The Jim Ross Is A Grouchy Hateful Vile Human Being thread

[S.L.L.]

Where's the inconsistency? I still don't understand.

It comes across like people are picking and choosing their spots to criticise, based on whether they like the wrestling product or not. I'm sure that's not true, but that's how it comes across. I know people here have no illusions about workers & promotions they like, but time and time again people fall back into old habits of pimping workers and matches they like with no regard to their concerns about the business or the participants' welfare... It's confusing. For example, if Bob Roop becomes a pimped worker after the Mid-South, is he a fuck-up for being in the business, a great worker or a fuck-up and a great worker?

 

If it makes you feel any better, any time I write about wrestling, the fact that the people involved are fuck-ups is a given, so I don't feel the need to specifically mention it unless it's important to what I'm trying to say. So a thread about how awesome JYD & Mr. Olympia vs. Ted DiBiase & Matt Borne is isn't guaranteed to contain comments about the drug abuse that destroyed JYD's and Borne's careers, the blatant hypocrisy of DiBiase in his post-retirement years, and the fact that Jerry Stubbs probably did horrible things, even if I don't necessarily know what they are, but it's not like I'm unaware.

 

What of you, OJ? Has everything you've ever posted about wrestling contained equal amounts of praise and scorn? Are you not guilty of this same "inconsistency" when discussing things in wrestling you like? Or is it only a double standard when somebody else does it?

[Resident Evil]

Wrestling fans talking about how stupid and "not worth it" wrestling is is pretty embarrassing, and a fad whose expiration date has come.

Wait, why is an opinion a "fad?" Saying something like that implies you think people who believe that are being disingenuous. Why would someone claim to believe something that they really don't? Just to troll you? Some of us have better things to do, believe me. I think it's "not worth it" for a guy to smash his head into a ringpost 4-5 times or whatever just to please some chanting morons and make a few bucks. Especially when this wrestling thing is supposed to be a work and you're not really supposed to go out of your way to hurt yourself or someone else.

 

 

Lots of people claim to believe something that they don't in the IWC. Some people even start believing what they write.

 

 

I don't agree with smashing a head into a ringpost a bunch of times either (I also don't like someone using a weedwacker in a deathmatch) but if someone can't handle that than they can't handle a lot of what wrestling is, what wrestlers are and why a lot of us watch it. That was Nigel showing a lot of these characteristics amplified and it seems to have scared people.

[Guest KCook]

Wrestling fans talking about how stupid and "not worth it" wrestling is is pretty embarrassing, and a fad whose expiration date has come.

Well I just totally disagree, with the caveat that when talking about wrestling being stupid and not worth it I'm talking mainly about avoidable injuries that come from things like headbutting a ring post, taking unprotected chairshots, mainlining steroids, etc.

 

I don't think wrestling is stupid (well it is but you know what I mean), but it is fake and many (most?) serious injuries are caused by someone doing their job poorly one way or another. I don't think there's anything wrong with mocking people for doing their job poorly. I also think that one of the contributory factors in all the injury and death in wrestling is that fans buy into the "it's athletic in its way" nonsense. Wrestling is not a sport and it is not particularly athletic. A guy wrestling though a concussion is not like a football player doing the same, it's more like an actor working through it after an accident on-set. Which is stupid and probably against union rules.

[Guest onlxn]

Well I just totally disagree, with the caveat that when talking about wrestling being stupid and not worth it I'm talking mainly about avoidable injuries that come from things like headbutting a ring post, taking unprotected chairshots, mainlining steroids, etc.

...or doing diving headbutts, moonsaults, taking sternum-first bumps after you've broken your sternum, clotheslining guys to the floor, taking protected chairshots, taking back-bumps, attempting piledrivers on weak knees, working against inexperienced guys, working "snug", as the kids like to call it, or just plain working.

 

Not trying to be difficult... I know what you mean. Nobody's endorsing what Nigel did eighteen months ago, as it was some stupid, self-destructive bullshit. Just saying that the line is a pretty murky one, and quite often the line people draw is that it's stupid to do this stuff in promotions they don't like. If current trends hold, most ROH workers will end up multiply concussed, battered, broke old men, forgotten by all but the most ardent wrestling fans... most of the rest will have long since died. In so doing, they'd end up pretty much exactly like the Mid-South alumni.

 

I don't think wrestling is stupid (well it is but you know what I mean), but it is fake and many (most?) serious injuries are caused by someone doing their job poorly one way or another.

