Sheamus

[BillThompson]

I'm not speaking for anyone but it seems to me like there's an anti-Sheamus sentiment from Irish/UK pro wrestling fans. At least that's the vibe I get when I hear them talk about Sheamus as opposed to McIntyre, Lynch, or Devitt. I have no idea why that might be, but I find it interesting nonetheless.

[Johnny Sorrow]

I'm not speaking for anyone but it seems to me like there's an anti-Sheamus sentiment from Irish/UK pro wrestling fans. At least that's the vibe I get when I hear them talk about Sheamus as opposed to McIntyre, Lynch, or Devitt. I have no idea why that might be, but I find it interesting nonetheless.

I'm not aware of that but would it be the same old shit that crosses all national boundaries ala "the big muscular guy gets the push instead of our favorites"?

[Jimmy Redman]

Maybe there's also a sense of resentment for Sheamus being a very cartoony, derivative Irish stereotype, whereas they can point to the Devitts and Lynchs of the world and see them as more post-modern Irish characters - wrestlers who happen to be Irish and not an Irish tale telling, Guinness drinking, shamrock wearing, ranga caricature.

 

I think there'd be at least a bit of embarrassment at such a caricature from the people he's representing who know far better, the same way that I might cringe if there was a cork hat wearing, boomerang throwing, kangaroo chasing Croc Hunter rip off in WWE.

[BigBadMick]

Maybe there's also a sense of resentment for Sheamus being a very cartoony, derivative Irish stereotype, whereas they can point to the Devitts and Lynchs of the world and see them as more post-modern Irish characters - wrestlers who happen to be Irish and not an Irish tale telling, Guinness drinking, shamrock wearing, ranga caricature.

 

I think there'd be at least a bit of embarrassment at such a caricature from the people he's representing who know far better, the same way that I might cringe if there was a cork hat wearing, boomerang throwing, kangaroo chasing Croc Hunter rip off in WWE.

Bingo!

 

Father Ted, anyone?

[NintendoLogic]

Maybe there's also a sense of resentment for Sheamus being a very cartoony, derivative Irish stereotype, whereas they can point to the Devitts and Lynchs of the world and see them as more post-modern Irish characters - wrestlers who happen to be Irish and not an Irish tale telling, Guinness drinking, shamrock wearing, ranga caricature.

 

I think there'd be at least a bit of embarrassment at such a caricature from the people he's representing who know far better, the same way that I might cringe if there was a cork hat wearing, boomerang throwing, kangaroo chasing Croc Hunter rip off in WWE.

 

Outback Jack?

[PhilTLL]

I need to watch more of him, as my WWE watching basically fell off a cliff when he started, but Sheamus always struck me as "competition barbecue." Hits the marks on the score sheet in technically impeccable fashion, but totally non-distinct, and thus forgotten ten minutes after eating.

 

Speaking of food, I think "has good matches every week" is no longer what it used to be, just like you expect every meal out to be better than 10-20-30 years ago, because the floor is a lot higher.

[concrete1992]

I don't know why I thought this but I thought Sheamus would be sorta a darkhorse on this list. Not to be near the top but still be a bit higher than people expected. The more talk that goes into this the more unlikely it seems. Not sure I get the "potential" talking point. Sheamus seems to be a guy that has made more out of what he's been given than most. He just happens to be not amazing at the parts that aren't in the confines of a wrestling match. Since that has no bearing on this he feels like a guy who could move up faster than maybe any other wrestler based on the next year of work.

 

A couple of POSITIVES for the guy:

• Works stiff. And I like stiff.
• Consistently good-great TV worker
• Can work against a variety of guys
• Doesn't look out of place and is at least above average in 1v1, 2v2, multi-man matches, gimmick matches, ect.

[Childs]

He's reached his potential as far as I'm concerned, but I'm not voting for a guy who's put up four good years. There's simply too much competition for that to be enough.

[goc]

I do think that's a fair point. Sheamus is a guy who in the overall scheme of things, hasn't made a very big mark in WWE. He has an advantage of having a lot of good matches on tape, but should he really get on the list over guys we have less footage of but had a much bigger impact? I mean when there is at least a handful of footage on a big name from the past that looks really good, I'm going to rank that higher over a guy who has had the advantage of being in a completely different era where having good matches every week on TV is actually possible.

[Alan4L]

I'm not speaking for anyone but it seems to me like there's an anti-Sheamus sentiment from Irish/UK pro wrestling fans. At least that's the vibe I get when I hear them talk about Sheamus as opposed to McIntyre, Lynch, or Devitt. I have no idea why that might be, but I find it interesting nonetheless.

well I'd say I'm the outlier to that if that's true. He's close to being my favourite guy in WWE right now, and as a whole I think his WWE work has been stellar. I get actively pissed off when the smarky North East crowds shit on him, and chant "boring" and stuff.

 

For anyone wondering about his pre-WWE career, he was atrocious. Dunno how much I'd hold it against him though - particularly if he keeps his good WWE work going.

