Squared Circle Gazette Radio #8 - The Overrated In Pro Wrestling

[JaymeFuture]

Stemming from all the feedback we got, this show was a lot of fun - the SCG panel discuss the Overrated wrestlers, matches and shows, including a big debate on Sting, as well as talk on The Undertaker, Brock Lesnar, Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Lance Storm, WrestleMania X7, WrestleMania 6, the nWo and a whole lot more. This one was a lot of fun to do, check it out, let me know what you think~! ;-)

 

http://squaredcirclegazette.podbean.com/mf/web/e4m7is/SCGRadio8-TheOverratedInProWrestling.mp3

[Dylan Waco]

I've enjoyed listening to these in part because of how much I disagree with the opinions of the panelists. This show may have set a record in that regard as I felt myself almost completely disagreeing across the board. Even in areas where I did agree with the general line - for example I'm probably the hardest of the hardcore anti-Sting as HoFer advocates and reserachers on the web - I thought the reasoning was flat (focus on buyrates over total ppv buys for example, arguing that Foley was a better opponent for Vader which I think is a massive stretch, failure to talk about his massive failings as a house show draw, et).

 

I thought the Lance Storm discussion was interesting. I can't begrudge anyone who was trained by someone for defending their mentor, and I imagine it is true that people loved working with him because he is one of the loosest workers I've ever seen. But in terms of the "name a bad Lance Storm match" argument I could name dozens. i watched every ECW match that exists on tape a few years ago, handhelds included, and Storm was one of the dirt worst guys in wrestling during his tenure there. Bad match, after bad match, after bad match. Just a dogshit wrestler. But I don't really consider him overrated because I don't think that many people rate him.

 

I also thought the Heyman discussion was interesting because a lot of the stuff mentioned in his defense sounded like something straight out of Heyman's mouth from one of his various podcast appearances. I was a huge ECW fan, and what Heyman did there was impressive in many ways, but at the end of the day I think his accomplishments there are far more often exaggerated than denigrated. He gets far more credit as a promoter than someone like Victor Jovica/Carlos Colon who drew much bigger houses, started from nothing, lasted far longer (hell they are still around) and in many ways were at least as influential as Heyman was (I contend the Death Match/Garbage wrestling world owes a ton to WWC). He also gets far more credit in that regard than Don Owen who headed a territory that produced or groomed more top talent, was around forever and was able to turn his size and relative obscurity into a net positive through a unique business model that accentuated his positives and hid his weaknesses. Hell he probably gets more credit as a promoter than Jerry Jarrett who pretty much has all the positives you could say about Paul except magnified (survived in a cutthroat environment longer than you might think, was willing and able to work out business deal with theoretical rivals to their mutual advantage, influential in terms of unique television that shaped the landscape of the business) and with none of the negatives. That doesn't even get into Heyman the manager who has a dismal record at getting over his talent during the most recent run,and during the one point where he was focal point manager headed a stable that was artistically incredible, but was a business disaster (The Dangerous Alliance). The guy is a great talker when he's on, but awful in my view when he's off. Even still Bill was hardly alone in terms of his views on Heyman, and this is coming from someone who did a mostly positive podcast running down his career about a year ago.

 

Anyhow I could keep bitching about things I disagreed with, but I figured I would just throw those brief thoughts in here, while also noting that despite my strong disagreement with the views expressed, I have enjoyed these shows

[JaymeFuture]

Well, first of all, thank you for listening and enjoying, even if you do disagree ;-) Would rather that than the "I agree"-fests that don't generate any talking points, and as I said to the guys when we did it - the problem with looking at Underrated/Overrated is that you're gonna piss people off no matter what, either by disagreeing, insulting things they like, or because you don't have that mindset, you can't speak to why they feel that way. But alas, it was interesting if nothing else to gauge reactions.

 

I think "Cactus as a better opponent for Vader than Sting" is absurd as well, for what its worth. I don't think any Vader/Cactus match was as good as GAB92, Starrcade 92, or Superbrawl 3.

 

Lance is a weird one, because you'll rarely hear anybody in the business shit on Lance's work in the ring. Ever. Who did he have bad matches against on the ECW house show tapes?