I'm just not entirely convinced that this is true -- I think a few nutty ROH workers are obscuring the more general trends. Bret, Arn, Steamboat and DiBiase were all forced to retire due to serious injuries... DiBiase's dad of course died due to in-ring injuries. Kawada, Owen, Vader, Austin, Jannetty and Chono have all seriously injured people. You could argue that they were all bad at their jobs if you wanted, I suppose, but I think the larger lesson is that wrestling is a chaotic, dangerous thing. Being good at it doesn't guarantee that you'll avoid injury.

 

Does Nigel take unnecessary risks from time to time? For sure, and he should be discouraged from doing that. But Harley Race would've had the same successful career without the diving headbutts that ruined his neck, Kobashi would've had the same successful career without the moonsaults that ruined his knees... I saw Flair get piledriven through a table in a meaningless midcard match at SuperBrawl '00, days shy of his fifty-first birthday. 99% of the workers you can think of have made unnecessary physical sacrifices to get pops, glory, validation, whatever you want to call it.

 

I also think that one of the contributory factors in all the injury and death in wrestling is that fans buy into the "it's athletic in its way" nonsense. Wrestling is not a sport and it is not particularly athletic.

It's certainly not a sport... contending that it's "not particularly athletic" is a little odd. It *often* isn't, it doesn't always *have* to be, but it usually is, and usually has been throughout its history. This strikes me as one of those "wrestlers aren't as cool as they think they are" criticisms that I have trouble fully getting on board with. A lot of workers probably wish they'd been successful football players or MMA fighters instead, but a lot of them don't. I doubt Nigel was thinking "now they'll believe I'm a real athlete" when he headbutted that ringpost... I'm guessing he was thinking "this is gonna be awesome WRESTLING WRESTLING WRESTLING". Stupid, sure, but I just think it's message-board posturing to contend that the guy doesn't understand the point of professional wrestling.

 

A guy wrestling though a concussion is not like a football player doing the same, it's more like an actor working through it after an accident on-set. Which is stupid and probably against union rules.

I'd say it's equally akin to both. Incidentally, you'd be surprised how often actors *do* work through accidents, injuries, illnesses, senility, etc... some fairly creepy shit goes on there too. In any industry where the money, pressure, or perceptions of glory are high, people are pushed to their limits.

 

I hope ROH and similar promotions tone down their styles, in part for the health of the workers, in part because I think the shows would actually be more entertaining if they toned things down. Anybody who calls for that... I'm with ya. But calling guys "retards" for doing what we've all devoted a lot of our time to just strikes me as distasteful (for more than the obvious reasons). We're all wrestling nerds here, nerds with hundreds of downloaded matches and message-board posts to our names... none of us can claim to be above the insanity of the business.

[kjh]

I think a lot of the ROH criticism isn't because people hate the promotion, but because they seem to get more of a free pass when their wrestlers do nutty stunts in their matches than when WWE and TNA wrestlers do similar things.

[Guest KCook]

Just saying that the line is a pretty murky one, and quite often the line people draw is that it's stupid to do this stuff in promotions they don't like. If current trends hold, most ROH workers will end up multiply concussed, battered, broke old men, forgotten by all but the most ardent wrestling fans... most of the rest will have long since died. In so doing, they'd end up pretty much exactly like the Mid-South alumni.

True, but there's also a real risk/reward point I don't think you're quite acknowledging. I'd rather not see Nigel McGuiness headbutting a ringpost or Jeff Hardy diving off a ladder through a table at Wrestlemania, but the latter makes more sense to me. The same way I'd rather not see any quarterback go back on the field after being hit so hard he blacked out, but it would make more sense to me if Tom Brady did it than it would if a Division III player did it. This might not be entirely fair but I do think there's something to it.

 

To put it another way, I swam (shittily!) in college and stopped when I hurt my knee because I didn't want it to lead to problems down the road. I think it would have been dumb to do otherwise. If I was an Olympic hopeful I would have gutted it out and wouldn't have thought it was dumb. Again, maybe not entirely consistent, but most people would say I had a point.

 

I don't think wrestling is stupid (well it is but you know what I mean), but it is fake and many (most?) serious injuries are caused by someone doing their job poorly one way or another.

I'm just not entirely convinced that this is true -- I think a few nutty ROH workers are obscuring the more general trends. Bret, Arn, Steamboat and DiBiase were all forced to retire due to serious injuries... DiBiase's dad of course died due to in-ring injuries. Kawada, Owen, Vader, Austin, Jannetty and Chono have all seriously injured people. You could argue that they were all bad at their jobs if you wanted, I suppose, but I think the larger lesson is that wrestling is a chaotic, dangerous thing. Being good at it doesn't guarantee that you'll avoid injury.

