Who makes your proverbial "boys club" (or gals) list? Someone you mark out for personally but isn't/wasn't a main eventer and seems to be overlooked or not appreciated enough by the majority of wrestling fans. I've shared a few of mine in passing but thought it would be fun to make this thread and compile a list, but more so I'm interested in reading everyone elses...

Big Show - This one may be a surprise to some but I did grow up with the best version of Show in WWE when Heyman booked him properly. Technically cheating right off the bat but who saw Show as a true main eventer for most of his run really? I have a soft spot for Paul Wight as he was made into a joke when he should have put the punch in the punchline. He also suffers from a dumb fucking name that never got over with me, but in spite of that, he's still one of my favorite giants ever.

Billy Kidman - He was my very first avatar on PW and the SSP will probably always be my favorite diving finisher. People sometimes forget how over he was in WCW and that he was a bigger star than Rey at one point in time. If only Billy could have cut a better promo. I feel like his time in WWE in particular is grossly overlooked at times.

Daffney - Amazing promo. Great facial expressions. Great look. Beautfiul, good wrestler. How the hell she never got more over than she did is mind-boggling to me. She could have been a great addition to guys like Raven, Sean O'Haire or even maybe Kevin Thorn had she made the switch from TNA to the E. She was an afterthought at times in the Knockouts Division, which was disappointing. Definitely underrated among casuals.

The Hurricane - WAZZUP WIT DAT!?!? Probably not as underrated as I think, but the gimmick too often outshined the exceptional performer that he was.

Jerry Lynn - Should have been a bigger deal than he was. Had he been bigger physically, who knows? Always thought he could have done more in WWE and should have been the lynchpin for their new Cruiser division.

Kanyon/Mortis - He's not as underrated as he used to be but Kanyon had a wealth of untapped potential. He could have and should have flourished more. In spite of all his hardships, he made the absolute best out of overcoming his talent weaknesses, but unfortunately he couldn't conquer the personal ones.

New Jack - Felt this way before he died: One of the greatest promos ever and his name never even cracks the Top 10-20 on most articles. A lot of that is his own undoing, but facts are facts - New Jack was one of the greatest on the stick EVER. Even in TNA he was dropping gold on the mic, it wasn't just ECW or SMW. He belongs in that conversation at the very fucking least.

Shark Boy - Sharky is from Dayton so im a little biased here. But I used to watch him on local HWA syndication (It's also where I got to see Nigel McGuinness for the first time) early in my markhood and he got pretty over with me before I even knew that. I have a soft spot for goofy characters as everyone knows.

Steve Blackman - Underutilized as fuck by 1999-2000. I don't think Steve was main event worthy by any means, but he was Chuck Norris on a pro wrestling show and while he had pretty much no verbal charisma, he did have a great and intense look that a lot of modern workers lack today. He deserved just a little better than the run he got.

Stevie Richards - Just add more muscle + better booking and who knows? Extremely underrated on the mic, always solid in the ring. He unfortunately had that "midcard look". I think it's shit that RTC was the height of his E run and then the stupid TNA doctor bit. Blegh.

Tajiri - Absolutely nothing was cooler to me in 2002-03 than Tajiri's green mist. Never put on a bad match, could go with anyone. Had an underrated comedic team with William Regal that got split up too soon. Proved to me that you didn't need to speak fluent English to get over in America; Tajiri's talking in the ring was sufficient enough for me.

Test - One of my favorite bigs ever who got a pretty raw deal in '99 (pun slightly intended). A better in-ring worker than I think he's given credit for. By all accounts sounded like a good dude, too. I actually don't see Test in the main event, just better runs as a singles worker and T&A is an underrated tag team that had potential but were simply big small fish in a bigger divisional pond.

Honorable mentions:
Caveman Ugg - A little biased because I wrote an article on him. Great look, decent in-ring and I love the gimmick. He's not very well known outside of Aussieland so I drop the name whenever I can. Imagine The Barbarian + a more agile Killian Dain. Had some fun matches with Bronson Reed that are worth checking out if you have the time.

