October 2024 Wrestling Discussion

[KriskitaKoloff]

Seth Rollins is completely unwatchable to me. SHIELD did a good job of covering up some of his weaknesses, on his own he is a channel changer. 

[Cobra Commander]

update from the Undertaker video... he hadn't figured out his hand placement for the Tombstone in July 1991 when he was dropping the Warrior with an awkward looking split grip

[odessasteps]

No wonder he believed Hogan when Hulk claimed he got injured from that tombstone. 

[Elsalvajeloco]

5 minutes ago, odessasteps said:

No wonder he believed Hogan when Hulk claimed he got injured from that tombstone. 

I think he believed Hogan because Koko freaked out on him the prior year. After that, he went out of his way to make sure he didn't hurt folks. 

It's funny cause IIRC Brian Adams freaked out on Kane for doing the same thing right when he started the Kane character. Knowing that Owen almost crippled Austin a couple months prior, I dunno if folks are going to cry for you cause someone put you in slight discomfort. Brian Adams was so hurt that he was magically on WCW TV three or four months later. 

[just drew]

23 hours ago, Technico Support said:

I imagine they want to create two indy scenes, a "haves and have nots" situation, where the bulk of the most talented wrestlers are eventually WWE-affiliated, thus choking off the pipeline to AEW, super indies like GCW, and other higher-up promotions.  This company has shown us who they are for four decades and it's only going to get worse now that they're backed my a multibillion dollar corporation.  But that's just me.

This was my thought, too. It's the biggest reason yet why AEW needs it's own developmental system of some kind. I'd like to think that most indy wrestlers are too smart to fall for what amounts to signing your future away, but I have twitter, so I know that isn't true.

[FourPostMassacre]

17 hours ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Old western mortician Undertaker was the best Undertaker is a hill I'm willing to die on.

Character wise I can agree. The presentation, peak Paul Bearer and most importantly no mic work.
 

Now the awful in-ring no selling slow motion matches…I feel like they have on a permanent loop in hell waiting for me. 

[Matt D]

Do we know if JBL is still under WWE contract? I half wonder if he’s not secretly scouting for them.

[Technico Support]

3 hours ago, just drew said:

This was my thought, too. It's the biggest reason yet why AEW needs it's own developmental system of some kind. I'd like to think that most indy wrestlers are too smart to fall for what amounts to signing your future away, but I have twitter, so I know that isn't true.

Hope springs eternal and people love to listen to cautionary tales and then say, "yeah but that won't happen to me!"

[BobbyWhioux]

19 hours ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Old western mortician Undertaker was the best Undertaker is a hill I'm willing to die on.

On paper, "zombie wrestler" is fucking stupid.  But he made it work because he 100% committed to actually moving like the monster in a horror movie.  Now unfortunately this also means a lot of choke spots and claw hold spots which isn't so fun from a match watching standpoint.  But slow stalking, sitting up like Dracula, even those early bits where the urn was like his phylactry.

There's a lot to be said for a guy genuinely having unique body language in the ring.

This era also has the simplest variant of his theme before all the overindulgence that came with his subsequent makeovers.

 

[BobbyWhioux]

1 minute ago, Technico Support said:

Hope springs eternal and people love to listen to cautionary tales and then say, "yeah but that won't happen to me!"

Con is short for confidence.

But it's not, as most might think, the scammer's confidence he can trick the mark.  It's the mark's confidence that he's the main character and can beat the scam anyway.

 

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

12 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

I think he believed Hogan because Koko freaked out on him the prior year. After that, he went out of his way to make sure he didn't hurt folks.

Was it the tombstone during his debut that Koko freaked out over? Because I mean... yeah. Valid. That was one of the nastier ones.

[J.H.]

I love that someone on this board used the word "phylactry" and no one blinks!

20+ years and this my favorite place on the internet!

James

[BobbyWhioux]

Undertaker pledging his allegiance to the patriotic team at Survivor Series with an out-of-date US flag is the best inside joke they ever did about him being "undead"

[It was still the wrong flag, because Undertaker's "life" as an Old West Mortician puts him at least 100 years after the Betsy Ross flag, but you gotta play to the back row and a 38 star 1880s just isn't gonna do that. So I still give them full marks for this one.]

