Imagining WCW somehow keeping their version of New Generation wrestlers into the nWo era genuinely bums me out. Like imagining Pillman, Austin, Cactus Jack, Vader, and so on, somehow part of the WCW resistance, in some capacity, and then beyond with a proper finish to the nWo angle in '98ish. It obviously could never happen, and Austin probably never becomes Austin without the ECW run first, but still, fantasy land, imagining best case scenarios, it's so beautiful to think about.

Holy shit, you learn something new every day. Was just listening to Cornette on Austin's podcast recently; I had no idea that Bobby Fulton was from Chillicothe, which is less than a half hour away from where I grew up. Pretty damn cool. I've always said that Ohio has given a lot of great but underrated talent to the wrestling world.

Oct 13, 2021 23:46:00 GMT Baker said:

I really hope rad is not referring to Memphis great Lance Russell. He's the 2nd best to ever do it imo.

I kind of get where he's coming from through if my supposition does turn out to be true. All the old timers called Gordon Solie the GOAT when I was younger and I always thought he was boring. Only thing I liked about Gordo was the way he pronounced suplex as "suplay." Didn't really come around on Solie until I heard him call a match between Tracy Smothers and A BEAR completely straight. It's hard to top Gordon Solie putting over the natural scientific wrestling skills possessed by bears. It was great. But Lance is still better. He was often the lone voice of reason in Memphis... the anchor that kept the wild and woolly world of Memphis wrestling from going completely off the rails. I kind of like those "friendly uncle" 80s commentators as a whole- Lance, Dave Brown, Bob Caudle, Boyd Pierce, etc. They brought a certain gravitas to the proceedings by not being over the top characters.

Fuck, he was one of them lol. He was better than his co-host I'll say, and whoever was the on-screen commissioner/authority figure was the worst of all three. He might grow on me the more I watch Memphis wrestling; I used to dislike Don West but eventually that changed, same with Jeff Jarrett on a wrestling level.

Oct 14, 2021 5:09:12 GMT Kilgore said:

Imagining WCW somehow keeping their version of New Generation wrestlers into the nWo era genuinely bums me out. Like imagining Pillman, Austin, Cactus Jack, Vader, and so on, somehow part of the WCW resistance, in some capacity, and then beyond with a proper finish to the nWo angle in '98ish. It obviously could never happen, and Austin probably never becomes Austin without the ECW run first, but still, fantasy land, imagining best case scenarios, it's so beautiful to think about.

Goddammit, you're confusing me again now whether that epic WCW rebook on the old PW was you or Baker-man. Or maybe I'm mixing memories of two different ones? I know Paul "Romeo" Roma was Baker. But I also recall the first year of the rebook concluding with like Austin, Pillman, Cactus, and Dustin clad all in black or something as like a proto-version of Nexus or Shield to combat the incoming Hulk Hogan?

Kilgore brought up WCW, the greatest "the one that got away" in the history of wrestling promotions. So time for some random WCW takes I guess:

- Mortis could have been a transitional main eventer/upper midcarder had he been in New Gen WWF rather than nWo era WCW. Wrong place, wrong time unfortunately. He could have been the original Kane (not the actual character but slotted into that position) and the matches would have been much better, too.

- I'd have done everything possible to sign RVD around 1999-00. Get your head out your asses and send some fucking fruit baskets, ya cheap motherfuckers.

- Recent booking idea but I'm sure someone else thought of it on here before: The NWA invasion should have been in WCW. It makes a lot more sense in terms of storyline. Flair, Dusty, Arn, Windham, JJ Dillon, (eventually Jarrett), Zbyszko, Eaton, etc. - you've got a ton of talent to make a faction there that's the complete antithesis of the nWo and a more viable threat than 4H was in terms of the numbers game. They'd still get buried probably but it would have at least been better than the joke that we got in the Fed.