Definitely a few missing here. Left out guys like Malenko and Regal because (at least by this point) they're almost overrated by how much people hype up their underrated-ness. I'm sure a few more will come to mind.

But with that being said, interested to see what others mention here. SHOOT!

Bumping this for @ness and Others. Have at it.

Cool topic that should have gained traction the first time around. I just didn't feel like playing along since a good portion of my posts over nine years have been dedicated to putting over my boys and a handful of gals. I'd just be repeating myself.

How did I miss this thread? Quality bump and timely as well because I was going to say during our mini-Test appreciation tangent that Joey Abs was one of my 'boys' and he had good matches with Test as well.

If I ever watch a SmackDown circa 2006-07, you know I'm going to see that one episode where my man Elijah Burke took that spear from Batista like a champion. I won't call him a boy for obvious reasons, but I was all aboard the Elijah Express back in 2007.

Any member of the Jung Dragons qualifies - Kaz Hayashi, Jimmy 'Wang' Yang and Jamie (K)noble.

Does it count if I never watched their Mexico stuff? Because Mark Jindrak The Reflection of Perfection is one guy I'd happily fantasy book to the Main Event of Wrestlemania XXI. Jindrak vs. Orton - Wrestlemania XXII Dream match right there.

Take these three and throw Monty Brown, Bob Sapp, Chyna, and Jazz in there 

To qualify as a boy for me you can't have really any great matches. If you have several ****+ to your name you don't meet my criteria. You have to not be a star and overness in question. Maybe you had a cool look, a few moves or whatever... basically if you're not a star but you have a likeability to you.

Hardcore, Billy Gunn and Test we've talked about.

Put me in with Blackman and Shamrock as well (though to his credit Shamrock did have that 3-way cage with Rock/Mankind) camp.

Erik Stevens from his ROH/FIP run, before he won the title there I was big into Ashley Remington/Dalton Castle but since in the latter he did become a "star" so he might not count. Also full on meta for having his OWN boys. I'm about to head to work and I'll expand on it more when I get back as I wanna look back at my time following indies and see if any former boys managed to break the mold and become men.

Another big time Blackman fan here. Always wanted more for him. His physique was always what I specifically aspired to too.

Jan 10, 2022 13:34:37 GMT 🤯 said:

Another big time Blackman fan here. Always wanted more for him. His physique was always what I specifically aspired to too.

The pump kick, lions den and a decent hardcore run. Plus he had legit tough guy cred.

rad could start a promotion with his club, jeez. That's a lotta names.

Mordecai

In retrospect he was an all-style-no-substance kinda wrestler, but boy was his style good. Incredible look, rarely have I seen a better look in wrestling. Appealed to my fantasy/geeky nature, and a great antithesis to The Undertaker. I loved him so much Mordecai was my online username for a while, before Borderlands came along and ruined my chance of getting Mordecai on any new websites. I say no substance, but I thought he was a pretty decent bruiser wrestler. The gimmick was far too short-lived.

When I opened this thread another WWE wrestler immediately sprang to mind but now I'm typing this post hours later I've forgotten.

Mordecai I wanted to succeed SO BADLY. I was so ready for those planned Taker/Eddy programs. Once he was repackaged as Kevin Thorn I had fully given up on the guy. I just loved the look with the blonde/white goatee and gear. Probably only got a PPV match due to the brand split roster limit.

Chris Sabin - it's like comparing Juventud Guerrera to Rey Mysterio Jr, meaning Sabin was unfortunate to be in the same division as AJ Styles. Potentially just as good, and maybe even better - but lacked something, whatever separated Styles from the herd in the early days of TNA. Considering what he was doing only a few years into his career is astonishing compared to how awful a lot of super jrs/cruiserweights today are, despite a decade in the business. 