[Elsalvajeloco]

44 minutes ago, Stefanie Sparkleface said:

Was it the tombstone during his debut that Koko freaked out over? Because I mean... yeah. Valid. That was one of the nastier ones.

Yep, one and the same.

I do love that I saw on X a few months back that only guys 7 feet tall (even though that's a worked height to begin with) should be doing tombstone piledrivers.

1. That's literally erasure of folks below six feet tall who absolutely mastered the move before Taker ever did it.

2. They clearly don't remember when he was doing it like a modified shoulderbreaker.

[Nice Guy Eddie]

47 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

Yep, one and the same.

I do love that I saw on X a few months back that only guys 7 feet tall (even though that's a worked height to begin with) should be doing tombstone piledrivers.

1. That's literally erasure of folks below six feet tall who absolutely mastered the move before Taker ever did it.

2. They clearly don't remember when he was doing it like a modified shoulderbreaker.

The two that stick out in my mind doing the tombstone before Taker are Don Muraco and Dynamite Kid. 

[Elsalvajeloco]

Off the top of my mind, there are a couple matches* with Jaguar Yokota where there are tombstone reversals that are utterly spectacular in execution. They couldn't have been done any better. Jaguar is like 5'2"-5'3". 

*whichever one with Devil Masami where the arena clearly has no A/C cause their sweating profusely 5 minutes in and the August 85 match with Lioness Asuka

[Cobra Commander]

just realized that the Undertaker/Hogan and Hogan/Giant PPV matches both took place in the same building

(and Hogan also lost the tag team titles in the Joe Louis Arena, so he lost 3 titles in the same building during his career)

[Ziggy]

1 hour ago, BobbyWhioux said:

 

There's a lot to be said for a guy genuinely having unique body language in the ring.

This era also has the simplest variant of his theme before all the overindulgence that came with his subsequent makeovers.

 

The first few months of squash matches was dope to watch him experiment with moves he was doing a Mean Mark. 

If he was working with Lawler at that time, he could be virtually immobile and green and Lawler would be able to still get that gimmick over.

That gimmick early on probably added years to his career since he didn't really start caring about workrate till 7 or years into that gimmick. 

Weren't his Knees and hips bad before starting that gimmick?

[Elsalvajeloco]

I think he hurt his hip during his WCW run. That along with Herd not seeing him being able to draw money is the reason why he landed in WWF.

 

[Brandon-E]

How bad do you think Mr. Kennedy/Anderson was as a worker?

[BobbyWhioux]

1 hour ago, Cobra Commander said:

just realized that the Undertaker/Hogan and Hogan/Giant PPV matches both took place in the same building

(and Hogan also lost the tag team titles in the Joe Louis Arena, so he lost 3 titles in the same building during his career)

Never should’ve torn The Joe down. It was a lucky building

[Cobra Commander]

1 hour ago, Ziggy said:

The first few months of squash matches was dope to watch him experiment with moves he was doing a Mean Mark. 

If he was working with Lawler at that time, he could be virtually immobile and green and Lawler would be able to still get that gimmick over.

and Undertaker worked 20+ matches with Lawler in 1989 when he was still really inexperienced

and his two matches between NWA and WWF in 1990 were against Bill Dundee and Jerry Lawler on the same night in October 1990

[odessasteps]

I always thought they gave him the Taker gimmick because of how little Mean Mark sold in WCW. 

[tbarrie]

5 hours ago, J.H. said:

I love that someone on this board used the word "phylactry" and no one blinks!

Will I ruin it if I point out that it's spelled "phylactery"?

[SovietShooter]

12 hours ago, just drew said:

I'd like to think that most indy wrestlers are too smart to fall for what amounts to signing your future away, but I have twitter, so I know that isn't true.

From my experience, most Indy wrestlers think they are ready to work the main event of WrestleMania after 4-5 matches in an armory in front of 18 paid fans. On top of that, there were plenty of talented guys I knew that had dreams of being WWE stars, but had no interest in travelling. So I can see plenty of idiots being taken advantage of, and selling their soul to get that WWEID. And, most of them will be "body guys"... your Amazing Red and Shane Taylor types ain't getting these deals.