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MAY 2019 WRESTLING TALK


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18 hours ago, JonnyLaw said:

This is pretty clearly a major issue. Take Baron Corbin. The guy’s a good talker, a natural heel, as shown during his Talking Smack appearances. However, he sucks at delivering the shitty scripts they give him and it’s killing him. 

One thing I realized earlier today is that we were all thinking that Dean Ambrose should have been the second coming of Austin, when Vince saw him more like the Rock: someone able to do/say goofy shit and remain an over badass.

Shield era Ambrose I saw as the evolution of Piper. His early work post Shield was also rather good in that Piper role.. but once he bece a main eventer his persona became a caricature. 

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11 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

I don't disagree with you, but the funny thing is: Austin was unquestionably the bigger star in wrestling. I mean, Rock was huge, but even when they turned Austin heel the audience still chose him over Rocky.

Yeah, that's kind of my point though.  Steve Austin was the perfect pro wrestler of the time.  There wasn't a person alive who was going to be bigger than him at that time.  As a pro wrestler, Steve Austin is better than The Rock in almost every way.  He was better in the ring, without a script he was better on the mic, and he had all the intangibles that filled in the blanks in between.  It's what he was born to do.

The Rock is just a hugely talented performer, who happened to be in a family where pro wrestling is where he landed.  He turned into a very good worker, but it took a while to get there.  Steve Austin was good within his first year in the business, he was a natural.  The Rock is someone who has the charisma to get subpar scripts from the WWE writers and turn them into something magical...but as we've seen in his more recent appearances, he doesn't have much of a natural feel of what an audience wants...he's just reciting lines.  Steve Austin adlibbed what is perhaps the most impactful promo of all time.  "You talk about your psalms and your John 3:16, but Austin 3:16 says I just whooped your ass," just came out of his mouth as he was trying to get some heat after beating Jake "The Snake" Roberts.  If the Rock's dad and grandfather were stage actors, The Rock would have been starring on Broadway.  If the Rock's family was in radio, he'd have a national talk show.  The Rock's abilities would work in any aspect of entertainment, but Steve Austin's were custom made for pro wrestling.  

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9 hours ago, CreativeControl said:

I'd just like you all to know that I was recently watching a Hansen v Kawada match on youtube and my missus walked in at the moment Stan performed a spiteful powerslam followed by a vicious boot to the back and she uttered the immortal words: "Wow, is this real?"

With Stan? 80/20 on yes with his vision.

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If Flair thinks he spoke to God while in a coma, someone needs to get him off whatever crazy pills he's taking because he'll be running for office soon enough at this rate.

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33 minutes ago, supremebve said:

Yeah, that's kind of my point though.  Steve Austin was the perfect pro wrestler of the time.  There wasn't a person alive who was going to be bigger than him at that time.  As a pro wrestler, Steve Austin is better than The Rock in almost every way.  He was better in the ring, without a script he was better on the mic, and he had all the intangibles that filled in the blanks in between.  It's what he was born to do.

The Rock is just a hugely talented performer, who happened to be in a family where pro wrestling is where he landed.  He turned into a very good worker, but it took a while to get there.  Steve Austin was good within his first year in the business, he was a natural.  The Rock is someone who has the charisma to get subpar scripts from the WWE writers and turn them into something magical...but as we've seen in his more recent appearances, he doesn't have much of a natural feel of what an audience wants...he's just reciting lines.  Steve Austin adlibbed what is perhaps the most impactful promo of all time.  "You talk about your psalms and your John 3:16, but Austin 3:16 says I just whooped your ass," just came out of his mouth as he was trying to get some heat after beating Jake "The Snake" Roberts.  If the Rock's dad and grandfather were stage actors, The Rock would have been starring on Broadway.  If the Rock's family was in radio, he'd have a national talk show.  The Rock's abilities would work in any aspect of entertainment, but Steve Austin's were custom made for pro wrestling.  

I don't know if I totally buy this argument, but man, it's a very well-made one.

My big issue with the argument is that The Rock was not completely scripted in, say, 1997, and he was fantastic off-the-cuff, so I don't know if there's enough evidence there that he doesn't have much of a natural feel of what the audience wants. He did just fine for himself from late 1997 on. 

And that Hollywood Rock era is basically evidence that he can get a crowd to do whatever he wants it to do because he got guys like the Hurricane and Booker T over so naturally that I would point to that as evidence that he understands pro wrestling exceptionally well. 

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6 hours ago, joseph2112 said:

Funny thing about the Moxley interview though. He never once complained about his spot, his push or his money or winning a belt or his wresltemania placement or any of that. He basically said "I wanted to make the company more money by being entertaining but they wouldn't let me, err, actively got in my way of doing that".

Well, honestly that ties into the "WWE is a TV show" (and inadvertantly, the "it's bad TV" as well.) If Moxley complained about his spot, his push, winning belts, Mania placements, it would be like "...dude. The Shield are undeniably three of the most defining wrestlers of the 2010s. You were a superstar from the moment you debuted, were pushed superhard, and got everything."

Saying "My spot was good, but I think I could have done it better and WWE wouldn't let me be as good as I knew I could be, and now I want a chance to be as good as I know I could be" is something that...well, no one can blame him for (because a lot of the stuff Ambrose did was very stupid), but it's still a case where if it's a TV show, you can see that it had to come to a head.

3 hours ago, LoneWolf&Subs said:

Was Jake Roberts into snakes before wrestling? 

Unfortunately, I can deny this one. 