- 3 Count could have been better had they dropped the boy band schtick and instead did something more akin to Tyler Breeze/Zoolander. Helms was probably charismatic enough even then to pull it off and they all looked the part. Split Helms from them eventually, rename Karagias/Moore as "2 Beautiful" or something, add a valet/manager and bam - Helms is your new Cruiser star and you have a decent tag team to eat some pins in a division that was beginning to struggle.

- 2000 roster was far from terrible. I think people lose sight of this because of how shitty the booking was, but they were still really stacked, they just made almost everyone look worthless because Russo see, Russo bro.

- Kilgore's post also has me sad. Now I really wanna see:
Pillman v. Any cruiser, but namely Jericho
Goldberg v. Vader
nWo v. Dangerous Alliance
Cactus v. Anyone in a hardcore division that doesn't suck balls
Hollywood Blonds v. AMERICAN MALES (American Males! American Males!) (or Harlem Heat or The Steiners, I guess... Laaaaame)

🤯 Good memory. That was me- The Revolution. Great idea. They debuted by hijacking Starrcade '94 during the Sting/Hogan main event.

rad The boring authority figure you're referring to is likely either Jerry Jarrett or Eddie Marlin. Jerry Jarrett looked like my dad and was acknowledged as the promoter onscreen. Marlin was Jarrett's real life father-in-law and filled the role of "matchmaker" (booker) on tv. He was an older gentleman who had a thick Southern accent. Guessing that's who you're referring to. Unless you watched that one video I posted in the USWA thread and are thinking of Tom Renesto?

I grew up on Jack Tunney as WWF Commissioner. If you don't know who he is, "dull and neutral" is the best way to describe him. He was ideal for the role of bland authority figure who only appeared on rare occasions to make important announcements. It wasn't until I got older and rewatched some classic WWF that I realized he was dry as a granddaddy's scalp. But you know what? After 10-15 years of big personalities in the authority figure role who were blatantly biased towards one side or another, there came a time when I longed for the return of a neutral Jack Tunney-style figure to call it right down the middle.
=======================
The real reason I popped into this thread right now is because something made me think of JBL's amazing subtle diss of Batista at work today and I just had to share it...

This was during the build to Batista/Taker at WM 23. It was an episode of Smackdown with JBL on commentary. The Wrestling God said something like "Sure, Batista has a chance to end Undertaker's Streak. He's better than King Kong Bundy! Better than Giant Gonzalez!"  :rofl: I was rolling. Incredible stealth insult. Talk about damning with faint praise. The best part is it probably went over the heads of most people (including Big Dave). 

Think the Dave match is the first time Taker Mania matches were really starting to be of quality.

Yes 17 was fun and 18 had the AA Spinebuster, but up to that point I think if it wasn't bad we lumped it as good. Far from the case until this point.

Clearly they had a point to prove getting demoted that show to Cena/HBK despite Taker winning the Rumble. Office did not have faith.

Oct 14, 2021 19:04:34 GMT @ness said:

Think the Dave match is the first time Taker Mania matches were really starting to be of quality.

Yes 17 was fun and 18 had the AA Spinebuster, but up to that point I think if it wasn't bad we lumped it as good. Far from the case until this point.

Clearly they had a point to prove getting demoted that show to Cena/HBK despite Taker winning the Rumble. Office did not have faith.

Was Taker/Orton poop aside from the chokeslam-RKO spot?

Oct 14, 2021 20:22:30 GMT 🤯 said:

Oct 14, 2021 19:04:34 GMT @ness said:

Think the Dave match is the first time Taker Mania matches were really starting to be of quality.

Yes 17 was fun and 18 had the AA Spinebuster, but up to that point I think if it wasn't bad we lumped it as good. Far from the case until this point.

Clearly they had a point to prove getting demoted that show to Cena/HBK despite Taker winning the Rumble. Office did not have faith.

Was Taker/Orton poop aside from the chokeslam-RKO spot?

