"He's ambitiously stupid" - Why Scott Keith's new book is scary bad

[Jingus]

Was anyone over enough in '94 to force a change of plans? Was the WWF even booked like that?

 

I wish someone had spared us Diesel's run.

No, no, and yes. The idea that the WWF wasn't "forced" into it like they were with Eddy, Benoit, or Rey is wrong because the company had an entirely different style of doing things back then. It didn't matter if Bodydonna Skip vs Reno Riggins was by far the best match of the night, there's simply no freaking way that the company would elevate them past their planned level. The company only pushed two smaller workratey types on top, and they were Bret (who got grandfathered in from the stunt booking title reign in 1992 when they couldn't decide who to put it on, and it seemed like they only put the belt back on him whenever their other planned stars crashed and burned) and Shawn (whom it's been long established must have secret photographs of Vince being the shooter on the Grassy Knoll for all the unheard-of preference that McMahon has given him over the years). Everyone else who got the belt back then was a Great Big Monster who the company had planned a long-term reign for, unless we're counting things like Backlund's week of fame. And yes, it was kinda odd to put the belt on Backlund rather than Owen, who cost Bret that match anyway, but clearly Vince just never saw Owen as a top guy.

 

Could opinions have changed in the post-99 era? Possibly, but it sure as shit didn't look that way at the time of Owen's death. He was doing a comedy heel gimmick, basically the same thing Kurt Angle did but earlier and with a silly superhero outfit. He was being pushed at a lower level than he had been in years, and the Intercontinental Hot Potato Title didn't mean shit at the time. Austin didn't want to work with him, Hunter probably wouldn't either. He might've eventually got a Jericho-like transitional reign, but that's assuming a hell of a lot, including that he'd stick with the company that long. After all, how many guys from the mid-late 90s are still with the company today? How many guys who spent as much time in the undercard as Owen did ever got elevated to the world belt? Jericho, Eddy, Benoit, Rey, RVD, Punk, and other guys along those lines only got their (short) reigns after spending 3-5 years with the company. The only single one I can think of who'd been there for over a decade and suddenly got rocketed to the main event outta nowhere is Bradshaw, and I don't think Owen would've gotten the Bradshaw push.

[Al]

The Monday Night Wars shows On Demand just started into 1998 and it's so painfully obvious that A: The fans were dying for even a brief Owen run as champ to get revenge for Montreal and B: DX was going to make sure that didn't happen for the same reason. I've never been a guy to get all hot and bothered over backstage POLITIXXX, but watching these shows with the knowledge of why certain things did or didn't happen makes me kind of mad.

It's a shame that things worked out the way they did, but there's no booking rationale on earth that could've given the belt to Owen before Wrestlemania XIV. The Austin program was in full swing and it would've hurt to hotshot the belt.

[Al]

One thought that did just occur to me however. Might Owen Hart have spent time and maybe gotten a title run in TNA?

[kjh]

To be fair sek, the timing really wasn't right for even a quickie World title run, as it would have diluted the build to Mania and Austin's ascension to the thrown. Still there was no good reason why Shawn couldn't have dropped the European belt to him and Hunter won all their singles matches in their feud. That said, it's easy to blame DX, but I get the sense that Vince McMahon was reluctant to reward Owen for his brother's treachery. How Owen was booked in that period is very similar to how Chris Benoit was being booked by Kevin Sullivan around the same time.

[Bob Morris]

I know a lot of this talk about "would Owen have gotten a top title run" assumes he planned on staying in the wrestling business, but I've always suspected Owen was going to give notice to Vince when his deal expired and get out of wrestling.

 

Owen seemed to be one of the few people in the wrestling business who had the foresight to save some money. It's possible he could have simply left the business for a couple of years, then come back later on a short-term deal so he can accumulate more savings, similar to what Chris Jericho seems to be doing.

 

TNA may very well have snagged Owen, provided he was interested in wrestling for them. I could definitely see Owen willing to work for a company where he gets a light schedule, would no doubt have been pushed as a top guy yet get plenty of time to spend with his family.

[Bix]

Ron Garvin is willing to loose clean to Flair (which Dusty won't do). Isn't a guy who is over enough that people will want to see him v other heels. He isn't a threat to either Dusty or Flair.. He's an ideal guy to trade the title with.

In J.J. Dillon's book, he explains that another part of the rationale for putting the belt on Garvin was to headline with Flair-Garvin title matches everywhere to differentiate their brand of wrestling from WWF with credible, hard-hitting main events.