My writing partner bubbles around the horror convention scene to support his reptile dealership. At one point he offered Jake Roberts the chance to hold one of his snakes for a picture. Roberts declined due to disliking them. When my partner asked on this, he said "greatest gimmick of all time."

Somehow, that feels almost...appropriate.

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See what I was saying in t'other thread about slow mo bump taking in HD? All over this video.

They forgot to add sound to some of it though.

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56 minutes ago, Smelly McUgly said:

I don't know if I totally buy this argument, but man, it's a very well-made one.

My big issue with the argument is that The Rock was not completely scripted in, say, 1997, and he was fantastic off-the-cuff, so I don't know if there's enough evidence there that he doesn't have much of a natural feel of what the audience wants. He did just fine for himself from late 1997 on. 

And that Hollywood Rock era is basically evidence that he can get a crowd to do whatever he wants it to do because he got guys like the Hurricane and Booker T over so naturally that I would point to that as evidence that he understands pro wrestling exceptionally well. 

Rock is also probably the #1 case as to why you at least need to run your promo by someone for approval He completely killed Billy Gunn when they were trying to push him as a singles star (for like the third time).

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38 minutes ago, Smelly McUgly said:

I don't know if I totally buy this argument, but man, it's a very well-made one.

My big issue with the argument is that The Rock was not completely scripted in, say, 1997, and he was fantastic off-the-cuff, so I don't know if there's enough evidence there that he doesn't have much of a natural feel of what the audience wants. He did just fine for himself from late 1997 on. 

 And that Hollywood Rock era is basically evidence that he can get a crowd to do whatever he wants it to do because he got guys like the Hurricane and Booker T over so naturally that I would point to that as evidence that he understands pro wrestling exceptionally well. 

I can't totally disagree with your counter.  The Rock was a phenomenal professional wrestler, but mostly because he'd be phenomenal at any performing art.  Here's the thing.  When he came in as Rocky Miavia, he wasn't very good, but that was such a generic character he couldn't really do anything with it.  Once he was able to find create a character, craft it, and perfect it, he was as good as anyone has ever been.  There are a lot of really good promos, matches, and moments, but shouldn't we expect that from an actor of his caliber?  That's kind of where I was trying to go with it.  Steve Austin isn't a good actor, he's perfectly fine playing a henchman or something in a big dumb action movie, but he's never going to really carry a film.  The Rock is a leading man who has been the most profitable star at the box office over a couple of years.  Basically I'm saying if you took Austin and put him in some other industry he's probably not very successful.  He's not that versatile of a performer.  The Rock has the kind of talent that makes him a incredibly successful box office draw, and when that talent was put into the wrestling business he became an all-time great.  Austin's talent was tailor-made for the wrestling industry.  Steve Austin is like Mike Trout, that dude was born to play baseball at an elite level...I'm not sure he could be that great at anything else.  The Rock was like Deion Sanders*, way too talented to fail, but was ultimately better suited for something else.  

*The Rock is way better at wrestling than Deion Sanders was at baseball, but you get the point.

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Jake got banned from owning Snakes in England because he was prosecuted for animal neglect and found guilty. That was before he got clean though.

20 minutes ago, Casey said:

I mean, there's an AEW thread.

Yeah, but I put it here because it's got DoN clips that everyone who didn't watch the PPV wouldn't have seen.

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11 hours ago, SorceressKnight said:

There's probably a good reason for that- once you realize WWE is a television show, it can become incredibly depressing to realize.

Even with those successes, ultimately there is usually that one point in time where the serious wrestlers eventually learn the harsh truth: You can be the best wrestler in the company. You can be the hardest worker in the company. Sometimes, you can even be the most popular worker in the company. But at the end of the day...it's a television show, and no matter how hard you work or how badly you want it, some people just don't GET to be the star.

 

1 hour ago, SorceressKnight said:

Saying "My spot was good, but I think I could have done it better and WWE wouldn't let me be as good as I knew I could be, and now I want a chance to be as good as I know I could be" is something that...well, no one can blame him for (because a lot of the stuff Ambrose did was very stupid), but it's still a case where if it's a TV show, you can see that it had to come to a head.

 

You're moving the goalposts here. People quit TV, Broadway shows, Movies, radio and probably every other form of entertainment because of creative differences. Dean quit because he is a creative person that was being stifled in a passive/aggressive workplace.

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4 minutes ago, West Newbury Bad Boy said:

Wow, I may need to tune in to Raw this week! This is huge!

 

So Brock’s wrestling this Monday? I guess this is their answer to their shitty post AEW show. It also seems like they once again did a reverse on their creative. The story leading into this episode was Brock was going to be punished.

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3 minutes ago, mattdangerously said:

The Rock clowned on everyone, and most of them ended up doing fine. If Gunn couldn't overcome one promo, then maybe it's because he was never going to be a singles star. There's no shame in being a Stan Lane.

Billy Gunn was never going to be a singles star.  He was not very good in the ring, not a good promo, and has nothing about him that says he could be a star.  I'm never looked at Billy gun and thought, he needed a bigger push.  He's a good tag team guy, but he probably wouldn't get to Intercontinental level in my personal promotion (Shout out to Stugotz).

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8 minutes ago, supremebve said:

Billy Gunn was never going to be a singles star.  He was not very good in the ring, not a good promo, and has nothing about him that says he could be a star.  I'm never looked at Billy gun and thought, he needed a bigger push.  He's a good tag team guy, but he probably wouldn't get to Intercontinental level in my personal promotion (Shout out to Stugotz).

He'd be a five time world champion if he came along in 2013 instead of 1993 though.

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