Oh, old wrestling talk! My favorite era was Bruno Sammartino, Gorilla Monsoon, Pedro Morales, Killer Kowalski, etc. I used to watch wrestling from the old Madison Square Garden and Sammartino was immensely popular. To this day Bruno is my all-time favorite.

Non-plussed with the "Twice in a Lifetime" Cena-Rock rematch.

There's no way they can match the theme song of the first one, I'd assume.

This thread got me poking around YouTube a bit, and there are some "shoot" interview clips with Jim Cornette that really need to be listened to if you're any sort of wrestling fan from the past 20 years or so. Cornette is still one of the sharpest, funniest guys in the business, y'all should check it out.

Those shoot interviews are fun to listen to, but Cornette got to book indy promotion Ring of Honor from (IIRC) fall of 2011 until this past October or so, and it led to some of the most boring storylines and angles I've seen. Watching Davey Richards and Eddie Edwards kick each other in the head for 30 minutes is not entertaining. It doesn't help that ROH hasn't really developed a worthwhile talent in 3 years or so.

I can't comment on any ROH stuff since I haven't seen a lick of it since Chris Hero was there, but the work Cornette did on an absolute shoestring budget in Smokey Mountain Wrestling in the 90s was superb. He did a good job in the WWE's developmental OVW promotion as well. I think his general track record in better than solid.

I also like the way he's never wavered for a moment in his contempt for Vince Russo and Ed Ferrera, the two terrible "creative" minds that made the entire sport nearly unwatchable for several years. I'm astounded anyone would hire them to book angles based on their creative record.

George "The Animal" Steel(e?). From "Parts Unknown". Exhibit A, as an example of why wrestling was funnier when it was mainly 47 year old fat guys, before the whole steroid thing.

The Cornette interviews are definitely recommended viewing/listing, as is (again) Colt Cabana's Art of Wrestling podcast.

I do often wonder whether I would enjoy wrestling more if I still had at least a shadow of a doubt re: the "legitimacy." All the tell-all books, documentaries, interviews, etc. are fascinating, but I also think they've made me watch wrestling as more of a critic than a fan. It's the difference between saying, "Whoa, CM Punk is a great wrestler!" and "Whoa, CM Punk is a great worker!"

There's something to be said for not knowing how the magician performs his tricks.

All that's gone. Modern crowds all know which wrestler has "heat" with the front office, who is getting "pushed", who is balking at "doing the job", and a pervasive air of cynicism pervades everything. I miss the old days of 'rasslin, never to return, but that's what getting older is about, ain't it?

I completely agree with you on that. I try to be as non-jaded as possible when I watch wrestling. It's obviously a little hard to get caught up in the actual "competition," but I try to look at what actually happens- how they tell stories, how they wrestle matches- as opposed to speculating about the backstage politics that started it. Also, I do not read dirt sheets as a rule. I vastly prefer being surprised when something unannounced happens. I made that resolution for myself about 3 years ago and it has improved my wrestling watching immensely.

George "The Animal" Steel(e?). From "Parts Unknown". Exhibit A, as an example of why wrestling was funnier when it was mainly 47 year old fat guys, before the whole steroid thing.

There is still plenty of campy humor. While he is a little overexposed, Brodus "the Funkasaurus" Clay as a giant dancing fat guy in a track suit really cracked me up when he started his shtick. The subject of this thread, Daniel Bryan, has also found a pretty god comedic persona while he's kind of stuck on the creative back burner.

To this day Bruno is my all-time favorite.

In case you hadn't heard, he's being inducted into the WWE HOF at MSG next month. Would've been a first-ballot WWE HOM'er.

In case you hadn't heard, he's being inducted into the WWE HOF at MSG next month.

This would be the same Wrestling HOF that includes William "The Refrigerator" Perry, Drew Carey, Bob Uecker and Pete Rose, no?