Only part I remember honestly. Like it could literally be like that Eddy/Rock match that was one great spot but otherwise a long resthold for all I know.

As I unintentionally forgot to include Dustin Rhodes in the WCW New Generation (because I found him utterly forgettable minus the Stunning Steve matches), I can't help but wonder if this is one of my weird opinions:

Has anyone with Dustin Rhodes generally very good reputation absolutely sucked more? For all the good things one could say about his in-ring work, uh, most of his runs were bad.

Natural Dustin Rhodes matches are generally, not as good as I remember. Even the aforementioned Stunning Steve matches, their first Halloween Havoc match was the best, then gradually declined in quality. No one remembers the end of this run particularly positively as he was just sort of there.

First run Goldust: The gimmick was cool, I guess, it was certainly provocative ... But the matches are shit. Oh my god, they are so bad.

Attitude Era Goldust: He still sucks in the ring, but now his gimmick has been fully Russofied, and I'm changing the channel to Nitro every single time.

Back to WCW Dustin Rhodes: Mostly bad, the aborted Seven, then he's just kinda there. Remember his matches being decent throwback NWA style matches towards the end, but this is a sliding scale, my friends. Like he went from unwatchable to not horrible.

Return to WWF: The first bit I remember was in the hardcore division, and he once again, sucked. The Booker teaming starts somewhere after that, people seem to love it, but I peaced out wrestling by then, so I'll just take people's word for it.

Third and fourth returns to WWE (TNA run in the middle): I've heard no one talk about these, good or bad, Dustin in his patented spot of just there.

Fifth return to WWE: This is the one people like, teaming with Cody, apparently Dustin started incorporating some new movez, people were stoked about the whole thing. But wikipedia tells me that was 2013-2015, and Dustin was there til 2019, so were these four more years of him just being there?

We're at AEW now, and there's only like 6 years where it seems like he's doing anything decent, and I'm being extremely charitable including Natural, and first year Goldust stuff as part of that tally, and just taking people's word that Bookdust and Rhodes Bros was good. Because I personally got like 18 months tops, where Rhodes/Goldust is interesting.

Basically, what's the fucking deal with Dustin Rhodes? Does his reputation greatly exceed what he's done? Most of his career seems to be alternating between just there and wrestlecrap. Am I wrong? I need answers.

Oct 14, 2021 21:23:46 GMT Kilgore said:

As I unintentionally forgot to include Dustin Rhodes in the WCW New Generation (because I found him utterly forgettable minus the Stunning Steve matches), I can't help but wonder if this is one of my weird opinions:

Has anyone with Dustin Rhodes generally very good reputation absolutely sucked more? For all the good things one could say about his in-ring work, uh, most of his runs were bad.

Natural Dustin Rhodes matches are generally, not as good as I remember. Even the aforementioned Stunning Steve matches, their first Halloween Havoc match was the best, then gradually declined in quality. No one remembers the end of this run particularly positively as he was just sort of there.

First run Goldust: The gimmick was cool, I guess, it was certainly provocative ... But the matches are shit. Oh my god, they are so bad.

Attitude Era Goldust: He still sucks in the ring, but now his gimmick has been fully Russofied, and I'm changing the channel to Nitro every single time.

Back to WCW Dustin Rhodes: Mostly bad, the aborted Seven, then he's just kinda there. Remember his matches being decent throwback NWA style matches towards the end, but this is a sliding scale, my friends. Like he went from unwatchable to not horrible.

Return to WWF: The first bit I remember was in the hardcore division, and he once again, sucked. The Booker teaming starts somewhere after that, people seem to love it, but I peaced out wrestling by then, so I'll just take people's word for it.

Third and fourth returns to WWE (TNA run in the middle): I've heard no one talk about these, good or bad, Dustin in his patented spot of just there.

Fifth return to WWE: This is the one people like, teaming with Cody, apparently Dustin started incorporating some new movez, people were stoked about the whole thing. But wikipedia tells me that was 2013-2015, and Dustin was there til 2019, so were these four more years of him just being there?

