I agree with Jeff Jarrett being on the Lucky list, but I would also add Jerry Lawler to that argument:

Kid who just wanted to be an artist randomly gets to "give it one try" and goes on to have a career many would give their souls for. Never really gets a full shot in WWE but is so well-established from his territory days that any time he wanted to have a match, he gets instant credibility. Then suffers a heart attack on air while world-class medical personnel are in the same building and save his life.

And even in that he managed to be lazy (being on screen for all of 2mins ) before injuring himself by collapsing the roof.

Kevin nash slandering should be banned!

LOL, injury-prone wrestlers, amirite?

Unluckiest - Big Show - horribly booked when he could have been the next Andre. Guy should have been going undefeated and used as a special attraction, a genuine star, but unfortunately entered companies at the wrong time and in the wrong era. Now he has threads about how noone can make him interesting in any situation. Sad and frustrating.

Luckiest - Sandman - no idea how he was able to make a living wrestling for so long. He owes Paul Heyman every cent he ever made because he was horrendous as a performer. If you go back now, he was wasted and all over the place in so many matches, but his character earned him a living, with absolutely no obvious talent.

It's gross

I friggen LOVED the Sandman

Thank you mercenary for looking out for norman!

The Sandman had the ultimate job showing up to work with a beer in your hand being part of that job (being already completely fucking wasted was optional) and you get to hit people over the head with a cane. Lucky as hell.

In a way I would have to say Matt Rage. His career was cut short in the early days when he got sick with cancer and he was out for a long time before making a kick ass return after beating cancer...but he lost out on so much time and would've been a main eventer/legend now, if he didn't get sick. Like, he is lucky to have beaten cancer and have his health but unlucky in that it has really hurt his career and he didn't get as many accomplishments as his contemporaries like Swede Savard.

Lol, you could add that to it too! He really was abysmal. I can understand Gertner liking the wild personality, especially being younger at the time, but he was abysmal and although people sometimes say that performers make the character, I don't think there was any skill involved. He was just a drunk that was allowed to hit people lol.

hahaha reminds me a lot of Xristo Diavlo! All he does is drink and hits people!

what the fuck are you talking about?


Listened to the podcast, going to make an argument with you beautiful men. I didn't say Arn would be champion, I said he could have had a few main even pay days (re: War Games). He was probably more politically savvy than Flair in that he didn't anger people so intensely, so he was always around to fill a hole when need be, if someone got injured and they needed someone strong to either be put over to sort of carry things over to the next months, or put someone over. That's what being versatile like Arn could lead to, as far as I'm concerned.

Great job as usual.

If he had a better promo he'd have been the better Hart. He had Bret's technical with the high flying ability too. Bret wasn't a master orator by any stretch so Owen was pretty terrible.

It's not as simple as being a "better talker". It's about how you carry yourself and how you wrestle. Bret wrestled like a main event champion, Owen didn't. Plus, Owen COULD fly certainly, but most of his run in the WWF was spent NOT flying (insert obvious joke about his death here... aka fuck off). His work was good, and he was for sure a great worker, but he did not string together the body of work Bret did. He just did not work a main event style. Maybe over time it could have progressed there, but to me, I've never seen it, at least at Bret's level.

I think Sean Waltman made the point, while Owen was great, he just didn't take it all that seriously, whereas Bret did, and that's why Bret was Bret and Owen was Owen. Maybe if Owen took it as seriously as Bret, he could have been the number one Hart, but he just wasn't, talking aside. He was not the worker that Bret was.

I can see your point I still maintain that Bret put me to sleep while Owen held my attention but we are different people. I've watched Bret and I just don't see the appeal outside of his heel turn which I think because he was a lot more brutal I wound up really digging it.

Bret taking it too seriously was his biggest flaw. Owen looked like he was having fun. That kind of energy Bret never had.

Owen was nowhere near as authentic as Bret. Heaven forbid someone takes their profession seriously not worrying about it not being cool.

Love this so much

fuck you Gertner, you pain in the ass :rant:

You can claim Bret put you to sleep as much as you want, but you can't argue with his body of work, and that many more of his matches are critically acclaimed.

