There, I said it. but maybe it's not that bad...
I have mentioned this before, noting that the Memphis-based Mid-South/CWA and Lexington-based ICW promotions were tremendous sources of entertainment to me in my pre-teen years. Since then, my interest has been mostly sporadic — until now, that is. After leaving Lexington, I watched WWF now and again and I know I spent at least one summer during college renting and watching all the Wrestlemania and WWF videos that were available up to that point. After college, my interest became even more fleeting and I would usually limit myself to watching some old-school videos about once a year for a couple weeks at a time. But this time, it's different. For about four months now, I've been enjoying a steady diet of pro wrestling every night after work and on the weekends. It started back when I snagged a set of 5 ICW DVDs from an online auction. Then I ended up watching a new installment of Smackdown! one Friday night and I became totally hooked. Since then, I have been watching Smackdown!, RAW, and ECW with some regularity and I have been catching up on the recent WWE pay-per-view events by picking up old DVDs of the shows at local secondhand stores. I even went out in a level 2 snow emergency to pick up a couple of DVDs a few weeks ago. I'm even planning on catching this year's big show, Wrestlemania 23. It's really that bad, folks.
I don't want to give anyone the impression that I'm really proud of all this. There's plenty to be embarrassed about. WWE isn't really your simple, light-hearted fake violence any more. It used to be that the arenas in Kentucky and Memphis would fill up with pre-teens who paid $1 or $2 admission to see hours of big match-ups; just fight, after fight, after fight. But these days, it's a completely different industry. All the salacious, over-the-top story lines along with the marketing, hype, sex and gore in today's WWE shows are really something of an annoyance to me. But the great thing about watching them on DVR/DVD is that I can just skip to the good matches and cut out all the crap in between. A good match between a face and a heel that includes some acrobatics, some bad acting and some cartoon violence is all I'm really after at the end of the day.
At this point, I feel compelled to share a little about my favorites from all these years of watching pro wrestling. It will be a little easier if I make two categories here: "Old School" refers to everything before the "WWE 'Attitude'" era (which I missed completely, by the way — No matter; "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, Goldberg and Mick Foley were never really interesting to me). "New Stuff" is basically a group that includes stuff from 2003 to now, as material from this era seems to be the easiest to find in secondhand stores right now.
Old School
Jerry "The King" Lawler: Lawler was the man when I was a kid. As a face, he ruled the CWA territory for years, engaging in some of the most memorable feuds of the day with folks like Jimmy Hart, Bill Dundee, Randy Savage, and Nick Bockwinkel. His old matches with Bockwinkel are still a lot of fun to watch. Lawler was a lot more exciting as a face than he was as a heel. I got to see Lawler wrestle at Rupp Arena in Lexington in the early 1980's. I still have the program, but I don't recall much about the event.
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| Mr. Perfect |
Curt Hennig aka "Mr. Perfect": Mr. Perfect had one of my favorite "finishing moves" of all time: The "Perfect-plex" (fisherman suplex). I got to see him wrestle the King of the Ring in 1993 and everyone around me was laughing at me because I kept yelling "Perfect-plex" him NOW!î Mr. Perfect's feud with Ric Flair (one of the best wrestling "bad guys" ever) and Razor Ramon led to one of my favorite tag-team matches at all time in the 1992 Survivor Series. Perfect was paired with "Macho Man" Randy Savage and although the match ended in a disqualification, it was still great to see Perfect escape Ric Flair's "figure four leglock" by nailing him with a chair. I just caught an old match between Hennig and Nick Bockwinkel for the AWA Title. The match was featured on the "Superstars of Yesteryear" DVD and it was the highlight of an otherwise crappy compilation.
"Macho Man" Randy Savage: Savage was a huge personality it Lexington before he ever uttered "Oooh YEAH" on a WWF show. I've already said this a few times, but his big steel cage match with Ratamyus really made a huge impression on me. I still remember how it felt to see him miss that huge elbow drop off the top of the steel cage. That was, of course, back when I thought it was all real! His WWF years were pretty good, but if you've never seen Savage's early years, it's worth checking out. One DVD compilation features a one-time pairing with Jerry Lawler in which the pair go up against King Kong Bundy and Rick Rude. It's a classic!
New Stuff
Chris Jericho: I guess he's not wrestling right now, but I just recently caught his ladder match against Christian on the 2004 Unforgiven DVD. It was amazing!
Edge: I guess I am still not sure if he was a face or a heel in his feud. with Kane. I think he's a heel right now, but he's still fun to watch. Looking forward to that "Money in the Bank" ladder match at Wrestlemania!
Mr. Kennedy: What a great bad guy! If I was to categorize wrestlers by philosophy, I'd rate him as something of a nihilist.
Shawn Michaels: Hey! Shouldn't Shawn be listed under "Old School?' I mean, is he still around these days? Yep. And still pretty exciting, too.
A long time ago, a friend of mine explained that pro wrestling — like all great stories — was about two things: suffering and redemption. Kind of an interesting take on it, eh? Don't worry, folks...Sooner or later, my fascination with pro wrestling is bound to subside again for a little while. Until then, I'll just enjoy the ride. At least I'm not into NASCAR, y'know?