To me this is setting the bar too low. It should be possible for wrestlers to work a hell of a lot more safely than they have, at least as regards really serious injuries. That lots of famous wrestlers have crippled themselves or others doesn't really convince me that wrestling inherently needs to be dangerous; it shows me that it has a horrible culture and that generation after generation hasn't learned from the past.

 

I also think that one of the contributory factors in all the injury and death in wrestling is that fans buy into the "it's athletic in its way" nonsense. Wrestling is not a sport and it is not particularly athletic.

It's certainly not a sport... contending that it's "not particularly athletic" is a little odd. It *often* isn't, it doesn't always *have* to be, but it usually is, and usually has been throughout its history. This strikes me as one of those "wrestlers aren't as cool as they think they are" criticisms that I have trouble fully getting on board with. A lot of workers probably wish they'd been successful football players or MMA fighters instead, but a lot of them don't. I doubt Nigel was thinking "now they'll believe I'm a real athlete" when he headbutted that ringpost... I'm guessing he was thinking "this is gonna be awesome WRESTLING WRESTLING WRESTLING". Stupid, sure, but I just think it's message-board posturing to contend that the guy doesn't understand the point of professional wrestling.

This goes to the culture again. If you think that wrestling is inherently unsafe and uncontrolled that's one thing, but I don't. Working through injury is a necessary part of the culture in football or MMA because getting hurt is an inherent part of those sports. That's why they have a culture of toughness. I don't believe that getting hurt is a necessary part of wrestling, so I don't think that athletic mindset should really be part of its culture. I certainly don't think fans should encourage it by pretending that being a wrestler is anything at all like being a fighter or a football player. It just isn't.

 

But calling guys "retards" for doing what we've all devoted a lot of our time to just strikes me as distasteful (for more than the obvious reasons). We're all wrestling nerds here, nerds with hundreds of downloaded matches and message-board posts to our names... none of us can claim to be above the insanity of the business.

Speaking just for myself, if I call wrestlers retards it's because I'm frustrated and disappointed by them, not because I look down on them. Wrestling should (and I think can) be a good, safe thing. Since it's not in large part because wrestlers refuse to learn from the past and because there's a sports mentality that really shouldn't apply, I don't see anything wrong with using harsh language to express that frustration and disappointment.

 

Re: ROH, one thing that should be pointed out is that they get shit on because they actually listen. Jeff Hardy isn't going to write a tl;dr screed to Dave Meltzer based on a letter some message board guy wrote. If they're listening, people who don't want to see stupid stuff should say "Please don't do stupid stuff."

 

Edit: And to bring it back to what I think is the main point here, the reason I don't see much hypocritical in watching old tapes while wringing one's hands over ROH or TNA or whatever is that what's in the past is done and while we can bemoan it, we can't do anything about it. On the other hand, we can shit on/boycott/support what's going on today.

[S.L.L.]

This goes to the culture again. If you think that wrestling is inherently unsafe and uncontrolled that's one thing, but I don't. Working through injury is a necessary part of the culture in football or MMA because getting hurt is an inherent part of those sports. That's why they have a culture of toughness. I don't believe that getting hurt is a necessary part of wrestling, so I don't think that athletic mindset should really be part of its culture. I certainly don't think fans should encourage it by pretending that being a wrestler is anything at all like being a fighter or a football player. It just isn't.

I agree with what you're saying in general, and I don't think this is strictly what you're trying to say, but getting hurt is "necessary" in wrestling insofar as it seems to be inevitable. However, as I think you're saying, wrestling culture leads them to push their luck in that regard far moreso than is really necessary.

 

Edit: In general, it seems like the anti-anti-wrestling movement is saying that "all wrestling carries risk, therefore you can't complain about any of it or you're inconsistent", which seems silly to me.

[Guest KCook]

getting hurt is "necessary" in wrestling insofar as it seems to be inevitable. However, as I think you're saying, wrestling culture leads them to push their luck in that regard far moreso than is really necessary.

Sure. Of course some people are going to get hurt wrestling, just as some people are going to get hurt being traffic cops, but I honestly don't see any reason why they have to be injured so often or so badly. (I also think that if this was really addressed the drug problems would largely take care of themselves.)

