The Wrestling Thread

[Menegrothx]

Stone Cold was out for 9 months between late 1999 and early 2000, McMahon-Helmsley era got started in December of 1999, while before that The Corporation was the main antagonist alliance. It wasn't called McMahon-Helmsley era before it was just Stephanie&HHH (+DX)

[BurningDoom]

Stone Cold was out for 9 months between late 1999 and early 2000, McMahon-Helmsley era got started in December of 1999, while before that The Corporation was the main antagonist alliance. It wasn't called McMahon-Helmsley era before it was just Stephanie&HHH (+DX)

Good times.

I'm glad WWE is going back in a direction I enjoy again. For the first time in a long time, I'm of the opinion that WWE is a definitively better wrestling product than TNA.

[Menegrothx]

Captain obvious: TNA should get rid of all the old men, go back the the old style ring and be like used be before Hogan&co joined

[BurningDoom]

Captain obvious: TNA should get rid of all the old men, go back the the old style ring and be like used be before Hogan&co joined

A year, two years ago; I would have agreed. Today, though, no. Leave it alone. TNA is doing fantastic. Guys like Austin Aries, Magnus, Samoa Joe, A.J. Syles, Bobby Roode, and Bad Influence (Daniels & Kazarian) are getting the attention and spotlight they've deserved for so very long, and are doing well with it.

[RCBH928]

Stone Cold was out for 9 months between late 1999 and early 2000, McMahon-Helmsley era got started in December of 1999, while before that The Corporation was the main antagonist alliance. It wasn't called McMahon-Helmsley era before it was just Stephanie&HHH (+DX)

Good times.

I'm glad WWE is going back in a direction I enjoy again. For the first time in a long time, I'm of the opinion that WWE is a definitively better wrestling product than TNA.

I am not following WWE, please explain how are they going back to the direction you enjoy. What happened? Last I checked, WWE was WWE.

I came back here to check if TNA was doing any better quality or financial wise. I see they are filling more seats . Am I wrong?

I gave up on that promotion, they had more than enough time to attract attention. Almost none of the original TNA wrestlers are on par of any of the WCW, WWF, WWE, ECW had. Abyss, Daniel, Magnus, Hernandez, and Eric Young got nothing really (IMHO). The only guy that I can say is on par of being called a "Star" is AJ styles. While X-WCW/WWE talent were supposed to bring attention and push TNA to be "up there" , it just turned out like they are the only ones people care about. I doubt any one does not see Angle, Sting, Hardy, Mickie James, Bully Ray are the better part of TNA. That is my opinion. As a matter of fact, Ray and James hold 2 out of the 4 available titles in TNA.

I know some will argue that there are the "techniques" of wrestling, and "in ring skills" , but in the truth is pro-wrestling is a show. People want to come in and see a show, and a good show is put on by a good character. I really doubt the the stardom The Rock got was because of the extra "in ring skills" he built since the time he was known as "Rocky Maivia" or that Stone Cold Steve Austin had better techniques than the time he was Stunning Steve Austin

[BurningDoom]

Stone Cold was out for 9 months between late 1999 and early 2000, McMahon-Helmsley era got started in December of 1999, while before that The Corporation was the main antagonist alliance. It wasn't called McMahon-Helmsley era before it was just Stephanie&HHH (+DX)

Good times.

I'm glad WWE is going back in a direction I enjoy again. For the first time in a long time, I'm of the opinion that WWE is a definitively better wrestling product than TNA.

I am not following WWE, please explain how are they going back to the direction you enjoy. What happened? Last I checked, WWE was WWE.

I came back here to check if TNA was doing any better quality or financial wise. I see they are filling more seats . Am I wrong?

I gave up on that promotion, they had more than enough time to attract attention. Almost none of the original TNA wrestlers are on par of any of the WCW, WWF, WWE, ECW had. Abyss, Daniel, Magnus, Hernandez, and Eric Young got nothing really (IMHO). The only guy that I can say is on par of being called a "Star" is AJ styles. While X-WCW/WWE talent were supposed to bring attention and push TNA to be "up there" , it just turned out like they are the only ones people care about. I doubt any one does not see Angle, Sting, Hardy, Mickie James, Bully Ray are the better part of TNA. That is my opinion. As a matter of fact, Ray and James hold 2 out of the 4 available titles in TNA.

I know some will argue that there are the "techniques" of wrestling, and "in ring skills" , but in the truth is pro-wrestling is a show. People want to come in and see a show, and a good show is put on by a good character. I really doubt the the stardom The Rock got was because of the extra "in ring skills" he built since the time he was known as "Rocky Maivia" or that Stone Cold Steve Austin had better techniques than the time he was Stunning Steve Austin

Sounds to me like you've already made up your mind about it.

But yeah, it's not as good as the late 90s to early 2000s. There is no single wrestlers as good as The Rock or Stone Cold were in their prime. But it's no longer completely kiddie, either. They're getting a little bit of an edge to it with their storylines again (not as much as the Attitude Era, though). The McMahon-Helmsley-Orton-Shield alliance (they really need to get a proper name) feels like a legitimately, threatening heel storyline; rather than the super-hero good guys and coward bad guys storylines they've been running with for years.

And I'm of the opinion that TNA is a great wrestling product right now, so I don't know what to say there. Excellent matches, with the genuinely talented guys on their roster in the spotlight; rather than trying to shove the latest WWE reject down our throats. And Immortal is long gone.

