Ricky Jackson Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 I love that they worked a fucking standing ovation. I'm just picturing Vince working everything in his life now. Linda: "You slept like a baby last night, Vince" Vince: "It was a work" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 I don't think Benoit was anywhere near as good as Bryan. This isn't a post-murder revisionist view for me either. I'm not going to play like I thought Benoit was a poor worker or anything insane like that, but one thing that always bothered me about him as a worker is that I never felt emotionally invested in any of his matches. On the one hand you could say that he had outstanding mechanics, was extremely versatile and did sell very well, but on the other end I don't think he was good at emoting in the ring. At all. What's strange is I felt the exact opposite sentiment, especially in relation to Brock Lesnar v. Chris Benoit. If I had to give a statement of essence to that match, it would be "One man's passion to become world champion." He was a wrestler's wrestler, and it's a powerful feeling to watch him between 2003 and 2004 in his struggle to become a world champion as even fans felt no one deserved it more. It's hilarious to see HHH, for example, try to connect with the audience in similar ways in failing each time. Benoit's style and persona commanded respect from the audience, which is why he got standing ovations. I know you're just expressing opinion, and I'm not claiming that you're wrong since your claim depends on your own experiences anyway, which is neither right nor wrong, but it's strange that your objection to Benoit's work would be based off of that given that the fans felt very much emotionally connected to him upon viewing an intense match of his, whether against Angle or Lesnar. What stood out most about Benoit's match against Lesnar was the amount of real emotional heat in that match in ways that no match in modern WWE can touch outside of a Wrestlemania main event like Cena v. Rock. The standing ovation after Benoit vs Angle at the 2003 Royal Rumble was worked. It was started by plants. I wasn't a plant. I was an asshole 21 year old. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Exposer Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 Chris Benoit vs. Kurt Angle - Royal Rumble 2003 The night the German suplex died. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kevin Ridge Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 I was at Royal Rumble 2003 and I'm not completely behind plants in the crowd starting that standing ovation but whatever. The crowd was totally hot for that match. Steiner/Triple H before did really suck big time though. Obviously with Benoit standing in the ring looking around at fans it will illicit a reaction from the crowd. Them keeping the camera on Benoit after match I can see but you need to actually have the fans care enough for him/match to get that big of a reaction after. I've mentioned it before but Shane McMahon was sitting a couple rows in front of me and was completely losing it during that match and enjoying the hell out of himself. If they had 15,000 plants in the crowd then you got me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 That's kind of what i was saying before. I know anecdotal evidence is frowned upon for good reason on the board, but I remember myself and a whole lot of other people around me jumping up at the end of that match. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 It doesn't mean that the plants were the only ones doing it. It just means it was their idea. And it was mentioned in response to the specific point of Benoit moving people to do standing ovations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Andrews Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 All this "plants starting the ovation" shit has been a rumour for years. I for one don't believe it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 Well that settles that then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 It doesn't mean that the plants were the only ones doing it. It just means it was their idea. And it was mentioned in response to the specific point of Benoit moving people to do standing ovations. All I can say is that I was up on my feet before any plant could have possibly been. And I was in the cheap seats. Boston is a smarky smarky town and it was probably a hell of a lot worse then. The guys who paid the money for the best seats were, in part, the smarkiest of the smark. They're the sort that'd be up on their feet before anyone else. I know I was at the time. That doesn't mean there weren't plants in there jumping up too, mind you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 You have ancedotal experience I don't want to discredit. I'm going off of what was reported at the time. I mainly brought it up because it's a huge asterisk in the point being made about Benoit's ability to emotionally connect with fans. I do agree that Benoit had periods of being very over. Interestingly enough, I always thought WCW crowds took to him way more than WWE crowds. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 I do think his music got a pop and the Crossface teases always got pops. In general, though, I just think Boston in 2003 is a bad example for a crowd that needed that sort of prompting. If he managed that in the middle of Iowa in 2006 I'd be more impressed. I'm not saying there weren't plants. I just think, having been there, that it may have happened anyway. If there were plants, that says more about how the company felt about things than actual reality, but ultimately, it's an important element to all of this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ButchReedMark Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 Interestingly enough, I always thought WCW crowds took to him way more than WWE crowds. I'd agree with that. He always seemed far more over with WCW crowds to me. Certainly as regards getting a reaction as a babyface. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Nell Santucci Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 Benoit's psychology was generally only as strong as his opponent's, but that seems impossible to dispute in retrospect. The matches tend to suggest the opposite. When I watched last years Mania Rock v Cena match I was struck by the degree to which Benoit had influenced the way Us heavyweight wrestling is put together these days. How so? I can't explain an observation. Just watch the ending of Lesnar v. Benoit. Maybe WWE did slick camera work, but he got a standing ovation and that the ovation came from Benoit's selling. Loss, I'm not disagreeing with what you've reported, but it's totally irrelevant. For starters, there is no way WWE had hundreds of plants in Boston, just to get Benoit over. Second, even if they did, obviously those hundreds of plants did not help out HHH at SummerSlam. Though there might have been a degree of a worked reaction, obviously there was something genuine enough about his work that would have led to Benoit getting a reaction. Surely one could tell the difference between that and piped in Goldberg chants later in his run or worse, WCW's applause signs at the Disney tapings. Though you're not wrong of reporting what was reported and that I have no reason to doubt there were some plants, there is no way that those plants could have led to the applause that Benoit got. Crowds don't think that way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rzombie1988 Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 I don't think Benoit was anywhere near as good as Bryan. This isn't a post-murder revisionist view for me either. I'm not going to play like I thought Benoit was a poor worker or anything insane like that, but one thing that always bothered me about him as a worker is that I never felt emotionally invested in any of his matches. On the one hand you could say that he had outstanding mechanics, was extremely versatile and did sell very well, but on the other end I don't think he was good at emoting in the ring. At all.Benoit was very good at showing emotion. As mentioned, he was good at showing his grit and toughness especially during selling. His WM 20 win gave me goosebumps live and was a great moment. Benoit always brought me into his matches and made them seem more realistic. Just because you didn't get into his matches, doesn't mean he was bad at getting fans into his work. I don't get into Davey Richards matches and there's always a bunch of people at ROH who are. Plants don't mean much. There couldn't have been 10 total. There were thousands of people cheering the Benoit/Angle match. There's multiple Cena Sucks chants everynight that never even make it on TV, and there's a lot more people doing it. As for Benoit vs Daniel Bryan, Daniel Bryan is probably more versatile as he can do comedy and make a goof of himself, which Benoit never would have done. Benoit was more believable, more realistic and he does have the better body of work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 Yeah, there's certainly a lot that can be said about Benoit's work, especially in WWE, but if there's someone who showed emotional attachment to his matches it's him. His sheer intensity was emotional, whether as a face when he would never quit or as a heel when he would beat up his opponent unmercifully. His post-match reactions also showed how much he cared about winning. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tigerpride Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 Interesting. This is the first I've heard of the standing ovation as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goc Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 I'm pretty skeptical about the standing ovation being started by plants. Simply because if it was that easy for them to do, I suspect they'd have done it again by now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 It was mentioned also that Shane was in the audience for this match. WWE has used Shane to start the crowd doing things before. Shane is the one who started the "You Sold Out" chants at Brock at WM XX. I am not making this up. This is all stuff that was reported in the WON at the time. I understand being skeptical of the accuracy of it. I just want to be clear that it's not something I made up, or that wasn't reported at the time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tigerpride Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 I question the Brock thing too. I was at WM XX and people were booing Brock like crazy during the videos leading up to the match. And the infamous serenade of Brock was the Goodbye song. People were all over him, no matter what Shane did. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eduardo Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 It was mentioned also that Shane was in the audience for this match. WWE has used Shane to start the crowd doing things before. Shane is the one who started the "You Sold Out" chants at Brock at WM XX. I am not making this up. This is all stuff that was reported in the WON at the time. I understand being skeptical of the accuracy of it. I just want to be clear that it's not something I made up, or that wasn't reported at the time. I read the WON at the time, but wasn't the story there that Shane went loudly along with the "You Sold Out" chants as opposed to him starting them? I honestly don't remember Meltzer crediting him with starting the chants at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rzombie1988 Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 It was mentioned also that Shane was in the audience for this match. WWE has used Shane to start the crowd doing things before. Shane is the one who started the "You Sold Out" chants at Brock at WM XX. I am not making this up. This is all stuff that was reported in the WON at the time. I understand being skeptical of the accuracy of it. I just want to be clear that it's not something I made up, or that wasn't reported at the time.I was at Wrestlemania XX and tons of people were chanting it. People were booing Brock and chanting stuff the whole night. A bunch of people were pissed(including myself) and reasonably so. It is silly to say "this person started it" because the whole crowd was on his case well before the match started. Maybe it's not the "official story" because Dave didn't say it, but it's the truth. I'm not likely to believe anyone who claims with 100% certainty that they started that mess that night because there were over 10,000 people chanting stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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