[Al]

TNA may very well have snagged Owen, provided he was interested in wrestling for them. I could definitely see Owen willing to work for a company where he gets a light schedule, would no doubt have been pushed as a top guy yet get plenty of time to spend with his family.

And consider that Owen and Jeff Jarrett were apparently great friends as well.

[sek69]

Ron Garvin is willing to loose clean to Flair (which Dusty won't do). Isn't a guy who is over enough that people will want to see him v other heels. He isn't a threat to either Dusty or Flair.. He's an ideal guy to trade the title with.

In J.J. Dillon's book, he explains that another part of the rationale for putting the belt on Garvin was to headline with Flair-Garvin title matches everywhere to differentiate their brand of wrestling from WWF with credible, hard-hitting main events.

 

 

If that was the plan, then why did they put Garvin on ice until Starrcade and make him an obvious placeholder champ to everyone? What stopped them from having a few matches around the horn to at least make Garvin more than the NWA's version of Stan Stasiak?

[kjh]

Wasn't the problem with Ronnie Garvin that he was super over as a challenger to Flair, but as soon as they put the belt on him the fans stopped supporting him?

[Loss]

That's the whole point. They weren't looking to make Garvin a star. It wasn't that they "dropped the ball" with him. If anything, they did exactly what they set out to do, which was find someone to go over Flair that Flair could beat to win the belt back at Starrcade.

 

Fans at the time really liked the Flair/Garvin series of matches, and enjoyed watching him challenge Flair for the title, but there wasn't really a push for him to actually beat Flair at some point.

[Jingus]

Allegedly, the main problem was that every heel refused to do any jobs for the jumped-up transitional champ, hence Ronnie's being taken off television and doing few title defenses while he held the belt. In his shoot interview, Flair claims that Ronnie was over in the southeast, but not really in the other parts of the country due to lack of consistent exposure as a top guy. A quick look at his career bio halfway confims that point, since he seemed to spend half of his career in Georgia and most of the rest in adjacent southern states.

[sek69]

Ronnie was always a guy you could tell that they wanted to have in their back pocket as someone they could plug in the main event, and it seemed like he was over enough after the angle with Jim Cornette throwing fire at him (that turned Jimmy Garvin face to come to the aid of his "brother"), but I think the fans liked Flair more and didn't want to see him lose the belt.

 

I still wonder if no one else wanted to do the job, why couldn't they have had a few matches with Flair where Garvin either gets some wins due to interference backfiring or having Jimmy come out to neutralize JJ or something like that? It's not like Flair ever had a problem putting over a guy for a while if he was going to get the belt back at some point.

[smkelly]

I noticed three of the Benoit books quoted each other, Bret's book, deathvalleydriver, and thesmartmarks.

 

I was definitely surprised to see DVDVR as a source, and a poster being quoted. I never realized DVDVR was that popular.

 

Ring of Hell - It was an okay read, had some interesting moments, but it felt like a bad day of mania, flip flopping from Benoit is a monster to it wasn't his fault, back to a monster, then he was the most caring and compassionate father in history. It was at time too sensational, the consistent flip flopping got irritating.

Some of the side stories were also interesting, like Sabu having a bullet in his face.

The author seemed to genuinely hate Vince McMahon, or at least portray the IWC opinions.

Scott Hall and Konnan being used as a credible source was humorous.

I had been watching Benoit since '94, or '95 and had never really noticed him looking like he was in immense pain or psychological duress. Although some of the things he did do was insane, like belly flopping from the top rope to the floor on a table, or his diving head butts from atop a cage or ladder.

I still think there is too much blame being placed upon the business, and Vince. He has unethical, unmoral, and unprofessional demands, but no one has to follow them.

I wonder why Benoit didn't just move to Japan and stay on the New Japan roster.

 

One of the Benoit books, titled Benoit was weird. It was really weird that they included Benoit's title reigns.

[kjh]

I still think there is too much blame being placed upon the business, and Vince. He has unethical, unmoral, and unprofessional demands, but no one has to follow them.

Irv Muchnick's coal mine owner analogy really fits here.

 

I wonder why Benoit didn't just move to Japan and stay on the New Japan roster.

He'd fallen for the WWE fame trap.

[smkelly]

He could have stayed in Japan prior to joining ECW, WCW, or the WWF.

From all accounts, he really enjoyed himself working opposite Liger and Ohtani. He enjoyed getting paid well for shorter tours, and apparently the traveling wasn't as bad as trekking through the continental United States.

[Jingus]

Honkeytonk Man calls out SKeith, literally:

 

 

EDIT: is there a code on this board to imbed a Youtube link onto the page here? Most other forums have that, weird if this one didn't.