Gorgeous speaking the beautiful truth.

A few things:

A) Bret was not a terrible promo by any stretch. As a heel, I'd even go as far to say he was a pretty damn good promo.

B) Owen was a great promo too. He was also hilarious on commentary when they let him do that.

C) Fuck all this Hart hate. They were both amazing.

Bret Hart is probably in something like 85% of my favorite matches of all time.

Owen was the motherfucking shit. Love him. But he wasn't a main even talent, at least while Bret was around.

Owen was the first heel that I ever cheered for. As much as I loved him, though, he would have seemed out of place in the main event. If he ever were going to win the big one, it would have HAD to have been in the Bret feud. Once that didn't happen, I think he was placed right where he needed to be.

Had Owen made it to the brand split era, he would've been as featured a talent as Edge,Jericho, JBL, Booker T, Kane, Big Show, del Rio and other guys who were "the man" on Smackdown but never really THE man.

Just a victim of his time. Owen would be an amazing foil to Cena these days. He just got lost in incredibly deep and talented roster in the mid to late 90s.

This is silly. How does someone take what they do too seriously a flaw?

By STD's logic, The Funkasaurus is a first ballot hall of famer.

Followed by cabbage-patching Lance Storm and Adam Rose.

He was a mark for himself.

Every great wrestler is a mark for himself. C'mon son.

And if you're even talking about what happened in that place in Quebec, that was an isolated incident. That definitely shouldn't be the man's entire legacy.

I'm a mark for myself. What's your point?

I'm about to stare at myself in the mirror for two hours once people stop responding to my posts tonight.

Name one star who wasn't a mark for themselves? Being a mark for themselves meant that when the time came to do the job the guy who got the rub benefited. Warrior beating Hogan or HBK beating Bret doesn't mean shit if you had put a Chris Jericho type in the role of doing the job.

Even Chris Jericho wrote three books. Tell me he's not a mark for himself too.

He just didn't ever really have any power potential, so to speak. Cruiserweight in WCW, non-homegrown talent in WWF. If he COULD have had more stroke, he would have used it. He started feuding with Goldberg (the hottest thing in WCW at the time) without anyone asking him to. Think about that.

Love Jericho, btw.

As do I. But if Bret, Hogan or even Cena laid down as seemingly voluntarily as he did they wouldn't have mattered near as much nor been such a big deal to beat cleanly.

Agreed

And plus Bret never buried guys when he beat them. He always upped their profile, unlike Hogan

Bret didn't have the buyrates/power to bury guys.

Nor did Michaels or diesel, but they still did.

Buyrates/power have jack shit to do with the ability to elevate another worker simply by working with them. Putting Owen over at Wrestlemania was the biggest win of Owen's career, not because Bret was some jobber but because he was a fucking winner and beating him mattered.

When HBK beat Bret for the title? Bret was a winner. It meant something. Bret making Waltman look like he could go with the big dogs in valiant loss to the champ on Raw. Austin losing to Bret but coming out a bonafide superstar.

Buyrates or not it's hard to point to other guys who've been able to accomplish that. How many guys did HBK or diesel make? Hogan? The only one who's been able to replicate what Bret did is Cena.

If Cena's wrasslin was a little less sloppy he would be on Bret's level as far all around wrestling, bell to bell (not the entire package though, cuz an easy argument could say Cena is better than Bret, and as much as I'd argue for Bret til the bitter end, it's a fair argument regardless). Cena is a fucking tremendous in ring talent, but he does what I like to call "Hollywood" moves, similar to Hogan and The Rock, where it just takes away the air of authenticity behind it... though particularly with The Rock and John Cena, it doesn't hinder their bell-to-bell THAT much. Just a nitpick I guess.

I agree. He has a very main event, more theatrical style in which he works his matches. But God damn it I've been so impressed with his work the least few years, especially this year, that I have to hand it to the guy. Sure, I'd like some character development and sometimes the promos get dull, but Jesus H. Christ he's put on a string of just tremendous matches week after week after week.

