I think now is the time to drop the old fart line about "lost art" and such.

I'm trying to decide who the most overrated wrestler of the past 10 years is:

 

John Morrison, Kurt Angle or Shelton Benjamin.

 

I'm thinking Benjamin. At least Kurt had a couple of years of good stuff.

 

 

Seriously though, what's the bet WWE are in fact intending on bringing back vets who can actually teach young guys stuff (Goldust, Masters, Venis etc.), but Meltzer is confusing those guys with who he considers underutilized?

I think WWE hiring Billy Gunn as a trainer for developmental is far more alarming.

I think WWE hiring Billy Gunn as a trainer for developmental is far more alarming.

Seriously ?

 

Well, he's the best athlete in WWF history so that has to count for something.

I think WWE hiring Billy Gunn as a trainer for developmental is far more alarming.

Seriously ?

 

Well, he's the best athlete in WWF history so that has to count for something.

 

Gotta put that rodeo scholarship to good use.

I'd imagine that Billy Gunn is perfectly qualified as a developmental trainer. The best trainers tend to be guys who were never top guys. Just teaching guys the basics and the style WWE wants sounds like something he's capable of doing. I saw him a few years ago on a TNA house show and he was clearly the guy with the best skills at connecting with the crowd and he was on like the second match. And he's probably better qualified than fucking Hugh Morrus, who I've heard is really disliked for his attitude towards trainees and his tendency to get too rough on them.

Yeah, great trainers aren't always great workers, and vice versa.

I'm trying to think of relatively young, unsigned guys with no star potential who would be better in that role, and I'm struggling.

You know, what about Matt Hardy? I know a year or so ago he was looking rough, but he seems to have had a full year on the indy scene with no incident, he's always been a decent worker, and while the crowd will always see him as a big deal, management will never see him above midcard, so it's perfect storm of guy who they don't need to push who has a bit of a name and can work some putting people over every week. Granted, a year of no incidents is probably a hilariously low bar for him to clear, but at least it's something.

Eh, I kind of understand the gripe with Billy Gunn's rehiring. Dave Taylor, Haku, Sean Morley and a ton of other horrendously talented vets are sitting around doing nothing right now, yet Gunn of all people gets the job.

Eh, I kind of understand the gripe with Billy Gunn's rehiring. Dave Taylor, Haku, Sean Morley and a ton of other horrendously talented vets are sitting around doing nothing right now, yet Gunn of all people gets the job.

Well, who's to say that any of these talented guys would be good at training developmental guys in the WWE style?

Agreed on the "doing =/= teaching" sentiments. There's this assumption that some people always have, that if you're really good at doing something, you should have no problem with teaching it to others. Which is flatly untrue. And there's plenty of guys who wouldn't necessarily be good at doing something, but are excellent at imparting the theory of that thing to others. Most of you guys have never set foot inside a ring, but there's plenty of sages on this board who could do a much better job of explaining what's important in wrestling than lots of actual great wrestlers. Take Bobby Eaton, for example: one of the best to ever lace up the boots, yet he relied so much on instinct and personal talent that he's infamously bad at trying to sit down and explain why he does what he does.

Yeah, great trainers aren't always great workers, and vice versa.

That's true.

 

Still, I always get a kick out of listening to Lance Storm explain what should and shouldn't be done, including talking about cutting promos.

Eh, I kind of understand the gripe with Billy Gunn's rehiring. Dave Taylor, Haku, Sean Morley and a ton of other horrendously talented vets are sitting around doing nothing right now, yet Gunn of all people gets the job.

I'm pretty sure Taylor was employed as a trainer at some point, maybe it just wasn't a good fit. Morley probably has more to do with the weird youtube videos.

The point about wrestling ability not necessarily correlating with training ability is certainly well-considered. I can only offer the following retort:

 

 

Billy Gunn, dude.

Pro Wrestling 2012, folks:

 

WWE has revealed the total votes for the Slammy Awards, which you can see below. The company said that the total Slammy votes cast totalled over 583,000:

 

* Kiss of the Year = 95,581

* Superstar of the Year = 93,805

* LOL Moment of the Year = 81,131

* Trending Now Award = 74,386

* Match of the Year = 70,568

 

The link at the top is annoying, but this is a classic collection of mostly Hyper Ric going crackpot.

I showed this video to a non-wrestling fan friend. His response to the second clip: "What the fuck did he just do? Is he fighting himself?"

 

Later in the video, he made the following observation: "He's not gonna die normal, is he?"

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Pro Wrestling 2012, folks:

 

WWE has revealed the total votes for the Slammy Awards, which you can see below. The company said that the total Slammy votes cast totalled over 583,000:

 

* Kiss of the Year = 95,581

* Superstar of the Year = 93,805

* LOL Moment of the Year = 81,131

* Trending Now Award = 74,386

* Match of the Year = 70,568

 

There were also awards given not on the show. The above also doesn't have the Comeback of the Year that Lawler did win.

I don't know what this means but last night I had a dream I was watching a classical music concert preformed by Al Snow, Mick Foley, Terry Funk, Blue Demon, Black Terry (wearing Steve Corino's Monster C mask), Jim Breaks & a bunch of random no bodies. After the show I was hanging out with Gabe Sapolsky talking about how we needed to track down Breaks because he was a drunk who'd blow all his pay off on booze and Hyundai cars then black out & not remember any of it.....

Saturday Morning Slam is the bestest. Remember you can't strike to the head also:

 

 

Super Luchas reported today that Antonio Inoki has converted to Islam and has changed his name to Mohammad Hussein.......wow

From everything I've heard about Inoki, that's probably not even in the top ten craziest things he's ever done. Anyone else remember when he convinced some government to buy an island because he seriously thought they'd find buried pirate treasure there?

Super Luchas reported today that Antonio Inoki has converted to Islam and has changed his name to Mohammad Hussein.......wow

Haha, my boss at the club's name is Mohammad Hussein. He goes by "Marty", though.

This is just something that isn't well known and not quite "news," isn't it? Ohtani's Jacket brought it up here a while back.

Inoki "converted" to Islam in 1990. The batshit part was that instead of calling himself Ali he took the Hussein part from Saddam Hussein. I think this is news again because he's revisited Pakistan.

Well, before the Gulf War, Saddam Hussein was a "good guy". Inoki's totally insane anyway.