Yo-Yo's Roomie Posted July 12, 2013 Report Share Posted July 12, 2013 Add me to the Cherry fan club. Adam Bomb too, for that matter. I'm the guy that started a Maxx Payne thread here, so I guess that's my best answer to this question. I like Hercules a lot too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jimmy Redman Posted July 12, 2013 Report Share Posted July 12, 2013 In 2004 I really liked Mark Jindrak. I'm not sure why. I also tolerate Khali and have an inexplicable love of the Khali Chop of Doom. I could watch him hit that on dudes all day long. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted July 12, 2013 Report Share Posted July 12, 2013 Everyone I liked was awesome. :/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smack2k Posted July 12, 2013 Author Report Share Posted July 12, 2013 In 2004 I really liked Mark Jindrak. I'm not sure why. I also tolerate Khali and have an inexplicable love of the Khali Chop of Doom. I could watch him hit that on dudes all day long. His chop and tree slam were sold like a KILLER that year and honestly I was into it to. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpchicago23 Posted July 14, 2013 Report Share Posted July 14, 2013 Another one of mine is Mongo and I make no apologies for it. I'm a life long Bears fan so maybe that skewed my judgement but I don't care. He was very charismatic too so that helps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted July 15, 2013 Report Share Posted July 15, 2013 Another guy for me was Mortis. I would lose my shit when Mortis was on my tv in 96/97. That reminds me that I thought Wrath and Glacier was the best ever! Well not really, but I did really like their stuff in 97. That is until Ernest Miller debuted. I liked Ernest Miller. In fact, I made sure to include the Wrath / Mortis vs. Glacier / Miller tag from PPV in 1997 on the 1997 yearbook. Even though he wasn't a good wrestler, I thought he was a really fun character in the last couple of years. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted July 15, 2013 Report Share Posted July 15, 2013 Hack Myers is the man Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpchicago23 Posted July 15, 2013 Report Share Posted July 15, 2013 Another guy for me was Mortis. I would lose my shit when Mortis was on my tv in 96/97. That reminds me that I thought Wrath and Glacier was the best ever! Well not really, but I did really like their stuff in 97. That is until Ernest Miller debuted. I liked Ernest Miller. In fact, I made sure to include the Wrath / Mortis vs. Glacier / Miller tag from PPV in 1997 on the 1997 yearbook. Even though he wasn't a good wrestler, I thought he was a really fun character in the last couple of years. Ernest Miller was a great character. I'm glad you added that match Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grimmas Posted July 15, 2013 Report Share Posted July 15, 2013 I had a soft spot for Adam Bomb too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smack2k Posted July 15, 2013 Author Report Share Posted July 15, 2013 Another one I was a big fan of was The Alaskans in the AWA (the Rick Renslow & Dave Wagner version)...liked their snow man look with the huge red coats and big hats when they came to the ring as well as the bearded outdoorsman look they had in the ring. Nothing special about them in ring, but was a fan when I saw them...they put a lot of work into being basically a jobber tag team that didnt get many wins...unless they were featured somewhere else in a prominent role? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
S.L.L. Posted July 15, 2013 Report Share Posted July 15, 2013 Wow, speaking of which, Cherry. When she started having matches she was my favourite wrestler in the world. Then they quickly shelved her after like a month and I was devastated. Yeah, I am totally on board with the Cherry love here. I wrote this review of her match with Natalya back when it happened: I had certain expectations about Cherry. For the five seconds that I was doing Smackdown workrate reports before I could no longer resist fast forwarding through Batista and Edge interviews, I was keeping track of the neat little positives that were going on in the Diva contests. One of those things was Cherry's character development. Cherry as shy, 50's-style teen angel getting bullied by the heels and encouraged by the faces was entertaining backstage filler. When the obvious payoff of Michelle winning, Palumbo riding down to the ring, smashing shit up, and Noble trying to avenge her didn't happen, it undid any good the contests might have done except Cherry's character development. You could've worked Cherry into the Palumbo/Noble/McCool absence-of-love triangle. You could've had Deuce and Domino feud with Palumbo over being in a rival biker gang, and Cherry is torn between her men and her new friend Michelle, but then the Deuce and Domino conflict is with Palumbo, there's no conflict inherent with Noble and McCool. You could do a three-way feud, but then you need to get tag partners for Palumbo and Noble. Or you turn Deuce and Domino face, and you have to get two partners for Palumbo. It's