[MikeCampbell]

http://www.rspwfaq.com/2010/06/26/i-dont-r...battle-royales/

 

Since the PWI MOTY was a battle royale, then obviously there wasn't anything good in 1972.

[Loss]

Even in the U.S., there was the Funk/Brisco match in Florida that took a full hour of TV that is pretty known and accessible.

 

I wouldn't criticize Scott Keith for not knowing about that so much, but it's annoying when he makes assumptions and answers questions based on those assumptions, and they end up getting repeated for years as fact.

[Bix]

Right, there's not knowing stuff and acting like you know stuff even though you don't. It's one thing for him to not know that the LA (and SF) battle royals were all-star workrate matches. There's nothing wrong with that, but he shouldn't be all BATTLE ROYALS ALL SUCK NEGATIVE ELEVENTY STARS.

 

That said, even he should have realized that it was an all star event, being a non-WWWF/Toronto/AJPW Bruno match during that period.

[Loss]

Also, that historically, PWI Match of the Year has been the biggest match of the year, not necessarily the best.

[Bix]

You're right, plus, it's not like there was anything close to a national consensus casual fan best match of the year until the late '80s, which is when the awards starting reflecting that (either because they really won or because the writers needed to make their choices based on how the business had changed).

[jdw]

I'd have to go back and look since it's been a while since I looked at what won in the 70s. But they tended to look for the most part what you would expect from a New York based publication that also tried to throw hat tips to the NWA. How many looked oddball?

 

John

[Johnny Sorrow]

I'd have to go back and look since it's been a while since I looked at what won in the 70s. But they tended to look for the most part what you would expect from a New York based publication that also tried to throw hat tips to the NWA. How many looked oddball?

 

John

1972 Sammartino wins battle royal Battle Royal in Los Angeles Los Angeles, CA

 

1973 May 24 Dory Funk, Jr. vs. Harley Race NWA World Heavyweight

Championship Kansas City, MO

 

1974 January 27 Jack Brisco vs. Dory Funk, Jr. NWA World Heavyweight

Championship Tokyo, Japan

 

1975 March 17 Bruno Sammartino vs. Spiros Arion WWWF Heavyweight

Championship New York, NY

 

1976 April 26 Bruno Sammartino vs. Stan Hansen WWWF Heavyweight

Championship New York, NY

 

1977 April 30 Bruno Sammartino vs. Billy Graham WWWF Heavyweight

Championship Baltimore, MD

 

1978 February 20 Billy Graham vs. Bob Backlund WWWF Heavyweight

Championship New York, NY

 

1979 August 21 Harley Race vs. Dusty Rhodes NWA World Heavyweight Championship Tampa, FL

 

 

And for fun, the Eighties:

 

1980 August 9 Bruno Sammartino vs. Larry Zbyszko Showdown at Shea Flushing, NY Steel Cage match

 

1981 May 2 André the Giant vs. Killer Khan Rochester, NY

 

1982 June 28 Bob Backlund vs. Jimmy Snuka WWF Heavyweight

Championship New York, NY Steel Cage match

 

1983 June 10 Ric Flair vs. Harley Race NWA World Heavyweight

Championship St. Louis, MO

 

1984 May 6 Ric Flair vs. Kerry Von Erich NWA World Heavyweight

Championship David Von Erich Memorial Parade of Champions Irving, TX

 

1985 March 31 Hulk Hogan and Mr. T vs.

Roddy Piper and Paul Orndorff WrestleMania New York, NY

 

1986 July 26 Ric Flair vs. Dusty Rhodes NWA World Heavyweight

Championship The Great American Bash 1986 Greensboro, NC Steel Cage match

 

1987 March 29 Randy Savage vs. Ricky Steamboat WWF Intercontinental

Championship WrestleMania III Pontiac, MI

 

1988 February 5 Hulk Hogan vs. André the Giant WWF Championship The Main Event Indianapolis, IN

 

1989 May 7 Ricky Steamboat vs. Ric Flair NWA World Heavyweight

Championship WrestleWar Nashville, TN

 

The weirdest thing about the Seventies stuff, is that PWI and the sister mags LOVED the NWA especially Florida. But Bruno meant more. I actually forgot that back in the day I always wanted to see this Bruno vs Spiros Arion match.

[sek69]

Wasn't a lot of the 70s WWWF love stemming from PWI trying to get into their good graces? I seem to recall neither Vince Sr or Jr were big fans of the Apter mags.

[Bix]

IIRC they didn't mind the Apter/Weston mags pre-expansion.