 

The Heyman discussion could have gone forever, and if there was a flaw it was in opening the discussion to people so wide that we had to tackle so many in a short period of time. I don't put blame on Heyman one bit for Axel, Ryback or Cesaro failing - as soon as they were put with Heyman, the priority was never on them to be elevated. I think saying Heyman is ever "awful" on the mic is a stretch personally, what would you base on that on, out of interest?

 

ECW booking, if people don't like or disagree with, I wouldn't argue - it was a niche style for a specific point in time, and to the audience it was designed to target it worked. But on the grand scale of life it wasn't the success of other companies in respect of money made, not was it as big a failure in terms of money lost. It was a small company, and in that sense, the fact it has such wide reach, was emulated stylistically in many ways, and resulted in so many guys being plucked from there, is pretty amazing. Jerry Jarrett, and Memphis in general (opinion of Lawler's work) seems to be somewhat isolated and overlooked, so I wouldn't disagree with that at all, but I'd say it's more that Jarrett is underrated than Paul is overrated.

[Dylan Waco]

If you want I can copy and paste some of the reviews I did of Lance matches to this thread, but I don't want to do that if you think it will detract from discussion on the rest of the show

[JaymeFuture]

I'll seek them out - they in the Microscope forum?

[Dylan Waco]

Unfortunately no. Hidden elsewhere and (I just discovered) butchered by a board upgrade

[JerryvonKramer]

I'm quite torn on this show. On the one hand there are aspects that make me frustrated, not just things I disagree with but views that I consider to be regurgitations of commonplaces that this forum does a special line in dismantling. On the other, I think it's quite fun and refreshing to hear views that get such a vehement reaction.

 

I don't care to discuss HBK; I think his best work was in The Rockers. Think it's one of those things we're so far apart on that we'll never agree. I don't think my views on that are as uncommon here as it might be assumed.

 

I thought the discussion about pre-expansion WWF wasn't very well informed with a lot of received opinions, generalisations and assumptions flying around. It's put me -- me of all people -- in the position of defending Backlund. He did work a technical style, his row row arm wrenches, his headlocks, his counter wrestling -- pretty "scientific". And the idea that a bodyslam was a high spot, seems to imply they weren't busting out suplex variations, Bob has a ton of them. His PILEDRIVER is more brutal than any high spot in the rest of the WWF in the 80s. He also had plenty of great matches. I don't really mind opinions with which I disagree but that stuff seemed lazy to me.

[BillThompson]

Some responses,

 

--Heyman does deserve blame for Axel and Cesaro. If he had the golden touch as so many seem to think he would have helped them. In the end he did nothing for them, and I found his segments with Cesaro to be cringe inducing bad in how he could not understand how to get Cesaro over with the audience.

 

--There's really no way to deny that ECW was a financial failure. I'm not a big numbers guy, but the numbers in this case don't lie and ECW never made a dime and lost oodles, and oodles of money. In that sense, what exactly did Heyman get out of that roster? You give that roster to Vince and he probably would have found a way to make money with it. It may not have been the ECW we all remember, but at least it would have made money. In fact the argument could be made that Vince was the money mark helping to keep ECW alive for years, and that if not for his financial input ECW would have been dead by 1997. Facts cannot be overlooked, and as a money making venture ECW was a terrible company that was kept afloat by outside money because it couldn't make any money of its own.

 

--As far as Paul the booker goes, he was his own worst enemy. He could never just let his wrestlers go out and do their thing. He always had to have a caning, the ring falling apart, a woman taking her clothes off, lights going black, etc. He borrowed liberally from Jarrett's booking in Memphis, and while there's nothing wrong with borrowing his version of Jarrett's booking was not as good as the original (and back to the money point Jarrett managed to make money with the same booking that Heyman lost money with.)

 

--My point about Brock is that he doesn't need to talk. By himself he is big, menacing, and legit. Heyman as his mouthpiece doesn't serve much of a purpose because Lesnar's actions are enough to get him and his feuds over.

 

--I tried to overlook the "rural Minnesota" cheapshot, but I can't. I'm from rural Illinois, am a published writer, a paramedic, have a wife who has a bachelor's degree, is a Mensa member, etc. Point being that the rural cheapshot is not needed, is erroneous, and only serves to make you look like a jerk.