For all intents and purposes Cena should have won over anybody who is a naysayer of his in ring work. Guy's been a stud this year.

Only during #Nashvember.

Cena definitely should consider himself fortunate. He's fine from that botched move during his match with Owens at that house show Friday.

I respect the hell out of Cena, but I do NOT want to see him take back the U.S. title @ NoC in 2 weeks. Let Rollins hold it for a bit along with the WWE WHC.

And yet somehow(probably because the WWE and mainstream wrestling in general refused to let it die)

And yes Owen was awesome on commentary I was just watching Ahmed V Goldust and something about Owens comments during that match just crack me up.

*looks at OWENBROWN*

Just want to thank everybody for their suggestions, we got to read a lot of them on the show, which is now available to listen to at the following link:

http://squaredcirclegazette.podbean....stlersEver.mp3

Join the panel as we talk the luckiest and unluckiest wrestlers in the history of the business, discussing the careers of Kevin Nash, Daniel Bryan, Bruno Sammartino, Bob Backlund, Ahmed Johnson, Mr. Kennedy, Sid, Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Steve Austin, Brian Pillman, Ted DiBiase, Brutus Beefcake, Jake Roberts, and yes, Triple H, as well as many more! A really fun show this week as break down the chance elements that led many to their destinations, check it out~!

Wooooo my post got read

I actually thought of Diavlo too man, but he has much better psychology, too talented to just say its luck!

Bo Dallas is a modern day Bret Hart

Heath Slater is a modern day Reno Riggins

Heath Slater is the modern day Kevin Sullivan.

Also, Bo has better mic skills than Bret, so that's a bad comparison by me.

He wasn't completely but I would put Dr. Death Steve Williams on the "unlucky" list. The man was an amazing wrestler and had a "full" career in Japan and the territories.... but I guess it would be unlucky for him to end up ending his career with the Brawl for All and never getting a chance to shine in the WWE.

Another "Dr. Death" that was kinda unlucky was David Schultz. He is the "infamous" wrestler that slapped John Stossel in the face for saying that wrestling was fake in the 80s. Then again, it was both an unlucky/ lucky situation for him. Unlucky because the slap affectively ended his career but I guess he could also be considered lucky because if not for slapping a reporter live on 20/20, he probably wouldn't be remembered by fans.

I remember he was on TNT and he invited the camera crew to dinner with his wife and kids. He spent the whole time berated his stupid children and lazy wife. Kicked everybody out. Hilarious.

Dr. David Schultz was basically a JTTS at the time anyways. He was doing jobs for Tito Santana and Andre. He would have probably moved on within 6 months even if the incident didn't occur.

New Day are lucky, originally they appeared to be something of New Nation of Domination and people were into the idea,having Big E as the muscle Kofi as the high flyer, and Xavier Woods,a guy who has multiple degrees IRL as the evil mastermind. All three then disappear from television and show up a few months later with the militant gimmick entirely dropped and in its place a weird gospel gimmick that everyone except the increasingly senile Vince McMahon thought was utter shit,The New Day were supposed to be faces but they were met with either boos or apathy every time they appeared.The WWE has been known to ignore fan reactions so this could've easily just continued to be the case with New Day being relegated to a team of jobber faces who fans had no reason to care about until they showed up on TV every once in a blue moon.Instead the WWE acknowledged the fans hatred which led to New Day KEEPING the gimmick and turning it up to super unbearable. It worked it shouldn't have, but it did. The New day managed to go from an also ran trio of jobbers to an amazing heel stable that has consistently managed to entertain and fans are loving it. Could've just as easily gone the other way.

All three of the New Day dudes are ultra talented, though. I'd say they were unlucky with creative having nothing for them for so long, but they ended up making their own fortune out of the New Day gimmick.

Oh they are super talented but that would have meant nothing had they not gotten the chance to play with that DOA gimmick they were stuck with.

Johnny Curtis is stupid talented and look at him.

sidenote:NEW DAY main eventing RAW again tonight and being hands down the best thing about the show. Words I thought I'd never ever say.