[Guest onlxn]

True, but there's also a real risk/reward point I don't think you're quite acknowledging. I'd rather not see Nigel McGuiness headbutting a ringpost or Jeff Hardy diving off a ladder through a table at Wrestlemania, but the latter makes more sense to me. The same way I'd rather not see any quarterback go back on the field after being hit so hard he blacked out, but it would make more sense to me if Tom Brady did it than it would if a Division III player did it. This might not be entirely fair but I do think there's something to it.

No, I'd definitely agree with that. But part of this may be a disagreement on just what kind of "reward" a guy like Nigel McGuinness is getting.

 

My sense is that a guy at his level, working ROH, NOAH and scattered shows, probably clears about $30-40,000 a year. Not great. On the other hand, there are dozens and dozens of people in the world who wear his T-shirts, and hundreds of people who praise his abilities and performances online (in addition to the hundreds that don't like him)... wrestling "pundits", such as they are, discuss him frequently. ROH is absolutely a minor league compared to the WWE, but if a guy's reward is attention... well shit, ROH workers don't hurt for attention. I'm not saying that the reward Nigel gets would be enough for *me* to wreck my body... I'm not even that into ROH anymore. Just saying it's perhaps enough reward for some.

 

A backyarder named Dimesac did a powerbomb off a cage to concrete in Anaheim a couple weeks ago, breaking his leg in the process... he was roundly mocked by about ten local posters, ignored by the rest of the world. Nigel's infamous ringpost dalliance happened in front of 1200 countrymen who were chanting his name, and the match finished 4th in the Match of the Year voting for the industry's biggest internal awards. That certainly ain't Wrestlemania, but it ain't the Anaheim Marketplace, either. I don't think it's ridiculous for an ROH topcarder to feel like a big deal, given the attention he gets from his industry.

 

To me this is setting the bar too low. It should be possible for wrestlers to work a hell of a lot more safely than they have, at least as regards really serious injuries. That lots of famous wrestlers have crippled themselves or others doesn't really convince me that wrestling inherently needs to be dangerous; it shows me that it has a horrible culture and that generation after generation hasn't learned from the past.

You're right about that. I don't think any of us can even imagine what truly "safe" wrestling would look like... it'd probably involve loose strikes, rolling bumps, no forays to the floor, no knee drops, and a lot of stuff we wouldn't even be able to think of, and even then, bones would still break every now and again. But I agree with you... that style exists out there somewhere, and the faster wrestling evolves towards it, the better.

 

Speaking just for myself, if I call wrestlers retards it's because I'm frustrated and disappointed by them, not because I look down on them. Wrestling should (and I think can) be a good, safe thing. Since it's not in large part because wrestlers refuse to learn from the past and because there's a sports mentality that really shouldn't apply, I don't see anything wrong with using harsh language to express that frustration and disappointment.

Understood. I think, though, that a lot of people do blur that line a lot, getting off on how mentally superior they are to the performers they watch... there's no shortage of examples here and elsewhere. Maybe some people are actually interested in offering constructive criticism to ROH and its ilk, but a lot of people are just saying "fuck those retards" and exchanging Internet high-fives about it.

 

Edit: And to bring it back to what I think is the main point here, the reason I don't see much hypocritical in watching old tapes while wringing one's hands over ROH or TNA or whatever is that what's in the past is done and while we can bemoan it, we can't do anything about it. On the other hand, we can shit on/boycott/support what's going on today.

I agree with this -- nothing hypocritical about it, as long as you don't act like one is inherently holy and the other is inherently stupid. Mid-South is great because it's great, not because it has some hazy, sepia-toned authenticity that ROH lacks. Not saying you're suggesting that, Cookie... but people certainly have been.

[Bix]

I really hate the talking point that safer wrestling would suck because the strikes would look bad. That's bullshit. Just learn to throw good working strikes.

[blueminister]

Safe wrestling looks more or less like Bret Hart. You don't need to sacrifice impact, variety, or dramatic build if you know what you're doing.

[Cox]

Jerry Lawler threw the best working punch ever, and the only people he ever hurt with it (Paul Heyman, Sal Corrente) he did so intentionally.

[Resident Evil]

getting hurt is "necessary" in wrestling insofar as it seems to be inevitable. However, as I think you're saying, wrestling culture leads them to push their luck in that regard far moreso than is really necessary.

Sure. Of course some people are going to get hurt wrestling, just as some people are going to get hurt being traffic cops, but I honestly don't see any reason why they have to be injured so often or so badly. (I also think that if this was really addressed the drug problems would largely take care of themselves.)