We're at AEW now, and there's only like 6 years where it seems like he's doing anything decent, and I'm being extremely charitable including Natural, and first year Goldust stuff as part of that tally, and just taking people's word that Bookdust and Rhodes Bros was good. Because I personally got like 18 months tops, where Rhodes/Goldust is interesting.

Basically, what's the fucking deal with Dustin Rhodes? Does his reputation greatly exceed what he's done? Most of his career seems to be alternating between just there and wrestlecrap. Am I wrong? I need answers.

I think people got caught up in this 20 plus year veteran actually improving which warped a lot of people's perspective. He's like a stat compiler now going on 30 plus years of okay to mediocre in ring  work (I never thought he outright sucked) topped with a few good but not outstanding years in what should be the twilight of his career. Seeing how high he ranked in the PWO greatest wrestler list floored me. I will say though his character work since transforming into to Goldust I've grown to appreciate in retrospect. He managed to capture his own charisma which made him escape from the rather large shadow of his father and left his own unique mark on the business, huge kudos to him on that front.

Oct 14, 2021 23:57:42 GMT Shootist said:

Seeing how high he ranked in the PWO greatest wrestler list floored me.

Genuinely, few moments ever made me feel more out of touch than seeing the Volk Han fanclub having Dustin Rhodes, like, Top 20 all time, or wherever they had him.

EDIT: Dustin Rhodes was ranked the #32 greatest wrestler of all time by PWO.

Oct 15, 2021 0:03:42 GMT Kilgore said:

Oct 14, 2021 23:57:42 GMT Shootist said:

Seeing how high he ranked in the PWO greatest wrestler list floored me.

Genuinely, few moments ever made me feel more out of touch than seeing the Volk Han fanclub having Dustin Rhodes, like, Top 20 all time, or wherever they had him.

Yeah, making it seem like he was putting on near Bret Hart quality matches on TV for 20 plus years on a consistent basis was a bit much. 

Overall though he's not as deserving of a massive pushback on current fan's praise like an Edge or a Chris Jericho. Edge and Jericho fanboism over the last 5-10 years  has really started to grate on me. Edge has firmly moved on to the overrated list with me while Jericho, as much as I liked him, isn't too far behind.

Yes, Chris Jericho entering GOAT discussion is insane to me and I was an OG Jerichoholic. That seemed to be a very limited window of discussion that has already passed by, however.

I like Goldustin a lot more than you guys and still think he's become insanely overrated by your PWO types.

I was there when the Dustin Rhodes Movement began. It started as literally one guy doing a "Dustin of the Day" project which was basically him saying "Hey, Dustin Rhodes is actually a lot better than you think. Here are some cool matches to check out." Within 10-15 years he went from "probably a little underrated" to "32nd greatest wrestler of all time." Absolute madness. As a Dustin Rhodes moderate, I will give the pros and cons...

His staunchest supporters are really high on his first WCW run. They love him as a babyface tag wrestler....a 6'6 Ricky Morton....or Barry Windham with no offense, if you prefer. But here's the counterargument. Most of those tag matches his supporters point to saw him in the ring with legit all timers in the Dangerous Alliance. Pretty hard to have a bad tag match with any combination of those guys.

The Bunkhouse Buck matches and a Vader Clash match are also revered in certain circles. I personally really like the Austin Halloween Havoc match. Kilgore was the one who turned me on to that one and I ended probably liking it more than he does. Counterargument: The high profile Rick Rude matches were snoozers. He was a lousy squasher. And he had another snoozer on PPV with Austin at Starrcade 1993. Plus he did little of note quality-wise during his last year with the company when he wasn't being pushed strongly as he had been in previous years.