[BigBadMick]

 

I'm not speaking for anyone but it seems to me like there's an anti-Sheamus sentiment from Irish/UK pro wrestling fans. At least that's the vibe I get when I hear them talk about Sheamus as opposed to McIntyre, Lynch, or Devitt. I have no idea why that might be, but I find it interesting nonetheless.

well I'd say I'm the outlier to that if that's true. He's close to being my favourite guy in WWE right now, and as a whole I think his WWE work has been stellar. I get actively pissed off when the smarky North East crowds shit on him, and chant "boring" and stuff.

 

For anyone wondering about his pre-WWE career, he was atrocious. Dunno how much I'd hold it against him though - particularly if he keeps his good WWE work going.

 

I think his body of work, particularly 2012, is very good. He's rock solid as a performer - a slightly higher up the card Arn Anderson type.

 

It's just his characterisation/caricaturisation that grates with me slightly.

[Alan4L]

 

 

I'm not speaking for anyone but it seems to me like there's an anti-Sheamus sentiment from Irish/UK pro wrestling fans. At least that's the vibe I get when I hear them talk about Sheamus as opposed to McIntyre, Lynch, or Devitt. I have no idea why that might be, but I find it interesting nonetheless.

well I'd say I'm the outlier to that if that's true. He's close to being my favourite guy in WWE right now, and as a whole I think his WWE work has been stellar. I get actively pissed off when the smarky North East crowds shit on him, and chant "boring" and stuff.

 

For anyone wondering about his pre-WWE career, he was atrocious. Dunno how much I'd hold it against him though - particularly if he keeps his good WWE work going.

 

I think his body of work, particularly 2012, is very good. He's rock solid as a performer - a slightly higher up the card Arn Anderson type.

 

It's just his characterisation/caricaturisation that grates with me slightly.

 

oh don't get me wrong, any time he's got a mic in his hands I cringe. His character is grating as hell. EXCEPT when he's in the midst of a match. It's funny, we give the likes of Austin and Hansen props for getting across their character so well during the course of a match. With Sheamus, it's almost like I'd give him props for managing to make me forget about his shitty character during the course of the match!

[Badlittlekitten]

Will get a vote from me. For delivering good matches week in week out I think he's got the likes of Matt Hardy and Christian beat at this point. And for all the criticism he got as a character I never found him as boring and vapid as them two. In fact I've quite a soft spot for his daft "flush bullies heads down de bog" babyface character. He fantastic current heel work puts him over the edge.

[GOTNW]

I guess Sheamus is a good candidate based on volume if you think he's produced an enormous number of *** TV matches but I'd probably rate all those matches a star or two lower. His matches vs Rusev were really good and unique. His match vs. Daniel Bryan from Smackdown earlier this year was great and it was almost surreal that something like that happened in a WWE ring seeing as it looked way more like a high end WAR brawl. Maybe some of you appreciate these glimpses of quality he shows from time to time a lot more than I do, but it's pretry clear he can only put it together when he's in there with a superior worker. He doesn't work like that always. Or often. Or really in 99% of his matches. On a week to week basis he's pretty useless and he's the guy who will shreik a stupid catchphrase for two minutes because Vince finay saw The Gladiator and sit in a chinlock forever. His supposed skills like "working stiff" aren't skills at all when you actually watch his matches and realise how little of his stuff actually looks like it matches his reputation. Maybe he's just not good at protecting his opponents. That's certainly the impression I get.

[Exposer]

Sheamus is in. He won't finish high or anywhere close to it on my list, but he's got seven years of high quality work. That's plenty to get him in. I think the Daniel Bryan 2/3 Falls match at Extreme Rules 2012 and the Hell in a Cell 2012 match with Big Show are two of greatest WWE matches of all time. He's had good to great matches with everyone. This includes Orton, Bryan, Big Show, Mark Henry, Cesaro, Ambrose, Reigns, Goldust, Evan Bourne, John Morrison, Titus, Tensai, Ziggler, Barrett, Christian, Harper, Bray, Cena, Del Rio, HHH, Batista, Miz, Jericho, and Rusev. This doesn't include all of the great tags and six mans he's been a part of over the years. He has WWE MOTYCs with Morrison in 2010, Bryan & Show in 2012, Cesaro & EC Shield six man in 2013, and Ambrose in 2014. The Bryan 2/3 Falls is a MOTDC in my opinion. He has great offense, is exceptional at selling, can switch his spots around based on his opponents, is a great tag worker, can work stiff heavyweight fights, brawls, and lengthy matches focusing on body part work and selling. He's both a great heel and face in ring. His biggest negatives are he works in modern WWE which everyone hates and has a shitty gimmick. He's great and will definitely find a spot towards the end of my ballot.

[Bierschwale]

Ambrose's US title return match, right?

 

I legitimately think that Meltzer goes ***** on that exact same match if you change Ambrose-Sheamus © on SmackDown to Ishii-Makabe © at Dominion.

[Exposer]

Yep. It's a really great match. And you're probably right about Meltz too.

