WON HoF Candidate Poll Thread

[Al]

Just about any kind of major success is due at least in part to dumb luck, both in wrestling and elsewhere. What if the MSG Incident never happened and Austin never got the micard push that was supposed to go to HHH? What if Shawn never lost his smile and Austin never had the submission match with Bret? What if there hadn't been a huge walk-up crowd the day of the first Wrestlemania and it had bombed as a result? What if Stephanie never discovered that John Cena could rap? Seriously, how far are we going to go with the what-if game? Are people going to push for David Von Erich and Magnum TA based on the careers they could have had?

I think there's a clear difference between interpreting a career a wrestler actually had and basing an argument over a career a wrestler never had.

[Mando]

Was listening to episode #26 of the Wrestling Culture podcast today on my commute that dealt with WO HoF discussion. A couple things I wanted to share.

 

On the topic of Gran Hamada: I'm lucky that my neighborhood indy fed is HWA (where Jon Moxley, Sami Callihan, Nigel McGuiness, Shark Boy, etc. started out) and as such I've had the opportunity to nerd out and discuss with a lot of the talent. Over a decade ago I was chatting with Chad Collyer who was selling homemade "Best of" tapes of his and when I inquired about his tours with Michinoku Pro he immediately and vehemently put over Hamada as the best worker he'd been in the ring with. He couldn't say enough about him and put him over huge.

 

Secondly, Dylan was saying how he felt wrestling magazines were the biggest under represented thing in the HoF. I totally agree that Apter deserves a spot and was also a fellow subscribe to PWI, The Wrestler, Inside Wrestling, and Wrestle America (that was Apter too, right?). It got me to thinking, and personally, I'd never vote for the guy, but would Rob Feinstein ever be considered ballot worthy? Not as a promoter etc. but for ushering in the tape trading/collecting boom which in its own way really cultivated and developed a lot of people's avid fandom. Just like I used to wait for my Apter mags I can recall my high school years during the late-'90's and a few of us at school trading RF Video catalogues and circling tape listings and filling out my little order form on the back page during study hall. There's no way to quantify his impact and it wasn't as widespread as Apter's by any stretch and its absurd to imagine him on the ballot when the JYD and Jimmy Hart's of the world aren't but would be curious to hear what others thought of it.

[Ditch]

RF didn't do anything like "ushering in the tape trading boom". Way too many people involved.

[FLIK]

but would Rob Feinstein ever be considered ballot worthy? Not as a promoter etc. but for

Nope & there is literally nothing you could put after "for" in that sentence that would make him ballot worthy.

 

for tape trading? Nope

for interviewing? Nope

for his legendary managerial runs as BWO member 7 & the "Fun Athletic Guy"? Nope

for attempted child molestation? Nope

for curing cancer? Nope

for bringing Eddie Guerrero back to life?......maybe....eh, Nope

 

No case for Rob Feinstein as a Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame member can possibly be made.

 

Heck, with all the stories of over the years ppl have told about poor quality tapes, some orders not being fulfilled & slow shipping on others that were , he's not even a great candidate for a Tape Trader hall of fame. The mans no Jeff Lynch

[jdw]

RF didn't do anything like "ushering in the tape trading boom". Way too many people involved.

This.

 

Also, on Apter, I'll saw what I said before:

 

Put in Stanley Weston & London Publishing.

 

That way Apter gets to go in as part of the group. As an individual, he doesn't deserve it and frankly it's an insult to Weston and the rest of the folks who did the majority of work on those mags.

 

John

[Moonsault Marvin]

I totally agree that Apter deserves a spot and was also a fellow subscribe to PWI, The Wrestler, Inside Wrestling, and Wrestle America (that was Apter too, right?).

Wrestle America was an Apter magazine, and it had been Sports Review Wrestling before they changed the name.

[FLIK]

I'm not trying to say it strengths his case. I just think if his failure to draw wasn't his fault then it shouldn't be held against him as black mark.

Yup, that's pretty much my stance as well.

 

For some reason, that's being interpreted as Sting being "blamed" for something.