Alex Shelley - should have been a big fuckin' deal. Charismatic, good looking, fonz-factor, maybe not quite as sharp as Sabin in the ring - but superstar feels. Was a massive missed opportunity for TNA, consider he only had 1 run as X-Division Champion. Why WWE didn't sign him, I don't know. Why AEW hasn't signed him considering the rub he and Sabin gave Gen Me, I don't know. 

Shane Helms - he shares little clips on his socials of sequences and spots, and in hindsight you realise just how good he was. He'll be remembered for his gimmick, but the ring work was 10/10. 

Brian Kendrick - another vanilla midget on my list. Paul London was probably the better performer if athletic ability is the only measuring stick. London was also a nut-job. Kendrick had the unfortunate problem of being short and lean in an era where short and lean wasn't as popular as it is now. Good performer, good talker. 10 years younger, he would have been one of NXT 1.0's top stars. 

Does anyone else find half the boys stables on OSW really underwhelming?

Half the picks are guys like Big Bossman, Jim Duggan, William Regal, Christian etc. who are bonafide legends.

A 'good' boy-pick follows the notion of a 'face only a mother could love' or in this case 'somebody Bake would consider a sleeper pick for his draft'.

Give me less Paul London who everyone knows is great and give me more KC James.

For me, Mordecai is a good pick. I'd expect his name to come up but he had a short-lived run, didn't really do anything of any real consequence but had enough turns at bat to make an impression. My favourite thing about Mordecai wasn't his 'bad-ass' persona but his cheesy Attitude Era style gimmick where he'd pray on behalf of whatever home town he was in.

Jan 10, 2022 23:36:26 GMT Emperor said:

rad could start a promotion with his club, jeez. That's a lotta names.

Mordecai

In retrospect he was an all-style-no-substance kinda wrestler, but boy was his style good. Incredible look, rarely have I seen a better look in wrestling. Appealed to my fantasy/geeky nature, and a great antithesis to The Undertaker. I loved him so much Mordecai was my online username for a while, before Borderlands came along and ruined my chance of getting Mordecai on any new websites. I say no substance, but I thought he was a pretty decent bruiser wrestler. The gimmick was far too short-lived.

When I opened this thread another WWE wrestler immediately sprang to mind but now I'm typing this post hours later I've forgotten.

Don't give me any ideas. I'll make a fan fic and then never finish it.

Hot take: Mordecai would have been infinitely cooler if not for his bleach blonde eyebrows.

Would the Mordecai gimmick have worked on a different worker? Who else could it have gone too around that time and potentially worked? Kevin Fertig clearly wasn't the guy.

Jan 11, 2022 15:08:53 GMT 🤯 said:

Would the Mordecai gimmick have worked on a different worker? Who else could it have gone too around that time and potentially worked? Kevin Fertig clearly wasn't the guy.

Like a ded srs Chris Daniels as the Higher Power?

Still find that one hard to stomach as a legit possibility despite the rumors.

Jan 11, 2022 15:12:31 GMT @ness said:

Jan 11, 2022 15:08:53 GMT 🤯 said:

Would the Mordecai gimmick have worked on a different worker? Who else could it have gone too around that time and potentially worked? Kevin Fertig clearly wasn't the guy.

Like a ded srs Chris Daniels as the Higher Power?

Still find that one hard to stomach as a legit possibility despite the rumors.

Agreed. Never would've worked. People who think it would've or even could've are such smarks.

Looking at who else was around WWE/OVW, best I can come up with is... Matt Morgan, Mark Jindrak, Luther Reigns, or Sean O'Haire. So I guess new characters in 2004 were all just doomed to fail (minus Eugene) because of no talent out there.

Jan 11, 2022 11:05:36 GMT Big Pete said:

A 'good' boy-pick follows the notion of a 'face only a mother could love' or in this case 'somebody Bake would consider a sleeper pick for his draft'.

Give me less Paul London who everyone knows is great and give me more KC James.

