Seanny asks Gertner Wrestling Questions Thread
 

This was a request made to your King and was granted.

Is anyone else permitted to ask questions?

Sure

Which belt do you consider to be the most aesthetically pleasing of all-time? And do you think the appearance of belts matters?

I've always loved the old AWA World Title.

https://www.rfvideo.com/images/produ...b/awatitle.jpg

People like to complain about the look of the belts nowadays but it really doesn't sell any more or less tickets.

Looking back, has Zack Rider had a good career? What's next for these new tag champs?

Who's your fav vanilla midget?

Hawkins just killed his gimmick. They'll become the B Team in a month.

Ryder has definitely had a good career. He's over-achived in my eyes.

I'm going to fill this thing up with every question that pops into my head while I watch WWE Network.

1. How long do you think Jim Hellwig would have lasted as Vader?

2. Is it just me or does Jim Ross outright ignore Jesse Ventura and Mike Schiavone whenever they go too far with the exposition? I like to imagine he's pinching their legs.

That's tough cause I genuinely don't like guys like Benoit, Malenko etc...

Probably Malenko if I had to pick.

Not long. Hellwig wouldn't have lasted long in WCW and he would have gotten eaten alive in Japan

JR didn't play well off those two. Tony and Jesse were great together. Ross is almost better on his own.

Outside of Ryback and Matt Morgan, who is the biggest missed opportunity in WWE this century?

Percy Watson

Lol I thought for sure he was going to be a Main Event guy

In terms of guys who actually made the roster, probably Nathan Jones, but that was more Jones than the WWE. Bray Wyatt is the correct answer though. They really ruined him.

You know who I thought the WWE squandered an awesome gimmick was : Mike Knox. That evil biologist gimmick he had was amazing and they did nothing with it

It looked like it back when he had a personality. Why did he even stop wrestling?

Jones or Knox?

I actually meant Percy, lol. Jones didn’t pick it up and Knox just got released. Heyman was apparently a big supporter of Knox. I mean, I don’t trust Prichard, but I don’t know what he gets out of lying about that. I saw flashes with him — I liked the way he kind of worked sneaky for a big man — but I wasn’t enamored or anything.

Really surprised Chris Masters never got a second look by the company, especially when you can work off Wellness suspensions. The guy’s only 36. I thought they would hire him back after he saved his mother from a burning house after lifting out that tree. Didn’t they give a job back o Daivari when he foiled a robbery? And Chuck Palumbo got another shot when his brother did something heroic overseas.

Actually, throw Shad Gaspard into the basket of heroic guys who didn’t get another shot. Well, Cryme Tyme got too. Reading up on Shad’s Wikipedia, it sounds like he has life by the balls, but his attitude to the company’s attitude apparently just didn’t mix. He and JTG both had good charisma, and I thought the company would have had a boner for the guy.

It looks like after he got released from NXT that Percy completely stopped. Didn't work the indies or anything. I heard he got released because he sulked when he didn't graduate to Smackdown with Titus and Darren after the original NXT ended. He probably just gave up.

They had him stop doing the gimmick too.

Worst spot callers in wrestling?

Watching War Games a while back and Sid was visibly calling things on camera the entire time he was in there.

Cactus Jack was also bad for it and I'm sure Rick Steiner was a culprit too.

Underrated or forgotten wrestling classics?

I saw a Rick Rude/Ricky Steamboat iron-man match that was pretty decent recently. If Ricky had any mic ability or verbal charisma at all he would have had a good WWE career.

Most over jobbers-mid carders?

I keep seeing supposedly shitty gimmicks but that were clearly over as hell(El Gigante, Norman The Lunatic). I think if you ignore PC culture a lot of these old gimmicks are hilarious.

When it comes to worst spot-callers, John Cena and Charlotte Flair are the worst modern offenders.

I don't know much about the new ones. Anything post 2003 is over my head. I will catch up when I hear it's worth it.

Modern wrestling is shit, but spot-calling is going to be far more prominent there because of technology and wrestlers being...not as tight.

John Cena hands down. Sid was also notorious

There's tons of great matches on House Shows that few people have seen. Any of the Savage vs Tito Santana House Show matches in 86 are great. Hogan's MSG title defences in 85 are very under-rated including his 3 match series with Muraco and Savage

Iron Mike Sharpe and SD Jones always got a really good reaction in the 80's.

You know who were insanely over for a period:The Oddities. Going back and watching 98 Raws, when they were with ICP they were crazy over.

Jimmy Valiant in the late 80's JCP is probably the best example of a mid card guy being insanely over during his feud with Paul Jones Army.

Bulldog vs Owen on the March 3 1997 Raw to crown the first European Championship never gets talked about and it's amazing.

Going to go and watch that match now. :y:

How the fuck did I miss this gimmick??

It was so good and they did nothing with it

Reading about that gimmick I was also like "I don't remember that." But straining I think I can remember him giving this weird promos about anatomy in a dark room. Or am I completely making that up?

Nathan Jones.

Ricky had a fucking amazing WWF career from 85-87. Headlined a lot. He decided to be mr. family man at the wrong time and pissed Vince off.