I was a huge fan of the Goldust character during its first year but even in real time I realized the matches stunk. Only ones I remember liking were a Savio match or two on Raw and another Raw match with Michaels. The HBK match doesn't even hold up all that well. Strobe once made the argument that Goldust having any matches that were even decent is a feather in his cap given the character he was playing. You guys can debate the merits that argument.

Then he sucked for two and a half years as both a character and wrestler, having go away heat with me during that time with the exception of one brief blip when he reverted back to the "classic" Goldust character. But that only lasted like two weeks before I got bored again.

By this point most people, including myself, thought he was washed up....at age 30. He went back to WCW. Got off to a rocky start. But as time went on I read a lot of WCW show reports (because I certainly wasn't watching that crap) about Dustin getting good babyface reactions. A lot of people also really liked the Dustin/Dusty vs. Flair/JJ match/feud because it was old school NWA transplanted into the messy world of early 2000s WCW. I'll have to rate this run as an overall win because he defied expectations by (allegedly) getting over when most thought he was already past it.

Then he came back to WWF in 2002 for a Royal Rumble nostalgia appearance....only to stick around...and immediately get thrown into a PPV match with a red hot RVD. OK, that was weird, and I wasn't digging it. But he soon won me over again. The BookDust segments were comedy gold. Then they formed a legitimately good odd couple babyface tag team. I liked how they alternated from match to match with both guys filling the Ricky & Robert roles at different times. Got over. Had some really good matches with Christian & Jericho. Then WWF stupidly broke them up when BookDust vs. Baby Evolution would have been a money feud that also would have done wonders for Orton & Batista. Then came the awful Tourette's gimmick and accompanying Wrestlecrap. Then he was gone again.

He bounced back and forth between WWE & TNA over the next 6 years, allegedly* sucking the entire time. In particular, his TNA run as Black Reign is notoriously bad. Funny how all the diehard Dustin supporters tend to gloss over this 6 year run and all the bad 90s Goldust stuff.

*I say "allegedly" only because I personally saw very little of this stuff.  Not because I don't believe it sucked.

He came back to WWE again in 2009 for a well received run. This was sort of a lesser version of his more famous 2013 WWE comeback. He was getting rave reviews by the people who watched WWECW at the time....it's just that few people were still watching WWECW in 2009 so it largely went under the radar. Think he had Sheamus' first feud and that got so over they hotshot Sheamus to the championship a few months later. 

Then he disappeared for a couple years before having the great old man run in 2013-14 WWE. I'm biased as a longtime Goldust fan, but I marked out for the bits and pieces of this that I saw. Old man Goldust doing fancy 21st Century indie moves was a hoot. The Rhodes Brothers vs. Shield Raw match is my favorite match of the last decade. Extremely small sample size, mind you. Kilgore made a good point that I had never thought of before and don't know the answer to- What was he doing during those 4-5 years after the hot start to his return?

Don't know much about his AEW run other than that Cody match everybody loved a few years back. 

Verdict- Goldustin Rhodes is not the 32nd Greatest Wrestler of All Time. He had way too many bad stretches for that. He did make my PWO criteria Top 100 last when I last played around with a list about a year ago. But lower end- 80s or 90s. And keep in mind I've seen a lot less (diverse) wrestling than your average PWO poster. He fares much better on a Favorites List mainly because 95-96 Goldust ruled as a character. 

*That ran long so I'll have to cover Edge and Jericho tomorrow. But you better believe I have some thoughts...

Going to use this as a dumping ground for wrestling shirts seen in the wild. Feel free to join in.

I'll go months, if not years, without seeing a single wrestling shirt in public. Then BAM! 2 in a week. What is this, the Attitude Era? Maybe wrestling isn't dying after all? Anyway, this time it was a young guy wearing a Hulkamania shirt. Guessing he was a high schooler. Schools were closed here in Baltimore County today... College kid at the oldest. Meaning this guy likely wasn't even born when old man Hogan made his 2002 WWF return and now I just feel old. Here is the shirt...