He's been repeatedly labled a failure by ppl in this thread & elsewhear so I got the same impression.

[Dylan Waco]

How was he not a failure on top? If people want to say "well it wasn't all his fault" fine. But as the ace of the promotion he failed and it's silly to say "Sting gets no credit for poor business when he was the ace and all the credit for everything good he did."

 

I actually like Sting a good bit and a part of me wants to argue for him because there are very few wrestlers I saw more in person than Sting over the years. But I keep coming back to two things - the guy who was supposedly "better in the chase" didn't even draw well in that role, and the dark years of the company coincide almost exactly with the period when he was slingshotted to the top, to the period where he was overtaken in the top face role by Hogan.

[jdw]

I like Sting better than some people I helped put in the HOF. The case is the problem.

 

Hell, I liked Hase better than a lot of people in the HOF. But I argued *against* his inclusion, and think he got in because a bunch of voters were flat out wrong in their giving him credit for various things.

 

John

[Jason Mann]

Even if "failure to draw the vast majority of his career" isn't a negative for Sting and shouldn't be held against him because somehow it was completely and totally the promotion he worked for's fault, what exactly are the arguments for putting him?

 

He had a few great matches and lots of good ones, but I can't imagine anyone arguing for him getting in solely due to in-ring work. 1996-97 is a really interesting period for him and he deserves a good amount of credit for that, but does anyone seriously believe that was enough?

[Dylan Waco]

Don't look now, but we have people in the Sting thread on Classics comparing Sting to Ernie Banks....

[Ricky Jackson]

So not winning a pennant or World Series but being a great player and nice guy in baseball = Not drawing on top* and being an at times good but usually average and sometimes worse worker and nice guy in wrestling?

 

The Sting HoF debate and cockroaches are the only things that will survive a nuclear holocaust.

 

*yes I know, except for 97.

[ohtani's jacket]

How was he not a failure on top? If people want to say "well it wasn't all his fault" fine. But as the ace of the promotion he failed and it's silly to say "Sting gets no credit for poor business when he was the ace and all the credit for everything good he did."

Labeling Sting as a failure implies (to me, anyway) that he was responsible for that failure in some way. To date, no-one has explained what his failings were. KrisZ already ran through the booking and from the numbers it doesn't look like anyone could have done better than Sting in the period. So unless there's some overwhelming reason why Sting was poor in the ace role what is he being taken to task for? Because he wasn't a national draw on the level of Hogan? Sting on top may have been a failure, but how exactly did Sting fail in the role? And why does Hogan get credit for the NWO when he turned around and fucked the whole angle up, ultimately destroying the company? It was a hot angle that revitalised Hogan's flagging act and unlike Sting he didn't get the legs cut out from under him.

 

None of this is a reason for Sting being in the HOF, but I don't think it's as simple as Sting dropping the ball. I also think it's stupid how non-American candidates are elected into the Hall without half as much analysis of their drawing ability as Sting. There wasn't even a single argument about McManus for example.

[Dylan Waco]

McManus was elected from a voting pool that I would guess was drastically different than the pool that keeps Sting out.

 

No one is "taking Sting to task" because he wasn't a Hogan level draw. That might be the single biggest strawman I've seen on this board actually. People are merely pointing out that in the world that existed Sting was not a draw as an ace. Since this is impossible to dispute the Sting defense squad seems to fall back on "well it wasn't his fault." Well okay, maybe it wasn't. But it doesn't change reality and it's hardly applying an absurd degree of scrutiny to say "Sting wasn't a draw as an ace."

 

Does this alone mean Sting is not an HoFer? No. For example if he was a great drawing challenger over several years I could see a case for him. The problem is he wasn't. If he was an all time great worker, with the longevity he has as a guy on top you could make a case. But he wasn't. If he was hugely influential I could see a case for him. But he wasn't. In fact no one is even arguing any of these things. Instead the focus of the Sting discussion has basically been around two things:

 

1. How much credit he deserves for the Crow Sting run?

 

2. Whether or not it is fair to criticize him for the fact that his run as an ace did not draw well?

 

I am actually willing to give him more credit for the Crow Sting run than John or Loss. But I still don't think one year as the top babyface in the States (which is arguable in the eyes of some) - even during the period he was hot in - is enough to get in.

