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R.I.P. VADER


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14 minutes ago, J.T. said:

The White Castle of Fear vignette was so cheesy it was fucking great.

It makes me smile to watch them again and see Vader walking around a cave wearing a noble cloak made of the fur of the polar bears he probably killed by himself with his own bare hands.

Of course, Leon is also part of the beach blast mini movie when cheatum blew up the boat. 

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Did anyone else have that moment when you first heard of a guy named Vader and you were like "Ugh, like Darth Vader, what a cheesy wrestling name to capitalize on the biggest villain of the 20th century"(but in like child words)?

But then you saw him and you were like "Oh shit that guy is way scarier than Darth Vader, this is the new Vader now."

Because that's how it happened for me.

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14 minutes ago, jaedmc said:

But then you saw him and you were like "Oh shit that guy is way scarier than Darth Vader, this is the new Vader now."

I remember Leon saying that he hated wearing the helmet sometimes because it was heavy and he could barely breathe in it, but he knew it would be part of his persona and it would help get him over big time when he would come out of the back and see Japanese children bursting into tears and running away shrieking from the guard rails at ringside as he made his entrance.

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I think Vader is the one wrestler who felt unbeatable to me as a kid.  In my heart of hearts I always thought the good guy was good enough to win no matter how big the odds were, but Vader felt different.  Vader was the one dude that I just didn't understand how the good guy was going to win.  I couldn't see how you could fight someone who was that big, that strong, that athletic, and that vicious all at the same time.  He was like a rhinoceros, I wouldn't even know where to start when trying to figure out how to to beat him.    

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10 minutes ago, J.T. said:

Heavenly Thunder by Chris Tsangarides was his best entrance theme.

There, I said it.

You mispelled "It's Vader Time" from NOAH

 

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2 hours ago, Smelly McUgly said:

Vader/Sting in the King of Cable match is one of my sharpest childhood wrestling memories and is still a great fucking match today.

Today was the first time I ever saw it, but it's great. It would not feel out of place on an NXT Takeover today.

 

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1 minute ago, RIPPA said:

Story on Vader's death is on front page of ESPN.com and actually made it to Pro Football Talk (since he had played for the Rams)

I am told by my old K-Line homies that it has also been announced in Japan on NHK.

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A couple of years ago, Vader was trying to get an autobiography going.  He was talking to my friend Scott Williams about doing one together.  For various reasons, it obviously never happened, which I think is a real shame.  I bet it would have been fantastic.

In talking to Scott about Vader, we both got the impression that Vader was insecure about his place in history, and sincerely didn't understand how great and important he truly was.  Getting in the WWE Hall of Fame was important to him, but I don't think he grasped the fact that he was quite probably the greatest super heavyweight wrestler of all time. (Andre being the only one that could conceivably rank higher.)

1 hour ago, Sublime said:

How could you not like watching him he was a monster but he was athletic, he looked unstoppable but still vulnerable at the right moments. 

This.  Perhaps Vader's greatest strength as a wrestler was knowing exactly how much to sell for his opponent in order to make them look credible, without hurting his own credibility as a monster.  His matches against Sting, Foley, and Dustin are all master classes in monster heel psychology. 

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1 minute ago, mattdangerously said:

A couple of years ago, Vader was trying to get an autobiography going.  He was talking to my friend Scott Williams about doing one together.  For various reasons, it obviously never happened, which I think is a real shame.  I bet it would have been fantastic.

In talking to Scott about Vader, we both got the impression that Vader was insecure about his place in history, and sincerely didn't understand how great and important he truly was.  Getting in the WWE Hall of Fame was important to him, but I don't think he grasped the fact that he was quite probably the greatest super heavyweight wrestler of all time. (Andre being the only one that could conceivably rank higher.)

This.  Perhaps Vader's greatest strength as a wrestler was knowing exactly how much to sell for his opponent in order to make them look credible, without hurting his own credibility as a monster.  His matches against Sting, Foley, and Dustin are all master classes in monster heel psychology. 

The match with Ray Traylor from (I think) a Clash of the Champions is so good because he alternates between throwing bombs and bumping like a maniac for Traylor.  I believe the story is that Traylor was afraid he was going to get cut by WCW so Vader decided to go out and make him look like a killer, even when he was llosing.  Such a great match.

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On ‎6‎/‎20‎/‎2018 at 11:10 AM, Pete said:

INOKI OUT! INOKI ABUNAI!

A riot broke out in Sumo Hall after Vader killed Inoki to death.

Pro wrestling was banned in Sumo Hall for two years after this match.

That's how hated and over that gimmick was. 

Since I was a African-American gaijin and have always had heat with Inoki for trying to make Muhammed Ali look like a buffon, Vader instantly became my hero when he suplexed the living dog shit out of Inoki. I loved the big guy.  I feel like I have lost a family member today.

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When I got into wrestling, it was pretty strictly WWF as that was all we got up here.  I saw a little bit of WCW here and there (my friend taped a Starrcade off of satellite) but I still favoured WWF.  One weekend we got a free preview of TBS and it happened to be the Vader-Cactus power bomb on the cement match and I was just transfixed: I knew it was fake because my parents told me it was but this was different.  This was real, I was sure of it.   I can still remember it and Vader was instantly the scariest wrestler I'd ever seen.  I kept hoping to see more of him but by the time we got WCW, he was on his way out.  I was so excited when he made it to WWF but it was rather lacklustre leading me to think I had overestimated him based on that one spot. 

Years later, on Smarkschoice, we had a Best of WCW poll so I ended up watching all these Vader matches I'd never had a chance to see when I was young and they were amazing: vs Foley, vs Sting, vs Flair, vs Rhodes and my favourite against Ray Traylor.  I love that match because it seems like Vader really wanted to make Traylor look good and he bumps all over and it's so nasty and stiff and sloppy and dangerous.  

God bless Big Van Vader.  

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19 minutes ago, mattdangerously said:

In talking to Scott about Vader, we both got the impression that Vader was insecure about his place in history, and sincerely didn't understand how great and important he truly was.  Getting in the WWE Hall of Fame was important to him, but I don't think he grasped the fact that he was quite probably the greatest super heavyweight wrestler of all time. (Andre being the only one that could conceivably rank higher.)

This is astounding. Vader won major titles on three continents, he got both, IWGP title and Triple Crown when those titles were prestigious and left lasting impressions everywhere. 1998 in WWF must have really killed his self-esteem. 

While I really enjoyed a lot of Vader and found him to be a very impressive performer, there's also the memory of him no showing dates during the fall of his career, under very dubious circumstances. 

Condolences to his family and friends. 

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Favourite Vader stories:

-Recruiting Mick Foley to drive him in the Cadillac he rented, drinking and singing along to the radio, potato chip crumbs in his chest hair.  

-I forget the details but post-WWE he was arrested after he was driving drunk.  When the cops came to arrest him, he said he was simply out getting night crawlers, scared the police dogs away by barking at them and tried to throw a boulder.  If the details are wrong, I don't wanna know because it's how I'll always remember him.  

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