 

Let's be honost here. We don't even hear about 1/50th of the injuries out there. The very nature of wrestling leads to injuries, injuries, injuries and more injuries.

 

Edit: In general, it seems like the anti-anti-wrestling movement is saying that "all wrestling carries risk, therefore you can't complain about any of it or you're inconsistent", which seems silly to me.

People can complain about it. That's ok. I've done it before. To me, I just want wrestling fans who are giving off a snob aura to realize that if they scream about wrestlers going too far than they have to realise that they're hypocritical because part of them watches wrestling for that very same reason. Otherwise, they'd only ever watch for the most part badly put together TV/Movie fights

[Resident Evil]

Jerry Lawler threw the best working punch ever, and the only people he ever hurt with it (Paul Heyman, Sal Corrente) he did so intentionally.

Tazz. He hurt Tazz. Maybe even twice. I hear partly due to him worrying about how good his punches would look close to the camera.

[Guest KCook]

The very nature of wrestling leads to injuries, injuries, injuries and more injuries.

Wrestling is fake. If people are getting hurt doing it they can change what they're doing. If they won't that has absolutely nothing to do with the nature of wrestling. Theoretically you could work a style that would guarantee no one would ever get hurt. The question is how far you can go toward that style without becoming unbearably boring, not whether you can go towards it.

[Guest KCook]

My sense is that a guy at his level, working ROH, NOAH and scattered shows, probably clears about $30-40,000 a year. Not great. On the other hand, there are dozens and dozens of people in the world who wear his T-shirts, and hundreds of people who praise his abilities and performances online (in addition to the hundreds that don't like him)... wrestling "pundits", such as they are, discuss him frequently. ROH is absolutely a minor league compared to the WWE, but if a guy's reward is attention... well shit, ROH workers don't hurt for attention. I'm not saying that the reward Nigel gets would be enough for *me* to wreck my body... I'm not even that into ROH anymore. Just saying it's perhaps enough reward for some.

 

A backyarder named Dimesac did a powerbomb off a cage to concrete in Anaheim a couple weeks ago, breaking his leg in the process... he was roundly mocked by about ten local posters, ignored by the rest of the world. Nigel's infamous ringpost dalliance happened in front of 1200 countrymen who were chanting his name, and the match finished 4th in the Match of the Year voting for the industry's biggest internal awards. That certainly ain't Wrestlemania, but it ain't the Anaheim Marketplace, either. I don't think it's ridiculous for an ROH topcarder to feel like a big deal, given the attention he gets from his industry.

Fair enough—but one way to change the calculus for a guy like McGuiness is to shout down the vampire crowd and viciously mock him if he does stuff he obviously shouldn't be doing. You wouldn't think that would have all that much of an effect, but then given ROH's attempts at damage control, maybe it does.

[Resident Evil]

Safe wrestling looks more or less like Bret Hart. You don't need to sacrifice impact, variety, or dramatic build if you know what you're doing.

All very much true but not many wrestlers can do what Bret can so they compensate in other ways.

 

Yeah, Bret was awesome and he should be ranked higher than he is because he has some of the best looking offensive ever without injuring someone but even with everyone doing Bret's style you're still going to get beat down and your body's still going to rot on you. It's an extremely physical business.

[Resident Evil]

The very nature of wrestling leads to injuries, injuries, injuries and more injuries.

Wrestling is fake. If people are getting hurt doing it they can change what they're doing. If they won't that has absolutely nothing to do with the nature of wrestling. Theoretically you could work a style that would guarantee no one would ever get hurt. The question is how far you can go toward that style without becoming unbearably boring, not whether you can go towards it.

 

Impossible. Absolutely impossible to work a style that would guarantee no one would ever get hurt.

 

 

Wrestling is fake and real. There is impact in wrestling. A TV fight is completely "fake". It's the real aspect of the wrestling show combined with the emotions that one can dig up with the benifit of the fakeness that makes wrestling tick for its fans. That's the nature of wrestling and why it differs to something like a movie fight and this leads to inuries, injuries, injuries. You might not agree that that's what wrestling should be but for better or for worse that's what it is

[blueminister]

All very much true but not many wrestlers can do what Bret can so they compensate in other ways.

Thing is, nobody's trying. They still either wanna play late-90's Four Corners of Heaven or just plain Mick Foley suicidal idiocy.

[Bix]

Jerry Lawler threw the best working punch ever, and the only people he ever hurt with it (Paul Heyman, Sal Corrente) he did so intentionally.

