Judy Bagwell Posted November 10, 2015 Report Share Posted November 10, 2015 Ive got to go with Hogan and Jimmy Hart 93-95 what was the point? why pair the most annoying wimpy git with your monster face? how about you guys? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dkookypunk43 Posted November 10, 2015 Report Share Posted November 10, 2015 Ricardo/RVD like that made any sense at all Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted November 10, 2015 Report Share Posted November 10, 2015 They didn't last, but Ric Flair and Baby Doll had zero chemistry as a pair. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
funkdoc Posted November 10, 2015 Report Share Posted November 10, 2015 obligatory "oliver humperdink + anyone" post Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Thread Killer Posted November 10, 2015 Report Share Posted November 10, 2015 I read somewhere that Rick Rude did not like Bobby Heenan and was pissed off that the WWF gave him a manager at all, especially Heenan. Which is odd to me, because having a manager preening all over him and telling him how great he was, was a big part of Rude's gimmick to me. He was fine to talk for himself, but having a sycophantic manager telling Rude (and everybody else) how great he was - that made the act. I think Rude's act wouldn't have been half as good without a manager. Â Although I think he is jerk of the highest magnitude, Superstar Billy Graham talked in his book about how at first he chaffed at having The Grand Wizard as a manager, until he learned that it wasn't about his promo skills, it was all about getting outside interference and a lightning rod for the fans to hate as well, for kissing his butt all the time. I really miss the Heel Manager/Heel Stable aspect of old school wrestling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jingus Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 I always thought the Varsity Club just never made any damn sense. A bunch of reputable college athletes, with "serious shooter" gimmicks, being led by... crazy babbling devil-worshipper Kevin Sullivan?! I've read/heard interviews with Sullivan where he claimed that the disconnect between himself and his wrestlers was the whole point of the gimmick, but I still don't think it works. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebrainfollower Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Graham's comment is odd since the Wizard rarely if ever interfered. Â Â Cannot speak of his prior work but Humperdink in the WWF wasn't that great, but being a face manager is tough. Â I'll say Vader and Paul Bearer. Thought he should have just kept Cornette till he turned face. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebrainfollower Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Let me retry that. Stacy Keibler and the Dudley Boys were annoying as heck as a combo. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
artDDP Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Hogan and Hart, as noted above. What the hell was the point aside from having someone else in place to turn on Hogan down the line? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shakla Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Some of those guys Teddy Long managed in his late WCW run seemed real slapped together. Jericho (although that was short-term), Bobby Eaton, Jim Powers. etc. Â Maybe Sid Justice/Harvey Whippleman too. Â Ted DiBiase with the Steiner Brothers in WCW was pointless. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBigBoot Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Some of these I didn't mind (Stacy with The Dudleys, Harvey and Sid) and I love the Varsity Club but can't disagree the others were all either horrible or pointless. Â Graham's comment is odd since the Wizard rarely if ever interfered. Â Â Cannot speak of his prior work but Humperdink in the WWF wasn't that great, but being a face manager is tough. Â I'll say Vader and Paul Bearer. Thought he should have just kept Cornette till he turned face. Agreed. I don't mind Humperdink but him with Bigelow as faces just didn't click. Not surprisingly he always used to mention in interviews how much he hated that run. The real surprise to me was that WCW decided to repeat that pairing. Â Bearer and Vader was a bad one. Maybe if it had been Percy Pringle III but the Paul Bearer character that was only ever going to work with certain characters. Undertaker, Mankind, Kane. There's nothing supernatural or spooky about Vader. It just seemed like they stuck them together because Vader wears a (well, sort of) mask. Â Â Anyway, the answer is Jim Cornette and Mantaur for me. Â Similar to Vader and Bearer but in reverse. Cornette normally managed people who were a bit more "human". Tag team specialists like the Midnights, Bodies, Rock and Rolls, Owen and Davey. Or big bruisers like Murdoch, Yoko and Vader. Â At the time I thought he had potential as a midcard monster (the KotR Qualifier against Bob Holly was very good) but Mantaur would have been more suitable for Whippleman. Still wouldn't have got over in those days but the gimmick was more up Harvey's alley. Putting him with Cornette just seemed like a rib. Â In terms of one's that I just personally couldn't stand: Sabu, RVD and Bill Alfonso as babyfaces. In 1997 I thought Fonzie had already jumped the shark (intentional reference) as a character but as heels at least it made sense and I can see the logic behind it. As babyfaces I can't. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Chief Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Rico managing 3MW was bizarre as fuck. Â Baron Von Raschke managing the Powers of Pain...as babyfaces? Â Slick and Rick Martel never clicked, thankfully they figured that out pretty quick. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Big Daddy Dink / Humperdink with the Freebirds. Add DDP into the mix as well. Â You've got Michael Hayes. You don't need a manager. You don't really need *two* of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 And they replaced Rocky King as "Little Richard Marley", who replaced Buddy Roberts as "General Buddy E. Lee" ... the Freebirds in 1990-1992 is so shamelessly pathetic that I've grown to admire it. It takes balls to be that bad of an act, and to be that committed to it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clintthecrippler Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Jim Cornette describing the Mantaur gimmick to Bobby Heenan is very easily on my all-time great shoot interview moments. Seeing the always unflappable Heenan be completely glazed in the eyes and speechlessly dumbfounded as Cornette continued his explanation was full on awkward comedy gold. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MVZ Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 And they replaced Rocky King as "Little Richard Marley", who replaced Buddy Roberts as "General Buddy E. Lee" ... the Freebirds in 1990-1992 is so shamelessly pathetic that I've grown to admire it. It takes balls to be that bad of an act, and to be that committed to it. I share your admiration. Garvin was especially terrible around this time in the ring but they were writing an encyclopedia of getting cheap heat: mascara one week, confederate flag make up the next; total cowards one week, heartless limb destroyers the next. Plus gold records, attacks on Bob Armstrong, tomahawk chops, Badstreet as a third member. Every trick in the book, including these terrible managers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Laz Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Personally, I loved the RVD/Sabu/Fonzie group as faces, but I'll definitely agree they were a much better fit as heels. Â Dusty Rhodes briefly managing Hall/Nash in 1998 is up there for me. Dusty's turn made no sense due to how closely affiliated he was with it, Hall/Nash didn't need a manager (and could be thirded by any nWo member, really), and it was dropped without a whole lot of attention soon after. Â My most hated grouping was Tiger Ali Singh managing Lo Down. They teamed for a month or two before he managed them and were actually gelling well as a face team before Singh. Then? Butt of a few jokes and popular entry on "worst teams of the '90s" lists. Mosh was more effective as a FIP (not great, but serviceable) than he was as a heel, and D'Lo was still shook up from Droz so he dialed back the swagger that made him a popular and very over midcard guy, so their being heels teamed with a negative charisma vampire like Singh was so atrocious it ended quickly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slasher Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 I always thought the Varsity Club just never made any damn sense. A bunch of reputable college athletes, with "serious shooter" gimmicks, being led by... crazy babbling devil-worshipper Kevin Sullivan?! I've read/heard interviews with Sullivan where he claimed that the disconnect between himself and his wrestlers was the whole point of the gimmick, but I still don't think it works. I think the idea that you had this set of All American jocks who can beat anyone on their sheer ability alone being harnessed as weapons of an evil cult leader sounds great on paper. It was just not executed as well and/or not utilized properly to get that point across. So yeah what you end up with doesn't work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slasher Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Double post. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Goodear Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 Lana and Dolph Zigler was a terrible combination with no chemistry whatsoever. Add to that the booking pushed Lana into a hypocritical stance where she would say she didn't have to be defined by Rusev one week and then would dress up to match Dolph the next. Just a terrible mix all around. Â Paul Heyman never did nothing for a host of guys most notably Cesaro. The pairing did nothing to elevate C into a upper level just when he was primed and ready to get there on the heels of his Wrestlemania Battle Royal win. The booking was more to blame than anything Heyman did but it sure didn't help even a little. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 The Varsity Club story was that a Satanist recruited a bunch of meatheads to do his dirty work. I wish it had been more over the top, but I think that was the idea. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sek69 Posted November 11, 2015 Report Share Posted November 11, 2015 I actually thought Jimmy Hart was good as Hogan's WCW hype man, it was just so weird seeing him as a babyface after decades of being the pipsqueak heel everyone wanted to punch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted November 12, 2015 Report Share Posted November 12, 2015 Â I always thought the Varsity Club just never made any damn sense. A bunch of reputable college athletes, with "serious shooter" gimmicks, being led by... crazy babbling devil-worshipper Kevin Sullivan?! I've read/heard interviews with Sullivan where he claimed that the disconnect between himself and his wrestlers was the whole point of the gimmick, but I still don't think it works. I think the idea that you had this set of All American jocks who can beat anyone on their sheer ability alone being harnessed as weapons of an evil cult leader sounds great on paper. It was just not executed as well and/or not utilized properly to get that point across. So yeah what you end up with doesn't work. Â Â Â The Varsity Club story was that a Satanist recruited a bunch of meatheads to do his dirty work. I wish it had been more over the top, but I think that was the idea. Â Â Yeah, kind of the general point. Â What's odd is that it kind of worked as a group taking a bunch of misfits and making them a package. Dusty had a certain fondness for Sullivan, but the Devil stuff in Florida was kind of played out. Like Slasher says, he came across more as a cultist twisting the jocks. Rotunda was going nowhere in JCP as a really bland worker that no one cared about other than the folks in the business. Steiner wasn't really going anywhere after splitting off with Sting: he had some flash that everyone could see, but not really a whole package at the time. Toss them together, with Sully as their oddball manager, Mike adding the base of their work as a term, Rick being able to add the flash... it worked. Then they had the goofiness of Mike being the "Captain" and Rick being the total dumb jock. The goofy stuff with Mike winning the TV title, and Steiner being handed the Florida Title that he's do that upside down wearing of. The dynamic worked for a good mid-card team. Â Doc made a good replacement for Rick when they started the move towards Rick as a face. Same type of thing: not really over with JCP fans, had some positives but not the whole package. The fit with Mike was pretty solid. Â It's one of those that on some level didn't make a ton of sense (it's wrestling... not a lot does), but "worked" to a degree. I always thought they killed it off before they should have, as neither Doc nor Mike worked well right after they broke them up. Doc didn't really have anything interesting until Gordy showed up, and Mike ended up leaving. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRH Posted November 12, 2015 Report Share Posted November 12, 2015 Slick managing Sheik and Volkoff (and later the Bolsheviks) never made sense to me. I know blassie sold him the contracts, but it just looked weird for some streetwise hustler to be managing foreign menaces. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ohtani's jacket Posted November 12, 2015 Report Share Posted November 12, 2015 Princess Paula and Finlay. Objectively speaking it was a success, but man did it ruin Finlay for me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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