened but was briefly mooted was actually putting Austin & Sable on screen together in some form because they were both bringing in the viewers, but I reckon that was absolutely an idea from Russo that McMahon considered for probably about a day or two because they were completely drunk on Sable in early 1998. I also never really got where they were going with the the Vince reinstating Sable in June 1998 deal. I'm assuming it was to just keep her on TV, but in retrospect it was also probably Vince being a fucking weirdo letch. Quote
Members SuperBacon Posted February 23 Author Members Posted February 23 1 hour ago, gmoney said: I also thought Mero was excellent as Johnny B Badd, but a lot of the magic was gone with the gimmick change, and post injury return he was finished. Yeah brilliant stuff, watching back. He would've been huge as that character in the new gen era of WWE, but he was just lost as the wildman, and then his boxer gimmick was a bit confusing and didn't fit, perhaps as it was maybe a year or so too early, and would've fitted further into the attitude era. I always liked Mero. Quote
BarryOVega Posted February 23 Posted February 23 15 minutes ago, Chili said: Something that never happened but was briefly mooted was actually putting Austin & Sable on screen together in some form because they were both bringing in the viewers, but I reckon that was absolutely an idea from Russo that McMahon considered for probably about a day or two because they were completely drunk on Sable in early 1998. I also never really got where they were going with the the Vince reinstating Sable in June 1998 deal. I'm assuming it was to just keep her on TV, but in retrospect it was also probably Vince being a fucking weirdo letch. I remember Prichard mentioning something about that on STWW years ago, think they did something after a show had finished to see how the crowd reacted to, in his words, ‘the most popular man and the most popular woman’ Probably never went any further because where do you go with it? Austin coming out to save her from some heel and drinking a can with her is all I can think of, don’t think any fan in ‘98 would’ve been into Austin being in a romance storyline and as much as they liked pushing the envelope, him giving her one might’ve been going slightly too far Quote
Paid Members Devon Malcolm Posted February 23 Paid Members Posted February 23 Putting Austin with Sable is the sort of fuckbrained thinking that only Vince Russo could come up with. Stone Dead Steve Austin. Quote
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 23 Paid Members Posted February 23 (edited) 18 minutes ago, BarryOVega said: I remember Prichard mentioning something about that on STWW years ago, think they did something after a show had finished to see how the crowd reacted to, in his words, ‘the most popular man and the most popular woman’ They definitely interacted a few times on TV. This was probably the first time… And then in 98 there was this segment on Raw, which is the closest they came to teasing something… Never went anywhere though obviously. And thank fuck. Last thing Austin needed in 98 was a valet. Edited February 23 by wandshogun09 Quote
Paid Members tiger_rick Posted February 24 Paid Members Posted February 24 12 hours ago, SuperBacon said: Yeah brilliant stuff, watching back. He would've been huge as that character in the new gen era of WWE, but he was just lost as the wildman, and then his boxer gimmick was a bit confusing and didn't fit, perhaps as it was maybe a year or so too early, and would've fitted further into the attitude era. I always liked Mero. I wonder if he'd come in as the flamboyant, camp character he was in WCW if it's not too close to Goldust territory? Obviously there was a copyright issue anyway but they could have easily had him lean in to JBB more as the Wildman but I think they've probably already got something similar going on. I liked Mero too. He was one of the guys who just appeared in the longest period I ever had without being able to find WWF and when I got back in near the end of 1996 guys like him and Ahmed made the product feel completely different. Enjoyed him while catching up with the PPVs and those brilliant Best Of Raw tapes they did. I'd love to find them again. Quote
Paid Members BomberPat Posted February 24 Paid Members Posted February 24 I don't know how true it is given that he was trained by the Malenkos, but the story I always heard was that Vince loved what he saw of the Johnny B. Badd gimmick, and when Mero turned up to work they'd found that he'd basically been taught how to work that gimmick and to work the specific tightly scripted matches he was given, but had nothing in the way of fundamentals or instincts, so without the gimmick they basically had to start from scratch. That could just be the usual "he doesn't work the WWE style" griping, though it does bear similarity to DDP coming in and getting buried because he expected to be able to script his matches - ironic, these days, when everything I see from WWE's own developmental brand is shit falling apart the moment anything breaks from the script. Given he was on a big money guaranteed deal, I imagine almost every complaint and criticism of the time was coming from grumpy wrestlers on less money feeding their gripes to Meltzer anyway. There's a moment on Steve Austin's podcast talking about Shawn Michaels, where Steve said that now he would say Shawn is one of the greatest of all time, but in '97 when they were both fighting for the same spot, he'd tell anyone who would listen that he was a spot monkey who couldn't tell stories. Quote
Paid Members Supremo Posted February 24 Paid Members Posted February 24 Terry Funk selling an already dangerous unprotected chair shot by diving head first into the concrete floor. A very different time. Quote
Chili Posted February 24 Posted February 24 1 hour ago, Supremo said: Terry Funk selling an already dangerous unprotected chair shot by diving head first into the concrete floor. A very different time. I wish seeing I could see Triple H and not take the piss out of him, but this reminded me that he didn't really rate Terry Funk much. You just can't help some people. Quote
Paid Members Devon Malcolm Posted February 25 Paid Members Posted February 25 Fair play to Mr. Ass for trying to stop Terry from falling on his head but the daft bastard's mind was already made up. Quote
Paid Members BomberPat Posted February 25 Paid Members Posted February 25 11 hours ago, Chili said: I wish seeing I could see Triple H and not take the piss out of him, but this reminded me that he didn't really rate Terry Funk much. You just can't help some people. I laughed out loud at the bit in Moxley's book where he said Triple H told him that he wouldn't want to "end up like Terry Funk" - what, financially comfortable, happily married for 50 years, with the near universal respect of his peers? Quote
Paid Members LaGoosh Posted February 25 Paid Members Posted February 25 (edited) 2 hours ago, BomberPat said: I laughed out loud at the bit in Moxley's book where he said Triple H told him that he wouldn't want to "end up like Terry Funk" - what, financially comfortable, happily married for 50 years, with the near universal respect of his peers? I think the exact response in the book from Mox was "Terry Funk rules, bitch!". I enjoy the casual shade Mox throws Triple H's way every now and then. It's clear he doesn't think much of him at all. Edited February 25 by LaGoosh Quote
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 25 Paid Members Posted February 25 Terra Ryzing didn’t rate Terry Funk? What a gonk. Fancies himself as some big time ‘student of the game’ and lover of wrestling history and has a dogshit opinion like that about one of the best to ever do it? Remember when he tried to rip off Harley Race with the handlebar ‘tache and instead of looking like a double hard sod like Harley he just looked like a sex pest? Quote
The Gaffer Posted February 25 Posted February 25 Didn't he cool on Foley once Flair got in his head too? Not that I don't put it all squarely on Triple H but I imagine there was a lot of car rides during that period where Triple H thought he was becoming Ric Flair and carrying the torch for 'proper wrestling' where Flair was seven sheets to the wind, talking about how he made all these guys, and Triple H was there as perfect fanboy foil to go "You know what 'Naitch, you're right." Quote
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