Agreed. The Gambler. Jake "The Milkman" Milliman. Ring Crew Express. Tom Brandi. Original New Breed. These are tru boyz. I'm not even sure Mongo qualifies tbh. Jacques Rougeau? No way. Far too successful. I'll just barely accept Henry O. Godwinn though. 
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Mordecai ruled even if the gimmick did have a limited shelf life. I just wish he would have stuck around long enough to get that sweet feud with Taker. Real reason he was taken off tv wasn't because "he sucked" but because Kevin Fertig was involved in a bar fight which lead to lawsuits being threatened. 

🤯 nailed it on potential Mordecai replacements. I think you needed a big boy to play the character and the talent just wasn't there at the time.

Christopher Daniels as the Higher Power was definitely a hot rumor back in the day. Doubt the idea ever crossed the mind of Vince or anybody important though. Imagine paying off this big angle during a boom period with an undersized, unproven no name. It would be like Ace Darling being the NWO's 3rd man. That's not even an exaggeration. We'd be talking about it today as an epic flop.

I remembered the other WWE guy.

Jack Swagger

Since his debut in WWECW, Jack Swagger was one of my favourite wrestlers in the whole company. By the time he became World Heavyweight Champion, undeservedly in the eyes of many, he was my favourite WWE wrestler. In many ways comparable to Kurt Angle: amateur wrestler with a singlet, lots of natural ability, picked up pro-wrestling very quickly, and had the ability to poke fun at himself.

My favourite part of Swagger's run is when he went all in on the character. He had the Swagger Soaring Eagle, in my mind the greatest mascot in pro-wrestling, the exaggerated heel promos where he gloated about himself and all his menial accomplishments. The drawback in this respect is that he didn't have the natural gift of the gab or comic timing as Kurt Angle, but in my mind his speaking ability was good enough.

Always enjoyed Swagger in the ring, plus he used the Doctor Bomb as a finish which is a beautiful and underrated move.

Moving onto another company...

Toru Yano

For those who don't know, this is Toru Yano.



No, no, not the guy on the left. He's not AJ Styles' alter ego.

He is New Japan Pro Wrestling's "Sublime Master Thief". Known in some circles as the "True Ace" of the company.

I'm not too well versed on his history, but what I know is that at some point in the past he was a no-nonsense bruiser type heel. Liked to bend the rules in standard heel fashion. A decent upper card talent but unremarkble in the grand scheme of things. Many wrestlers are like this, they don't find what makes them special and cruise on to a forgetful career. Yano did not do that. He found his niche. And while his brand of wrestling meant he would be a midcarder for life, he would also become one of the most unique and entertaining wrestlers on the roster.

Yano became a comedy wrestler. His gimmick revolved around him being very silly in the ring, treating wrestling matches as a joke by bending/breaking the rules, and infuriating his opposition. He started doing a mock version of the RVD thumb gesture. Not R-V-D but YANO-TO-RU. He would stall by running to the ropes, talk funny trash (I know it's funny because the crowd always laughs, not because I understand Japanese), remove the turnbuckle padding in full view of referee and opponent, pull the hair, use low blows, and spam rollups. His goofy light-hearted personality made it all work, and soon he became a staple of the G1 Climax.

The G1 Climax is the most gruelling tournament in all of wrestling, and it's a blessing to be drawn in the same block as Toru Yano. A match with him means a night off. Most likely a very short match (under 5 minutes), without having to take a single bump. Plus you get to have a lot of fun in the process. Many wrestlers use it as a chance to showcase their personality even more than normal.

In kayfabe, however, it's a curse. Yano is the ultimate wildcard. The hierarchy in G1 is pretty clear: midcarders almost never beat main eventers. Yano is the exception. He can beat literally anyone. Once he pinned Kota Ibushi in under 30 seconds. OK this was long before Ibushi became a top star, but still a huge result. He's defeated Kenny Omega at the height of his powers, Naito, Tanahashi, Shibata, and notably has a huge winning record against Minoru Suzuki. And this when Suzuki was an upper midcarder, not the jobber he is now. Hence the nickname Sublime Master Thief.