[JaymeFuture]

I blame booking rather than Heyman for the fate of Axel and Cesaro. Neither of those guys have main event, money drawing personality to begin with, Heyman is put them to fill that void, while neglecting the other half of the equation, which is booking them to be something special. Good booking and personality can make stars, but they were put in the position to flounder in the middle, and that's what they did.

 

I agree that maybe Brock doesn't "need" Heyman (I think Luke said the same thing if memory serves), but I don't think there's any question he adds massively to the act. And in the WWE, where they do want the heels to talk, Lesnar doing it on his lonesome isn't nearly as good as Heyman is in selling a match, and since Brock isn't there often, his presence is very valuable.

 

Paul as booker not letting guys be themselves in matches is one I'll question though.

 

He didn't always use the Memphis masterpiece theatre finishes in - he stayed hands off on the stuff he knew didn't need the run-ins and the woman getting spanked, and he usually did it for the guys he had that could do with the help. Sandman and Dreamer without the smoke and mirrors are nothing special, but they were the main guys he had to work with, they were over with his audience and it made them come across like stars to his crowd. No doubt he didn't make money with it, and in terms of money Jarrett is far superior as a businessman, but they had two different agendas. Jerry was running within his area and targeting a broad audience in one place (and did superbly), Heyman was targeting a niche audience on a national basis (and failed). In terms of trying to run nationally, Jerry lost his ass on TNA pretty bad and pretty quickly (I don't recall the exact figure at this moment but $20 million rings a bell?). Still, getting off track, and there really is no point in arguing the business side because clearly Jarrett wins.

 

Booking. The reason I think Paul's ECW work was so good was because he was able to create auras around guys, and his company in general, to the point where people either truly believed they were great (Sabu, Public Enemy, etc) or bonafide top star quality (Shane Douglas, Mike Awesome, Taz, etc), despite the limited remit and appeal of the company. In the most heated competitive landscape ever, he survived almost solely on the illusion. Ultimately I think it was an environment that nobody could have succeeded in, but he did a hell of a job. As an aside, we're going to be doing a show soon, that I'm looking forward to getting feedback from here on, about how good ECW really was and how successful it really was.

 

As for the rural Minnesota line, I'll apologise on Karl's behalf, but to clarify it was meant a good-natured jab at me since me and my family are from an area of Shropshire that is about as rural as it gets, and he jokes about it all the time. Knowing that nobody knows the context I probably should have edited it out, but it was so throwaway I completely forgot about it until you mentioned it.

 

As for JvK's point above, I wasn't trying to say Backlund sucked at all, but I think the presentation of Bob Backlund as a technical wrestler was very much in the way he was talked about and his demeanour being so straight. Maybe it's down to most of his opponents, maybe it's just a stylistic thing, but I think of matches like the one with Muraco where he's just holding a headlock without doing all that much with it forever, grinding it in the over the top "New York" ham-sandwich style, and compare that to the way a lot of the guys in the NWA and it just doesn't come off nearly as technical, and it may just be a personal preference when it comes to the execution of the style.

[shoe]

In regards to Heyman and Brock. Brock is on a deal where he only has "x" amount of dates . Heyman is their to continue the feud so they don't burn out the dates. So in that regard he is essential to the act .

[ohtani's jacket]

As for JvK's point above, I wasn't trying to say Backlund sucked at all, but I think the presentation of Bob Backlund as a technical wrestler was very much in the way he was talked about and his demeanour being so straight. Maybe it's down to most of his opponents, maybe it's just a stylistic thing, but I think of matches like the one with Muraco where he's just holding a headlock without doing all that much with it forever, grinding it in the over the top "New York" ham-sandwich style, and compare that to the way a lot of the guys in the NWA and it just doesn't come off nearly as technical, and it may just be a personal preference when it comes to the execution of the style.

 

I'm not a massive fan of Backlund -- like I wouldn't rate him as one of my all-time favourite guys or anything like that -- but he was really good at working those headlock spots. Maybe not so much the grinding, but switching out of the headlock into something interesting then going back to the headlock. He was really good at that sort of thing. I also don't think anybody in the NWA was a significantly better mat wrestler.