 

But what really gets me is that we have people arguing that it's wrong to criticize Sting or assign him any blame for the failings of WCW when he was on top and instead these people apparently want to argue that this is somehow a POSITIVE for his candidacy because "hey it could have been worse" or "well he was on top at least" or "it's part of the longevity argument we need to build a modicum of a case."

 

If people want to toss any discussion of Sting as ace out the window that's fine, but let's be fair about it. Drop the longevity/consecutive years on top argument, drop any talk about his best matches virtually all of which occurred during that period, drop complaints about booking and unfairness, et. Instead make the case based on 88-89 and 94-present. Does anyone really think such a framing would help his case?

[Childs]

In the realm of sports-related statements inspired by the HOF defense of Sting, I was actually more bothered by the dude who claimed Sidney Moncrief was once the third-best player in the NBA.

[Dylan Waco]

In the realm of sports-related statements inspired by the HOF defense of Sting, I was actually more bothered by the dude who claimed Sidney Moncrief was once the third-best player in the NBA.

I thought that was utterly insane also, glad I'm not alone

[ohtani's jacket]

I don't think Sting's 1990-93 period should be used as a positive or thrown out. I just think it should be properly assessed and weighed accordingly, because to me there's a big difference between a guy who bombs on top because he's a terrible promo and a bad worker and a guy who is handicap by injury, poor booking, a downturn in business and politics even if the end result is the same. Who were the top 10 draws in the US from 1990 to 1993 and how much more did they draw in comparison to Sting? If Hogan's drawing power was reduced during the period then how can Sting have been expected to be a big draw? It's all well and good to say he failed and that's that, but I don't see how he could have realistically overcome those obstacles and I can't think of anyone who drew under those sort of circumstances. But this is getting a bit redundant and he's not going in anyway so it hardly matters.

[NintendoLogic]

Was Moncrief ever even the third-best player in the Eastern Conference?

[ohtani's jacket]

You could make a case for Moncrief as one of the top three players in the East in '82-83.

[Dylan Waco]

I don't think Sting's 1990-93 period should be used as a positive or thrown out. I just think it should be properly assessed and weighed accordingly, because to me there's a big difference between a guy who bombs on top because he's a terrible promo and a bad worker and a guy who is handicap by injury, poor booking, a downturn in business and politics even if the end result is the same. Who were the top 10 draws in the US from 1990 to 1993 and how much more did they draw in comparison to Sting? If Hogan's drawing power was reduced during the period then how can Sting have been expected to be a big draw? It's all well and good to say he failed and that's that, but I don't see how he could have realistically overcome those obstacles and I can't think of anyone who drew under those sort of circumstances. But this is getting a bit redundant and he's not going in anyway so it hardly matters.

It's been redundant.

 

KrisZ wrote a very good post outlining the issues Sting had to deal with on top. I didn't address it directly because a. I mostly agree with it and b. it doesn't alter the reality of his poor run as an ace.

 

Sting was unfortunate enough to have come along during the dark ages of wrestling. One way of looking at that is "man that really sucks for the guy, he could have done so much more if things were different." There are other ways of looking at.

 

For example if someone was REALLY negative about Sting as a candidate they could argue that the "WCW was an incompetent disaster company run by fools" talking point applies to the decision to build the company around a totally unproven commodity like Sting in the first place and then stick with him after it was obvious things weren't working. They could point out that at a time when WCW was rapidly losing ground in their home region, SMW with a tiny, tiny sliver of their budget, no national tv and a much thinner talent roster was actually doing pretty well, expanding and at times drawing pretty comparably to WCW under Sting. Furthermore they could build on the "who were the top 10 draws in the US from 90-93" and point out that even in this admittedly low period for wrestling in the States there was no point where Sting was EVER the top draw in the United States.