doable, but it's not as easy. Doesn't flow as well. Using the Diva contests as a launchpad for Natalya actually gives Cherry something to do. Doesn't make it the right booking move, but it is a good way of making the most of a bad booking situation. So now she's a wrestler. Her character work made for entertaining backstage filler, but no reason to expect it would translate to anything in ring. And well, it's not like she's going to make you forget Jaguar Yokota, but she did exactly the right things she needed to do for her role in her match in her angle. True, "terrified non-wrestler who has no idea what she's doing" isn't exactly a performance choice that will earn you a lot of snowflakes, but it's exactly what she needed to do, and she was pitch perfect at it. I think aside from the Batista and Edge interviews, the main reason I stopped writing Smackdown workrate reports is because I didn't want to have to write "I really liked it when Cherry got beat up so much that she started crying", for fear that I would wake up the next day and find out I'd become Tiger Driver '91. The fact that I've already written this much about a six-minute Diva match (and I haven't even started talking about the match yet!) makes me feel like I'm half-way there. But she did what she needed to do perfectly, and it made for an entertaining Victoria match, which doesn't come by too often. I had certain expectations about Natalya. I had never seen her wrestle before, so I didn't really have a good reason to have expectations about her, but I had them anyway. It's guilt by association, really. She's palling around with Victoria. Victoria is the worst actress in the WWE. Think of the ground that covers. And well, the interview Natalya gave the week before this suggests she's right down there with her in that regard. She's also someone they were hesitant about bringing up because they feared she was too similar to Beth Phoenix. Those who read my Raw workrate reports during the five seconds back when I was doing that might remember I didn't care much for Beth. I don't feel so badly about her now, but at the time, this was a monster heel who had less credible offense than Torrie Wilson but with all of her physical awkwardness. So Natalya is kinda presented to me as a not-quite-ready-for-prime-time Beth Phoenix knockoff. On top of all of that, her dad is Jim Neidhart. My most recent exposure to the man was him teaming with Butch Reed in that awesome cage match against Mr. Wrestling II and Magnum TA from '82, so I'm not feeling too badly about the man in general. At the same time, I remember all the post-Hart Foundation Neidhart that was not nearly as awesome. So I had never seen Natalya before, but the names she was associated with were Victoria, Beth Phoenix, and Jim Neidhart. Not something that makes me get my hopes up. So Cherry I have minor good expectations for, and Natalya I have minor bad expectations for. Mild expectations that cancel each other out to create, effectively, no expectations. And well, this isn't exactly a MOTYC, but it was one of the better Diva matches in recent memory, and actually leaves me thinking that Cherry might actually be the hidden good worker in the WWE. It helps that Natalya is better than her pedigree suggests. Doesn't do anything fancy, just tosses Cherry around with slams, shoves her face first into the mat, smacks her around. She's bullying her, and that's a good road to go against Cherry, and she does it pretty well. We get a point midway through the match after Cherry's just been trying to backpedal when she's not getting beat on where Natalya has her in the ropes, and she's just slapping her and taunting her. Cherry finally snaps and downs Natalya with two hard slaps of her own, and then just unloads on her in the corner with an awkward but emotional flurry of slaps and kicks, crying her eyes out the whole time, like Ralphie beating up Scott Farkus in "A Christmas Story". Again, it's not exactly high end offense, but it would be stupid to expect high end offense here. This is what is called for, and this is what works. Cherry's so wrapped up in her temper tantrum, that she seems lost and confused when the ref pulls her off of Natalya, which leads to Natalya charging in and Cherry catching her with what was actually a pretty nice forearm. But soon after that, Natalya catches a kick and stomps out Cherry's standing leg. The rest of the match is Natalya working over Cherry's knee, and Cherry sells it like a motherfucker. She even gets a brief comeback at the end - which includes a schoolgirl pin recalling her win over Victoria the week before - where she actually does the Rey Mysterio limping run, trying to monkey flip Natalya out of the corner, but gets shoved off and locked in the Sharpshooter, forcing her to tap. And now here I am, fantasy booking Cherry as the poorest man's Chigusa Nagayo, teaming with Michelle McCool to form the poorest man's Crush Gals and taking on Natalya as the poorest man's Dump Matsumoto. You'll see better wrestling than this. But it's a fun six minutes, and proof that a little personality goes a long way. As I recall, after this, they