SPOILER: Click to show

{Spoiler}

I think there's an AEW fan at work. Honestly not sure if he still works here (Baker can confirm that rca turnover) but I recall him having a backpack (those pullstring types) with the AEW logo. Never had the social fortitude to broach the wrestling subject for fear of coming off like a mark.

Oct 15, 2021 19:10:57 GMT @ness said:

I think there's an AEW fan at work. Honestly not sure if he still works here (Baker can confirm that rca turnover) but I recall him having a backpack (those pullstring types) with the AEW logo. Never had the social fortitude to broach the wrestling subject for fear of coming off like a mark.

Just do it, what's the worst that can happen?

What does "coming off like a mark" mean? Being a fan of wrestling? Well, you are a fan of wrestling. So is he. Nothing to be ashamed of. Go for it!

@ness, just offer to touch his dick before bringing up wrestling. Then being a fan of wrestling or not will be a moot point of embarrassment after.

Oct 15, 2021 3:31:44 GMT Baker said:

*That ran long so I'll have to cover Edge and Jericho tomorrow. But you better believe I have some thoughts...

Don't really feel like going into deep detail like I did with Goldustin, but I'm with you guys on Jericho being a laughable GOAT contender. He was never the top guy! People get a kick out of Cornette's "he was the guy who works with the top guy" line about Triple H. Well, that's my take on Jericho. Truth is I've always been the low vote on Jericho. Which is why few somewhat commonly held wrestling opinions have made me scratch my head more than the idea of Jericho as a serious GOAT candidate.
=============
Edge is interesting just because of how consensus opinion has flip flopped on him over the years. From about 2005-2009 he was an internet darling who could do no wrong. An entire generation of Cena-hating fans viewed him as the anti-Cena, which made him a breath of fresh air. Back then I (mostly) liked Edge, but did think he was a little overrated, just as I always thought Jericho was overrated.

Then I left the IWC for 3 years. Edge was forced to retire early from injuries during this period. So you'd assume Edge would be even more overhyped due to the tragic tale of a career cut short. Wrong! When I returned to reading about wrestling online, consensus had done a 180 and Edge was now considered "overrated" or simply "not very good." What the hell happened in those 3 years to turn all these Edgeheads into Edge haters? 

TL;DR- Thought he was a little overhyped in the 2000s, but became underrated in the 2010s. 

Verdict- Jericho and Edge are basically the same guy if we're talking strictly WWE careers. If I had to make a Greatest WWE Wrestler list they'd probably be back to back in Tier 3 just above Angle (mainly due to longevity) & Eddie. Jericho obviously trumps Edge overall simply because he worked more places. But a few midcard runs outside of WWE and an old man AEW main event run aren't enough to boost him 50-100 spots or whatever above Edge. Both are laughable GOAT candidates. Yet I still rate both comfortably above Goldustin Rhodes.

Jericho vs. Edge (in an all timer discussion) is clearly Jericho to me because I hold a strong belief that working at the top of a hotter period means significantly more than during a colder period. While Jericho was never The Guy, he was working singles main events during the Attitude Era, which means more than Edge's (probably longer) period of working main events as the business begins its nosedive during Ruthless Aggression.

This is also why I rank Backlund and Cena types much lower than, like, the fourth or fifth banana of boon period (in a discussion strictly about drawing power, obviously).

Oct 16, 2021 1:52:46 GMT Kilgore said:

While Jericho was never The Guy, he was working singles main events during the Attitude Era

Was he though? Jericho's first main event was the KOTR 2001 triple threat against Austin & Benoit. The widely accepted AE end date is Wrestlemania X7 which was 2-3 months prior to KOTR.

EDIT: Unless you're counting Raw/Smackdown main events, in which case....I'd have to check.