Yano kept evolving his act to stay fresh. One of his more recent tricks is to bring a lot of tape to the ring and tie his opponents to objects on the outside of the ring to get a countout victory. Many people have tried to beat Yano at his own game. Yes, a handful have succeeded, but for most it backfires horribly. Unfortunately, evne great things cannot last forever.

Sounds amazing, right? Well, a lot of people don't like Toru Yano. I don't know why. They are wrong, and they should be ashamed of themselves.

3-Minute Warning. I loved their beatdowns.

Jan 11, 2022 22:08:43 GMT Ed said:

3-Minute Warning. I loved their beatdowns.

Seconded. They were the tag team Brock to me. I latched onto both acts instantly and for life. Shame 3MW never really did anything of note.

As a tag team they did nothing but had okay midcard runs as singles. But they're samoans, they pretty much had wwe contracts at birth.

Jan 11, 2022 14:51:50 GMT rad said:

Don't give me any ideas. I'll make a fan fic

Go for it. The best thing I ever did on either version of PW was my all boys and girls fanfic fed- New Generation Wrestling. That's my PW magnum opus. Runner up would be the time I went back and counted every single dime Jeff Jarrett ever drew from me. Iirc it was in the 700s. Suck it, Mike Graham. 
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I'll second Emperor on the greatness of Toru Yano.
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It's always cool to see your boys grow into men. Hardy Boys and Bradshaw are two that spring to mind for me. Hardys were Baker boys back in their days as Superstars & Shotgun jobbers so I was tickled pink to see them finally make it big. Became a Bradshaw backer when he was still going nowhere in 1998. Loved seeing him finally get over with the APA skits and there was no bigger JBL fan than yours truly.

Too Cool, Al Snow, D'Lo Brown, and Scott Norton are borderline boy material even at their peaks. So backing these guys when they were going nowhere (Too Much & Leif Cassidy for example) definitely puts them in the Boy Club. They all made it big compared to where they were when I first became a fan of theirs.

Just went on a wrestling deep dive and remember dragongate existed. I feel like dragongate describes a boy in promotion form. Also learning Naruki Doi and Yamato are still active. They look old.

"The Illustrious" Jonnie Stewart deserves a shoutout for being a rich man's Chris Candido who looked like a young Curt Hennig and put Ric Flair to shame in the robe game...

Just occurred to me, I think my earliest "boy" was Robbie Rage during his post-High Voltage singles run. Literally thought he was the best wrestler ever, and didn't understand why he was relegated to WCW's F show instead of challenging champions in the WWF.

Jan 13, 2022 3:03:30 GMT 🤯 said:

Just occurred to me, I think my earliest "boy" was Robbie Rage during his post-High Voltage singles run. Literally thought he was the best wrestler ever, and didn't understand why he was relegated to WCW's F show instead of challenging champions in the WWF.

PI might have just won this thread. Hard to top Rage from High Voltage for boy status. 

I developed a soft spot for High Voltage as well after for years being perplexed by Kenny Kaos' WCW World Tag Team Championship win. Good young tag team that bumped their asses off, especially for the Steiners who really should have been elevated in 1998 when WCW were phasing out the Steiners, Harlem Heat, The Faces of Fear, The Outsiders etc. Give them a run, have them face the Dancing Fools, Neidhart & Bulldog, Born To Runner Up (Stevie Ray & Brian Adams) before you phase in that WCW 1999 tag division.

In real time, Rage suffered a serious injury anyways but it didn't seem like High Voltage were in line for anything regardless.

The High Voltage nomination inspired me to search google and see if Kenny Kaos had given any interviews, low and behold he was on a podcast last year where he went over his entire career.

He seems to be doing really well for himself and he talks like he's cutting a 1980s promo which made for an entertaining listen. His story is relatively straight forward, he went to DDP to get into the Pro Wrestling business and he pointed him towards the PowerPlant. He was in the same try-out group as Prince Iaukea and they made it through Buddy Lee Parker's military program together. He wasn't offered a contract or anything and had to pay-out of his own pocket to attend the PowerPlant so he had to go back to work to put himself in a more financially secure place before travelling to Atlanta.