[Matt D]

Sheamus is another candidate hugely helped for me by the amount of footage we have so as to make me feel more confident about just how good he is. He's someone that we just have so much of in the last seven years that it makes him easy to fully grasp. He's at the very end of my list but I value week to week TV matches almost as much as anyone here, I think, and he's one of the first people to come to mind in that regard. Still, if I suddenly decide, in the next week, that I've fully wrapped my head around someone like Keith Haward or Negro Navarro completely and that they absolutely need to be on my list, he's going to be one of the first casualties.

[goodhelmet]

He just missed the final cut for me.

[Jingus]

He just missed the final cut for me.

Ditto. I like Sheamus, nothing wrong with his work, but he suffers from some stuff that too many modern WWE stars suffer from. Their matches are so micromanaged by the promotion, with the script and the agents and the timing of the segments and the commercial breaks always happening the same way and the general in-ring rules of WWE Main Event Style and the requirements to hit so many signature moves to make the crowd pop and also a LONG list of various moves they aren't allowed to do for various reasons... with all this shit to worry about, way too many of the matches end up blurring together and looking like the exact same goddamn match every single night. Sometimes you'll have an exception, but Sheamus isn't a Daniel Bryan who is so brilliant that he can routinely find ways to work around the WWE's strict insistence on making the in-ring action as prefab and cookie-cutter as they possibly can.

[Jimmy Redman]

I'll most probably be Sheamus' high voter. He's getting stupidly high for me.

 

In terms of WWE Cookie Cutterness, I think his 2012 World Champ run really elevated him to a level beyond the simple "he's had plenty of good but soulless WWE matches" that people seem to place him in. His 2012 was insanely good, and came with not only a slew of good-to-great TV matches basically every week, but also really special, high end matches (vs Bryan, vs Show) and he himself worked as a consummate babyface world champ like almost nobody else has done this century. His ability to get the balance right between dominance and sympathetic selling was so on point, and he worked to hierarchy perfectly, which is something people like Dylan like to cite as a good trait.

 

In particular, it's his arm selling throughout 2012 that impressed me. Bryan worked over the arm during their feud in April/March, but instead of forgetting about it and moving on the week after, Sheamus worked the rest of the year like he had a chronic arm problem. His arm was a genuine weak spot that the random midcarders he'd face on TV could exploit in order to create vulnerability. The only interesting thing about his summer feud with Alberto was the fact that Alberto had the armbreaker and it was a genuine threat to a guy with a bad arm. Even just the simple spot of a guy missing a tackle and running their shoulder into the post suddenly meant something in Sheamus matches, because when it happened it was a legit turning point, and Sheamus was always like "Fuck, not this fucking arm again." And most of the time he'd still overcome this setback and win (he was the babyface world champ after all) but it created the necessary drama in his matches in a really intelligent way.

 

It was the thread that ran through his whole 2012, and again I think is something that really makes him stand out in the age of the WWE assembly line. He's capable of being much more than that.

[Quentin Skinner]

The more I think about it as time winds down for this project, Sheamus isn't an out of the box pick could sneak on to my ballot in the 90-100 range. A guy who's capable a lot, but doesn't really have many "big matches" to really boost his case. Even with that being said I think he's that great of a TV worker (one of the best in his era) and has done stuff I've enjoyed with a variety of guys like Reigns, Goldust, Bryan, Morrison, Cesaro, Big Show, Mark Henry, Ambrose, Del Rio, and Ziggler. As Jimmy mentioned he actually can work effectively switching between sympathetic and dominant as a babyface which is something I don't think he gets enough credit for. He's also great as a brutish, bully heel. Glad I'm not the only one who's really high on his 2012. May not be important to other people, but I always end up super impressed with Sheamus when he's thrown in to gimmick matches. In ladder matches he's very unselfish and has no problem taking insane bumps which is something you don't expect from a man his size.

[GOTNW]

I was kind of perplexed what was the whole "Sheamus as Misawa" comparison about and wondering whether I accidentally slept hrough that part of that one podcast but now I remembered it was about him having multiple moves he could put opponents away.

 

Yeah I disagree.

 

What happened is basically they gave him a bunch of moves that used to be someone's finishers (Air Raid Craish, Cloverleaf, maybe someone used the Fireman's Carry Roll...I think that's it?) and then he won a match or two with them before quickly prostituting their credibility. If you're raving about Sheamus having all these finishers you better put over Dolph Ziggler's Sleeperhold and John Cena's Diving Legdrop. Punk *really* only had the Go 2 Sleep as a proper finisher but his Anaconda Vice and Roundhouse Kick won more matches than any of Sheamus' secondary stuff. It's an odd and blatantly utrue talking point.

 

I also hate it when wrestlers hook the leg just for the sake of doing it. The shoulders matter. Sheamus hooking the leg when he's facing Big Show always looked so stupid.

[Jimmy Redman]

My Sheamus as Misawa talking point had little to do with multiple finishers and almost everything to do with how he worked as an ace in a similar way to him.

[GOTNW]

Well someone brought it up anyway. I've hammered on Sheamus enough. He's had some great matches over the years. So has Taguchi. Dylan likes overrating mediocre wrestlers.