started to phase out the "terrified non-wrestler" aspects of Cherry's matches to show her growing in confidence. Admittedly, you can't be a terrified non-wrestler forever, but that dynamic was what made her interesting, and without it, she didn't really bring a ton to the table. I'm inclined to think they could've found other ways to deal with that, and I was bummed when they fired her, but she never really was the same after that. Still, it was a glorious couple of weeks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jimmy Redman Posted July 16, 2013 Report Share Posted July 16, 2013 Amen to all of that, great write up. Cherry was so, so perfect in her role. She was saving pro wrestling for me for like...three weeks. Going to have to watch her run again now. Speaking of which, I'm sure I could fill this thread with a lot of women since I love the Divas far more than any sane person should. But I always really loved Michelle McCool. Most people seemed to hate her and think she was terrible, which I never understood. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alucard Posted July 16, 2013 Report Share Posted July 16, 2013 Amen to all of that, great write up. Cherry was so, so perfect in her role. She was saving pro wrestling for me for like...three weeks. Going to have to watch her run again now. Speaking of which, I'm sure I could fill this thread with a lot of women since I love the Divas far more than any sane person should. But I always really loved Michelle McCool. Most people seemed to hate her and think she was terrible, which I never understood. I always thought Michelle McCool was good too, ended up getting very good. My pick as personal favorite diva in the ring will always be Candice Michelle. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jimmy Redman Posted July 16, 2013 Report Share Posted July 16, 2013 She's not one of my favourites, but I just watched her stuff from around the "Look how much Candice Michelle has improved!" period, and I was amazed all over again how much she brought to her matches. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpchicago23 Posted July 16, 2013 Report Share Posted July 16, 2013 I might get a backlash for this but i liked Mabel in some ways, didnt like Vis but loved Big Daddy V. In order it would be hated Vis, liked Mabel, loved V Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stiva Posted July 16, 2013 Report Share Posted July 16, 2013 I might get a backlash for this but i liked Mabel in some ways, didnt like Vis but loved Big Daddy V. In order it would be hated Vis, liked Mabel, loved V The squash on ECW with Big Daddy V beating 3 guys is absolutely great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smack2k Posted July 16, 2013 Author Report Share Posted July 16, 2013 My wife Loved Big Daddy V....me? Eh, he was OK...King Mabel, outside Summerslam match, was a great heel...you could tell he was trying hard to get that over and looked like an asshole..and put some good beatdowns on... Also like the MOM vs. Razor / Savio...Take the bad outfits out and Mabel kicked some ass in that one...underrated match to me...not a "Great" match, but really good and not talked about. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpchicago23 Posted July 16, 2013 Report Share Posted July 16, 2013 His samoan drop was fucking awesome. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smack2k Posted July 16, 2013 Author Report Share Posted July 16, 2013 I was a BIG fan of the Palumbo "biker" gimmick and was pissed it didnt go further...he was good in teh ring and fit that character welll...especially when adding McCool to it...dont know why it got killed off.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alucard Posted July 17, 2013 Report Share Posted July 17, 2013 I was a BIG fan of the Palumbo "biker" gimmick and was pissed it didnt go further...he was good in teh ring and fit that character welll...especially when adding McCool to it...dont know why it got killed off.... Agreed, great look & a killer theme. Had some good matches around that period too, would've loved to have seen him last a little bit longer into the 2010/2011 era of 15 minute Superstars matches. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
artDDP Posted July 18, 2013 Report Share Posted July 18, 2013 I really liked Sean O'Haire dating back to his WCW debut. Admittedly I haven't seen any of his work since then so I have no idea if I'll still feel the same today. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smack2k Posted July 18, 2013 Author Report Share Posted July 18, 2013 I really liked Sean O'Haire dating back to his WCW debut. Admittedly I haven't seen any of his work since then so I have no idea if I'll still feel the same today. O'Haire came out like a bad ass kind of "psycho" during his Natural Born Killers angle and his tag teams during that time... They never gave him a shot in WWE...his smart character that Piper was helping to get going in 2003/4 could have been great if given a psycho side to it as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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