Oct 16, 2021 2:02:00 GMT Baker said:

Oct 16, 2021 1:52:46 GMT Kilgore said:

While Jericho was never The Guy, he was working singles main events during the Attitude Era

Was he though? Jericho's first main event was the KOTR 2001 triple threat against Austin & Benoit. The widely accepted AE end date is Wrestlemania X7 which was 2-3 months prior to KOTR.

EDIT: Unless you're counting Raw/Smackdown main events, in which case....I'd have to check.

I was thinking of the title "win" against Triple H on Raw when I wrote that, which was 2000, I think. An Attitude Era crowd HYPED that Jericho won the title, until it was reversed. 

Oct 16, 2021 2:22:14 GMT Kilgore said:

Oct 16, 2021 2:02:00 GMT Baker said:

Was he though? Jericho's first main event was the KOTR 2001 triple threat against Austin & Benoit. The widely accepted AE end date is Wrestlemania X7 which was 2-3 months prior to KOTR.

EDIT: Unless you're counting Raw/Smackdown main events, in which case....I'd have to check.

I was thinking of the title "win" against Triple H on Raw when I wrote that, which was 2000, I think. An Attitude Era crowd HYPED that Jericho won the title, until it was reversed. 

Jericho was getting a work-out in early 2001, plenty of TV main events. 

RAW 29.01.2001 - Fatal 4 Way
SD 27.03.2001 - Tag Team Match
SD 03.04.2001 - IC Title Match
RAW 21.05.2001 - Winning the Tag Titles
SD 22.05.2001 - TLC 
RAW 04.06.2001 - WWF Title Match
SD 05.06.2001 - Defending the Tag Titles
RAW 18.06.2001 - 6 Man Tag
King Of The Ring 2001 Title Match

32 viewing HOW.

Oct 16, 2021 20:28:41 GMT @ness said:

32 viewing HOW.

They're all aboard the Lex Express.

Oct 16, 2021 20:28:41 GMT @ness said:

32 viewing HOW.

It's gotta be...

KANE!!! 🔥 🔥 🔥 🔥

For no real reason I'm trying to group WrestleManias into sets that make sense together.

Like the "Attitude" WrestleManias, for instance, I feel like would be the five shows spanning WM13 through WrestleMan X-Seve; the "New Generation" WrestleManias would be the five spanning WM8 through WM12; etc.

To me, the "Get the F Out" WrestleManias would seem to be WMX8 through WM22. The thinking being it witnesses a transition from WWF being a bit aimless in the wake of the wake of the Invasion and departures of Rock and Austin... to the rebrand as WWE, experiments like the brand split, searching for the next "star" in OVW call-ups, and HHH happily filling the void in the meantime until Cena is fully cemented.

Just trying to think if WM1 through WM7 can or should be subdivided, or just lumped together as the "Hulkamania" WrestleManias? WM1 through WM3 feel like a set, as do WM5 through WM7, with WM4 being sort of a bridge between the two sets (fittingly as it's the first WrestleMania where Hogan isn't champion going in or coming out of the show).

Anyway... Time to start listening to The Obstacle is The Way.

Oct 14, 2021 21:23:46 GMT Kilgore said:

As I unintentionally forgot to include Dustin Rhodes in the WCW New Generation (because I found him utterly forgettable minus the Stunning Steve matches), I can't help but wonder if this is one of my weird opinions:

Has anyone with Dustin Rhodes generally very good reputation absolutely sucked more? For all the good things one could say about his in-ring work, uh, most of his runs were bad.

Natural Dustin Rhodes matches are generally, not as good as I remember. Even the aforementioned Stunning Steve matches, their first Halloween Havoc match was the best, then gradually declined in quality. No one remembers the end of this run particularly positively as he was just sort of there.

First run Goldust: The gimmick was cool, I guess, it was certainly provocative ... But the matches are shit. Oh my god, they are so bad.

Attitude Era Goldust: He still sucks in the ring, but now his gimmick has been fully Russofied, and I'm changing the channel to Nitro every single time.