Tazz. He hurt Tazz. Maybe even twice.

 

I never read this anywhere reputable, and if it's true, then, well, see above about the intentional potato shots.

[Guest KCook]

The very nature of wrestling leads to injuries, injuries, injuries and more injuries.

Wrestling is fake. If people are getting hurt doing it they can change what they're doing. If they won't that has absolutely nothing to do with the nature of wrestling. Theoretically you could work a style that would guarantee no one would ever get hurt. The question is how far you can go toward that style without becoming unbearably boring, not whether you can go towards it.

 

Impossible. Absolutely impossible to work a style that would guarantee no one would ever get hurt.

 

This is not a matter of opinion, my man. You're just wrong. Practically speaking, no one is going to work such a style, but that's not the point.

 

Also, there is nothing real about wrestling. It is not real. General confusion on this basic point has led to deaths, murders, crippling injuries, drug addictions, etc. I really think one thing fans can do is stop buying into the big lie that wrestling is in any sense, on any level, real. It is not. It is fake.

[Guest onlxn]

Safe wrestling looks more or less like Bret Hart. You don't need to sacrifice impact, variety, or dramatic build if you know what you're doing.

Bret deserves credit for never injuring an opponent (that we know of), but safe wrestling does *not* look like Bret Hart. Even if you chalk up Goldberg's mule kick as an unfortunate fluke, Bret broke his sternum taking a nutty bump to a guardrail, had serious knee issues, and used the same hard-bumping style that completely fucked the backs and necks of many of his colleagues.

 

Wrestling totally damaged Bret Hart's body, even before the concussions. It's a complete fiction that wrestling would be safe if everyone was like him.

[Guest onlxn]

Fair enough—but one way to change the calculus for a guy like McGuiness is to shout down the vampire crowd and viciously mock him if he does stuff he obviously shouldn't be doing. You wouldn't think that would have all that much of an effect, but then given ROH's attempts at damage control, maybe it does.

Completely agree with this... the more backlash that actually reaches ROH, whether via the Internet or live fan reactions, the better. But I don't think anybody was posting for Gabe's eyes when they wrote *on this board* that all pro wrestlers were fucking morons, or that they looked forward to laughing at them when they became drooling retards. I mean, let's not kid ourselves, here. That wasn't noble fans campaigning for change... that was some dudes hating on some shit. All well and good, but call it what it is.

[S.L.L.]

The very nature of wrestling leads to injuries, injuries, injuries and more injuries.

Wrestling is fake. If people are getting hurt doing it they can change what they're doing. If they won't that has absolutely nothing to do with the nature of wrestling. Theoretically you could work a style that would guarantee no one would ever get hurt. The question is how far you can go toward that style without becoming unbearably boring, not whether you can go towards it.

 

Impossible. Absolutely impossible to work a style that would guarantee no one would ever get hurt.

 

 

Wrestling is fake and real. There is impact in wrestling. A TV fight is completely "fake". It's the real aspect of the wrestling show combined with the emotions that one can dig up with the benifit of the fakeness that makes wrestling tick for its fans. That's the nature of wrestling and why it differs to something like a movie fight and this leads to inuries, injuries, injuries. You might not agree that that's what wrestling should be but for better or for worse that's what it is

 

It's not all or nothing though. You can take a lot of precautions that are not being taken, and even though it won't make wrestling "safe", it'll still be better than the current status quo. It's not like there's no middle ground between totally safe wrestling (read "none") and dudes headbutting ringposts in front of a couple hundred people.

 

Look, I live on Long Island, and when ROH comes around, I usually go. It's Long Island, so the crowds tend to be pretty indifferent, and knowing this, the shows usually aren't that significant, and the internet at large tends to ignore them. There is precisely zero reason why the Briscoe Brothers should be doing lengthy spot-fu/headrop/indy stiffness/DANGEROUSSSSSSS matches that go 20+ minutes. And yet, that's exactly what happens, and they're not the only ones doing it. Why? Why does this have to be the match they work every time out, no matter the card position, card significance, match significance, etc. These are the kind of risks that can be reduced, and even though it won't make the matches "safe", it won't make them needlessly dangerous, either.

[Eduardo]

Safe wrestling looks more or less like Bret Hart. You don't need to sacrifice impact, variety, or dramatic build if you know what you're doing.

Bret deserves credit for never injuring an opponent (that we know of)

 

FWIW, Bad News Allen claims Bret gave him two concussions.