Derrick King

[Dylan Waco]

Discuss Here.

[Dylan Waco]

Nominated him in hopes I could con Phil into voting for him. Of all the guys who have worked random Memphis/Nashville loop indies and quasi-territories over the last fifteen years I think the best of the bunch have been Lawler (duh), Kid Kash, and King. Excluding Lawler, I could probably be convinced that the most impressive individual performances belong to Kash, but he hasn't popped up on tape nearly as much as King and I don't think he's nearly nearly as good a babyface in that setting as King is.

 

Having said that King is really best as a heel. The blonde haired black guy who trolls unreconstructed rednecks by look, action and impulse is something that would probably work on a cheap heat level no matter what, but King dials it up to ten. He has the facial expressions, timing, and punches you want from a guy brought up in the Memphis region, and can really bring it with the big bumps when the situation calls for it.

 

There was a two and a half year period or so where he was turning up a lot on YouTube and pretty much every time delivering with a fun bout, and occasionally something great (love his brawls with Frankie Tucker). If you dip into his back catalog he's got a long run of this stuff, though it's far from fully documented. I have no clue how he was in OVW but I would love to find out. He is also an excellent tag team wrestler, and the Derrick King Enterprises tag team with Drew Haskins is one of the two or three most underrated teams of millennium so far.

 

It's hard to tell if King is limited or not. He works the style that he has to in the setting he's in and does it very well. That the absence of a big slate of great matches would be the big criticisms of him. I won't vote for him, but Phil, SLL, someone....take the bait?

[S.L.L.]

Ummmmm....his run on Wrestling With Death clearly established him as a better television presence than most wrestlers working today. Also, he had a couple of years earlier this decade where he showed up on tape a lot and clearly demonstrated himself to be a top flight worker in the old territorial heel tradition.

 

Here's the thing...I don't have a ton of exposure to him beyond that. I mean, if someone wants to point to his work outside his awesome '11-'12 run, I'm game to do a deep dive, because I did love that stuff, and I was vaguely aware of him before that, and he always seemed interesting to me. But I don't claim any real familiarity with it.

[Tim Evans]

Derrick was the highlight of Power pro wrestling in the late 90's. From cosplaying HBK and trying to get married to Jacqueline to being the young guns champ and feuding with Bulldog Raines over dog food in late 99. I think he run in Power pro was some of his first years in wrestling and he was already really good. I suggest watching his feud with Brandon Baxter and team with Kid Wikkid. With that said, I can't vote for him for the reasons Dylan said.