Back to WCW Dustin Rhodes: Mostly bad, the aborted Seven, then he's just kinda there. Remember his matches being decent throwback NWA style matches towards the end, but this is a sliding scale, my friends. Like he went from unwatchable to not horrible.

Return to WWF: The first bit I remember was in the hardcore division, and he once again, sucked. The Booker teaming starts somewhere after that, people seem to love it, but I peaced out wrestling by then, so I'll just take people's word for it.

Third and fourth returns to WWE (TNA run in the middle): I've heard no one talk about these, good or bad, Dustin in his patented spot of just there.

Fifth return to WWE: This is the one people like, teaming with Cody, apparently Dustin started incorporating some new movez, people were stoked about the whole thing. But wikipedia tells me that was 2013-2015, and Dustin was there til 2019, so were these four more years of him just being there?

We're at AEW now, and there's only like 6 years where it seems like he's doing anything decent, and I'm being extremely charitable including Natural, and first year Goldust stuff as part of that tally, and just taking people's word that Bookdust and Rhodes Bros was good. Because I personally got like 18 months tops, where Rhodes/Goldust is interesting.

Basically, what's the fucking deal with Dustin Rhodes? Does his reputation greatly exceed what he's done? Most of his career seems to be alternating between just there and wrestlecrap. Am I wrong? I need answers.

I never saw the original WCW Dustin Rhodes and still haven't outside of that terrible moving truck match. Apparently I'm not missing much. I always just figured he got a prolonged David Sammartino/George Gulas treatment and then WWF just spun that shit into gold (pun intended).

"Artist Formerly Known As" was the worst era for me. The fucking ball-gag and pink hair, christ almighty...

BookDust is probably my favorite offbeat tag team ever. They were honestly one of the better reasons to watch Raw at a time when Heyman was churning out magic almost every week on Smackdown.

From what I have watched, I'd say Dustin's a solid worker. Not amazing and not even as good as his brother but still solid. I don't see him on a card and cringe like it's Khali, but he also shouldn't be near anyone's Top 100.

I love putting eras together.

I just lump the entire Hulkamania era into it's own series. Wrestlemania through to IX and if we have to sub-divide it's Wrestlemania I-III, Wrestlemania IV - VI, Wrestlemania XII-IX. I - III is Hogan building his legacy culminating in his victory against Andre infront of a record crowd. The middle portion is the downfall where we watch another friendship disintergrate while a young fresh upstart debuts at IV and ultimately beats Hogan at VI in a match where everything that could go wrong for Hogan did. Then VII - IX is retribution where he has to step up and take care of Slaughter because Warrior failed to do it. Wrestlemania VIII is his swansong and IX is the for real swansong.

X-XII is the New Generation era built largely around Shawn Michaels stealing the show at Wrestlemania X, falling short at XI before going over at XII.

XIII works as the birth of Stone Cold X-Seve is the perfect culmination. I'd still throw X-8 since it still has the Attitude era production but it's more like an epilogue with a Monday Night Wars flavour with DDP, Booker T, Ric Flair, The Outsiders and Hogan all featured prominently. XIX can work as a transitional Wrestlemania as you wrap up the Austin era and move onto the HBK era with him making his comeback.

I see XIX-XXVI as the Michaels era where he's the focus of the show and as long as he's belting out classics it doesn't matter. We get the Jericho comeback match, the WMXX main event, the instant classic against Angle, the McMahon match which led to the biggest program of 2006, the XXIII main event, the Ric Flair retirement, the showstealer against Taker and finally his retirement match.

XXVII-XXX is all about the Undertaker slowly but surely meeting his maker at the hands of the conqeror Brock Lesnar. HHH going over Brock even kind of works as Taker underestimates Brock only to get annihiliated Rocky IV style.

XXXI-now is all about the Roman Empire. From failing to get the job done to dominating both Edge and Daniel Bryan in one of the most dominant victories in Wrestlemania history. It's also the one era you'll never rewatch.