It was DDP who introduced him to Rage and suggested that since he was a shorter guy he should form a tag team. Rage had been in the try-out group before him and was close with DDP but it didn't take long for Kenny to realise they'd make a great pairing. They were around the same size, he had the long light brown hair, Robbie had the short dark brown hair and they both worked well together.

It wasn't long before they were on Nitro and he experienced the highlight of his career which was the return of the Steiners to WCW where the arena popped so loud he couldn't hear anything in the ring.

He was pretty happy with his lot in life. In his 20s, getting to be apart of the industry when it was red hot, forming friendships with Rick Steiner, Ray Traylor, Scott Steiner, Curt Hennig and Goldberg while rubbing shoulders with his heroes like Randy Savage and Bret Hart. His one regret was not getting to know Savage or Bret and offering to do a job for Savage especially. He admits he was just too shy but now he realises he could have easily organised it.

Had no issues with Eric who paid him well and even allowed him and Rage to go to NJPW to earn even more money for a tour.

As far as winning the tag team titles, at the time he knew it was a bad angle so he didn't really take it seriously. Looking back on it now though it's cool to have that achievement, especially with Rick who he was pretty close with.

However things came to an end when AOL-Turner merged in 1999. They started making budget cuts and he was among them around Christmas of 1999 and from there he only wrestled sparodically. He did a try-out with the WWF when they were in Atlanta, but he was rusty. Apparently he was offered a development deal in Memphis but turned it down because in his early 30s he thought it was getting too late to re-tool. Kevin Sullivan offered him a deal in TNA, but he turned that down as well as by that point he had moved on from Pro Wrestling and was getting back to his previous vocation in Telecommunications.

I think he had 5 people on his Mt. Rushmore - Ric Flair, Hulk Hogan, Bruno Sammartino, Randy Savage and Bret Hart. Bret and Savage seemed to be the performers he looked up to most.

He still watches Pro Wrestling occasionally and rates Randy Orton as the best. Great athlete who has been doing this at a high standard for 20 years and makes it look so easy. He appreciates guys like Rock, Cena, Batista, Miz who were able to create careers out of Pro Wrestling, but for a guy like Randy who has never explored other avenues made him appreciate it more.

He's now in the mining sector and is financially secure. He's a pretty religious guy and he's got his girlfriend and her daughter to take care of. In his experience he's found in life there's selfless and selfish people and to surround himself with the former since it's far more fulfilling.

My earliest boy was The Red Rooster. During my exposure to wrestling at the start was Summer Slam 1989. I am not ashamed to tell you all, as a 6-year boy, I was in tears when he was beaten by Mr. Perfect.

Chris Masters. The first run before he came back after allegedly "getting gud". I like the hokey nature of the challenge as a way of beating up jobbers without winning matches. I liked the theme (my reminder) and the idea of a full nelson as mostly unbreakable outside of a nutshot, back into buckle or rope assist (usually into the Piper pin) was fun to see. People go gaga over an Umaga Squash like 🤯 suckling on rad s giant nutsack turned mince meat (busting your balls) but me I really liked the MLC. I know Samoans make for good squashes (also see 3MW... or maybe it was just Umaga's role in that?) but whatever.

Loved Lawler basically doing a weird bear skin rug vince/hbk love affair with him on commentary.

Also while I don't think he won any titles he does get a trivia answer for why Cena started using the STFU in a submission match. 2006 era Raw just had a weird energy to it and I guess Masters just fit the bill for what wrestling had become. And I loved him for it. Just narcissist gimmick #478 but was actually allowed to blossom for a minute. Guess that's all long reigns can ever be, random IYH title defenses on the regular because you can't blow through marquees like we did with the Smackdown Six.

I've always thought Masters was just a guy. Noting he did stands out. His pec shake was more over than him.