[Menegrothx]

I know some will argue that there are the "techniques" of wrestling, and "in ring skills" , but in the truth is pro-wrestling is a show. People want to come in and see a show, and a good show is put on by a good character. I really doubt the the stardom The Rock got was because of the extra "in ring skills" he built since the time he was known as "Rocky Maivia" or that Stone Cold Steve Austin had better techniques than the time he was Stunning Steve Austin

That's true, but if I had to choose between watching a show with 1 hour and 45 minutes of great wrestling and 15 minutes of uncharismatic promos vs a show with 1½ hours of talking and 1½ hours of mediocre wrestling (if even that much), I'd choose the former. Unless some one is as entertaining on the microphone as Chris Jericho, The Rock, Kurt Angle and Edge(+Christian) were in late 1990s&early 2000s, then no matter how much of a character they are, all the talking is going to become boring sooner or later. Nothing's worse than a droning 20 minute Triple H promo where nothing happens (funny how The Rock knew to do a parody of that in 2000 before that had even become a thing)

Ring of Honor has the best in ring talent out of any American promotion

[Gamerforlife]

I know some will argue that there are the "techniques" of wrestling, and "in ring skills" , but in the truth is pro-wrestling is a show. People want to come in and see a show, and a good show is put on by a good character. I really doubt the the stardom The Rock got was because of the extra "in ring skills" he built since the time he was known as "Rocky Maivia" or that Stone Cold Steve Austin had better techniques than the time he was Stunning Steve Austin

That's true, but if I had to choose between watching a show with 1 hour and 45 minutes of great wrestling and 15 minutes of uncharismatic promos vs a show with 1½ hours of talking and 1½ hours of mediocre wrestling (if even that much), I'd choose the former. Unless some one is as entertaining on the microphone as Chris Jericho, The Rock, Kurt Angle and Edge(+Christian) were in late 1990s&early 2000s, then no matter how much of a character they are, all the talking is going to become boring sooner or later. Nothing's worse than a droning 20 minute Triple H promo where nothing happens (funny how The Rock knew to do a parody of that in 2000 before that had even become a thing)

Ring of Honor has the best in ring talent out of any American promotion

I'm the complete opposite. I don't care how good the in ring product is if the characters and storylines are boring. That's why I can praise a guy like Eddie Guerraro but never liked Chris Benoit. Benoit was a boring guy with no charisma. His in ring prowess just didn't matter to me because of that. Eddie was the best of both worlds. He was an entertaining character, which made me more interested in his in ring work.

Wrestling isn't a real sport. It's sports entertainment, and if the entertainment isn't there then I just don't care. I don't tune in just to see great athletes. I could watch real sports for that.

[Menegrothx]

Does that mean you don't enjoy puroresu at all? Atleast I never watch japanese promos, interviews etc, only the matches, I have no idea what's going on story wise, but I enjoy all the cool and hard hitting moves
That's the thing about pro wrestling, you'll never see moves like that in MMA

On the whole Benoit thing: I don't see how he is that much different from, say, Goldberg or Lesnar. If being stoic and scary can work for big strong guys, why not for smaller and more technical guys like Malenko and Benoit? As long as they have presence and look confident in what they do (mannerisms, how they walk to the ring etc). And I think it's important to realize that the same formula doesn't work for all wrestlers. A guy like Benoit shouldn't put in a situation where he has to do a lot of back and forth talking, but rather keep it short and sweet, that way it might have more impact.

Btw, which do you guys prefer: the old bad ass Rock of 1998-2000 or the hyper active Rock of 2001-2002 (I'd put Hollywood Heel rock in the same category). He had a lower voice and was more bad ass when he was heel, and then when he was doing the heel to face transition. Later on he got rid of the flashy clothing, his voice was more high pitch and rather than acting cool and callous, he was super hyped up and excited in his promos.
I kind of bring this up because my previous point about Chris Benoit reminds me of this:
at first Rock was just a regular bad ass, and he's say something amusing and insulting like "go suck on a monkey's nipple" to the interviewer. Later on as he was the face of the company, he would set up his jokes for minutes before there was finally a punchline (at times). I feel like the comedy stuff carried over from his heel antics to the point that they got carried over with his whole funny guy role.

[BurningDoom]

Does that mean you don't enjoy puroresu at all? Atleast I never watch japanese promos, interviews etc, only the matches, I have no idea what's going on story wise, but I enjoy all the cool and hard hitting moves

On the whole Benoit thing: I don't see how he is that much different from, say, Goldberg or Lesnar. If being stoic and scary can work for big strong guys, why not for smaller and more technical guys like Malenko and Benoit? As long as they have presence and look confident in what they do (mannerisms, how they walk to the ring etc). And I think it's important to realize that the same formula doesn't work for all wrestlers. A guy like Benoit shouldn't put in a situation where he has to do a lot of back and forth talking, but rather keep it short and sweet, that way it might have more impact.

Btw, which do you guys prefer: the old bad ass Rock of 1998-2000 or the hyper active Rock of 2001-2002 (I'd put Hollywood Heel rock in the same category). He had a lower voice and was more bad ass when he was heel, and then when he was doing the heel to face transition. Later on he got rid of the flashy clothing, his voice was more high pitch and rather than acting cool and callous, he was super hyped up and excited in his promos.
I kind of bring this up because my previous point about Chris Benoit reminds me of this:
at first Rock was just a regular bad ass, and he's say something amusing and insulting like "go suck on a monkey's nipple" to the interviewer. Later on as he was the face of the company, he would set up his jokes for minutes before there was finally a punchline (at times). I feel like the comedy stuff carried over from his heel antics to the point that they got carried over with his whole funny guy role.

I like Rock from anytime before he left the first time. After he came back, went heel, and had that huge tribal tattoo on his shoulder; he was never quite as good again. But even then he's still better than 99% of WWE's current roster.