 

Does a guy pushed as "the guy" by the most incompetent, shitty decision making company in history, who was less successful as ace of a company than 1993 Bob Armstrong and who couldn't even rise to the level of "top draw in the United States" during a period regularly referred to as the dark ages of wrestling really sound like a Hall of Famer?

 

Now THAT would be a negative narrative on Sting.

 

I actually think my take is fairly moderate. I think he's a better worker than a lot of his supporters do (as evidenced by the Classics thread where his biggest cheerleader called him "passable") and I tend to give him a decent amount of credit for the Crow Sting run. I don't think the longevity issues are completely irrelevant, but I don't see much value in them. I give him credit for the great series with Vader. I feel bad for his bad luck, but can't help but think it's not a coincidence that WCW's worst period coincides almost exactly with his run as company ace, nor do I think it's easy to explain away the fact that he wasn't even a top level challenger for Flair despite his push.

[Slasher]

Honestly I have given up on the thread for the most part. People are reducing themselves to flat out lying about Cena just to prop up Sting somehow.

[Dylan Waco]

Honestly I have given up on the thread for the most part. People are reducing themselves to flat out lying about Cena just to prop up Sting somehow.

I think the best was the guy who argued that Cena going in as the top star in wrestling for at least the last seven years was the equivalent of the top star in Continental in 83 going in.

[Slasher]

Yeah that comment got my head to figuratively explode. I obviously got a bit petty with my reply but yeah. Crazy stuff there. It just seems like these people don't want to recognize Cena because he has this certain stigma to him, like he's still this annoying white thug wannabe rapper/marine character and he's not cooler than the face painted surfer/movie character ripoff guy. I know I am probably underselling their issues with him but that's what I feel it all boils down to.

[sek69]

Feelings are hard to overcome, especially when dealing with a business like pro wrestling that exists just to manipulate said feelings.

 

A section of people believe truly that Sting is a Hall of Famer because he was the face of WCW for a generation of fans. The fact that his run as the top guy was not the best business wise or that the boom time came when others were clearly the top stars just won't sink in. I think Dave's mentions of how it's unlikely anyone from TNA will ever get in the HOF because the company does such little business applies to pre 1996 WCW as well. No one who's bulk of work is mainly in early 90s WCW is going to have a chance. Personally, I've always thought the biggest blow to Sting's career was his knee exploding in 1990 or thereabouts. You got the feeling the Horsemen turning on him was where he was going to get the proverbial rocket up the ass push. The injury scrapped all those, and the rebooking that had to be done in the aftermath really cooled him off when he came back. To me he never really seemed to fit the same way again. He was still Sting, he was still popular, but there never was any real sense he was going to be the clear #1 guy.

 

A similar emotional reaction seems to be surrounding John Cena. There are people who were against him in the HOF because it's too soon. I can at least see the logic in that, but does anyone really think if Cena gets hit by a bus tomorrow his current resume wouldn't be sufficient? What baffles me are the people who seem to legitimately believe he isn't a Hall of Fame level guy because he doesn't do Austin or Hogan numbers. I don't think it's fair to expect a guy working in a different era (and a different business model) to have to equal or surpass the two biggest draws in history to be seen as worthy. I get how the way he's booked more often than not is annoying as hell to anyone over 12 years old, but he's the only guy wrestling in the US (and possibly all of North America) who makes a difference when they are or aren't on a show. Any argument trying to suggest he isn't HOF material don't pass the laugh test.

[Childs]

You could make a case for Moncrief as one of the top three players in the East in '82-83.

Yeah, that was his peak year, and you could argue that between his offensive efficiency and his strong defense, he was a top-5 player in the league. But in addition to Bird and Magic on the rise, you had Moses Malone at the height of his powers, Kareem and Dr. J stil playing at an elite level, and a bunch of great scorers like Gervin, Dantley, Alex English and Bernard King. Then Isiah jumped up, and by 1984-85, you had Jordan. So if Moncrief had a window as a cream-of-the-crop star, it closed quickly.