Well, they're technically in the non-existent "celebrity" wing of the non-existent HOF. It seems to mean something to the retired guys who get inducted, so I am happy for him either way.

I think Bruno honors the HOF, not the other way around...

Really hope Brock just destroys HHH at WM but I'm thinking HHH will stand tall.

Umm, yeah.

I do often wonder whether I would enjoy wrestling more if I still had at least a shadow of a doubt re: the "legitimacy." All the tell-all books, documentaries, interviews, etc. are fascinating, but I also think they've made me watch wrestling as more of a critic than a fan. It's the difference between saying, "Whoa, CM Punk is a great wrestler!" and "Whoa, CM Punk is a great worker!"

I think that's certainly true, as I've alluded to earlier in the thread. When everybody is focusing on the technical aspects of a performance, rather than simply enjoying the performance as audiences typically do for other forms of entertainment, it creates a sort of reductionist diminishment of the product. Good acting, for example, can't be fully appreciated outside of the context of a good plot with good dialogue and other compelling characters. The internet-fueled obsession with "workrate" and "spots" created a really sloppy, unappealing (for me) product for many years as wrestlers lost interest in match aspects that didn't result in immediate "oohs and ahhs" from the crowd.

George "The Animal" Steel(e?). From "Parts Unknown". Exhibit A, as an example of why wrestling was funnier when it was mainly 47 year old fat guys, before the whole steroid thing.

There is still plenty of campy humor.

Well wrestling, like other forms of performance art, has its archetypes. George "The Animal" Steele was one of the better-known variants of the "wildman" archetype, alongside Abdullah the Butcher, Kamala, Bruiser Brody, Pampero Firpo, Killer Khan, etc., some funnier than others :) The "whole steroid thing" did indeed become a real distraction when the industry collectively began to prize physique over most other aspects of performance; wrestling always had its share of Adonis physiques going back to Buddy Rogers but noted steroid-gobbler Vince McMahon (he of the ill-fated World Bodybuilding Federation) really pushed the industry in a bad direction through his obsession with freakish muscularity at every level of the card.

I think Bruno honors the HOF, not the other way around...

I think Bruno needs a little positive accolade from the industry after the horrific beatings Superstar Billy Graham put on him in the 70s. No less an authority than Graham himself told me that to this very day Bruno still wakes up in the middle of the night, screaming, "Those arms! Those python arms!" Truly Bruno was never the same after Graham pinned him to take the WWWF title.

There is still plenty of campy humor. While he is a little overexposed, Brodus "the Funkasaurus" Clay as a giant dancing fat guy in a track suit really cracked me up when he started his shtick.

he lost me when he started trying to be a real wrestler. if he'd have limited himself to dancing for 5 minutes before the match, then squashing colin delaney in 20 seconds, and then dancing again for 5 minutes after the match, i think that would have been ideal. plus, if he did that long enough he'd have gotten a ton of heat from everyone in the audience who wasn't in preschool, and with his size, he might have been able to turn that heat into a solid mid-upper card heel run.

The "whole steroid thing" did indeed become a real distraction when the industry collectively began to prize physique over most other aspects of performance; wrestling always had its share of Adonis physiques going back to Buddy Rogers but noted steroid-gobbler Vince McMahon (he of the ill-fated World Bodybuilding Federation) really pushed the industry in a bad direction through his obsession with freakish muscularity at every level of the card.

axl rotten talked about that on colt cabana's (awesome) the art of wrestling podcast, and his take was as good as anything i've ever heard on the subject.

Can you summarize? I don't much like Axl, his voice gives me hives.

The internet-fueled obsession with "workrate" and "spots" created a really sloppy, unappealing (for me) product for many years as wrestlers lost interest in match aspects that didn't result in immediate "oohs and ahhs" from the crowd.

I still enjoy the early 2000s stuff that I grew up watching (it's not like Super Dragon can really stop being interesting), but yeah, when I go to the well to watch wrestling on YT, I can only really do lucha anymore.