He had a much better NWA, WCW career though.
I don't rate the Savage match that highly either.

The Steamboat vs Muraco matches in late 85 are tremendous.

Who's the best referee? Watching WCW and at one point Ole Anderson seems to be a relief referee. Slow, quiet counts...

I like Ole, he was a horse and his biography is one of the most entertaining and hateful. Not much of a ref though.
Pretty sure I saw Ronnie Garvin refereeing in early 90's WWE too.

I like the referees that emote like Italians on amphetamine. I like Charles Robinson from the invasion era. He really went for it.

The Savage match is tremendous. Just not the greatest of all time.

If Nash and Hall stayed in WWF do you think the Monday Night Wars would have happened and how do you think things would have been different.

The WWF actually was experiencing an upturn in business at the time of Nash's departure with the 4 way feud between Taker, Diesel, HBK and Bret. Nash definitely had that "Austin Anti-Hero" feel. The Monday Night Wars were already happening in late 95, but I think this changes things greatly. I don't think WCW gets hot like they did.

Nash was doing his best work as anti hero Diesel

Garvin and Valentine came up with that Garvin as a ref angle. Pretty under-rated feud between the two.

Dick Woherle is my favourite old time referee from the 80's. Dude was jacked lol. A big showboat.

Google image search his name and look how many pictures of the real guy there are in comparison to how many are of the action figure they made of him. Unreal.

If you wanted to save WCW at which point would you have stepped in?

Starrcade 1997. They had their most profitable year in 98, but the wheels were in motion by late 97.

I met him at the wrestling HOF. He had the strongest handshake I've ever felt and he was 81 at the time lol

Told some awesome stories, too.

Is your hand made of canvas?

Which leads me to this question that I pose to Gertner and anyone else who wants to chime in: Which match is more overrated? Steamboat-Savage or the WM X HBK - Razor ladder match?

I love both matches but don’t think either belongs in the GOAT discussion.

And I know the iron man match between Bret and Shawn is gonna come up when discussing overrated WM matches but that’s not what I’m asking about. So leave it alone, Goddammit.

HBK-Razor ladder match is way overrated. Particularly considering (IMO) that Bret versus Owen was the much better match of the two.

Thank you. I have not had nearly enough vindication on my belief that that match gets too much credit. And that’s coming from the world’s biggest HBK mark.

Bret vs Owen was better but I do wonder sometimes if that match gets a bit overrated in hindsight too simply because Owen won clean which was such an odd finish for that era of WWF. How far down does it fall if Bret just gets the win and it blends in with every other clean finish of the time?

The first time I saw Razor/HBK I remember thinking "Wait... that's it...? That's what all the fuss was about?"

The Savage/Steamboat match didn't exactly make me want to grab my nuts and scream "Yeah!" either.

So probably Savage/Steamboat because it just seems odd that a pretty standard match gets such love. I suppose it was arguably the first undeniably good Wrestlemania match though. Not some gimmick or celeb affair, just two great athletes going at it. That was 50% of most cards I saw growing up though. Going back to late 1998-2002 there was a wealth of high tempo match ups. Heat got really stupidly good by virtue of the lighter guys having no other showcase.

When I watched WCW at that time I remember thinking the only disappointing matches were main events. Early WCW main events were way more entertaining than WWE though. Looking back now it couldn't be more obvious that the match quality was so much higher.

Well, the finish itself was perfectly executed and was completely 100% the right move - which served to make an already great match all that much better. You can't really fault a match for being booked well. If Bret won, I'm sure people would say it was a great match but the finish itself takes it up a notch to a classic.

So, you're right but not in a way that downgrades the match.

Right. I’m just saying that finishes are held to a higher standard in hindsight than actual match quality. It’s not wrong. There’s a FUCKTON of matches that people rate super high that I’m sure is strictly because of a finish that I just was not invested in. (WrestleMania 20 and 30, mainly... and every match from the “women’s revolution because we say it all is” era.)

Do we overrate the significance of finishes though? Flair and Steamboat have both said their best match against each other was at a house show. The finish didn’t mean dick. If we saw it, it would probably just be a little novelty addition to our list of best matches. Are THEY wrong in their labeling of “best match” or are we?

I ask this here because it’s the wrestling-nerdiest question I’ve ever posed and this thread is dedicated to Gertner who is the nerdiest wrestling nerd I’ve ever known. So if not now, then when?

and as Gertner's handsomer and more virile lacky, I felt compelled to answer.

I always try and review matches putting myself in that time frame.

Steamboat vs Savage was so much better than anything the company was doing at that point. You look at that match compared to other nationally televised WWF matches from that era and that match is in another galaxy . I actually prefer their Maple Leaf Gardens match from Feb. 87. It's tremendous.


I can't say the same for HBK vs Razor.

i also think Savage vs Steamboat holds up as a great match, but I prefer the older style of working. Only thing that ruins it for me is George Steele.

I can’t say anything bad about George Steele. Fucking loved that man for everything he was to 80s WWE.

Lol when you start watching all the House Shows from the era George's shtick gets a bit old after a while. They ran that feud with Savage into the ground. I think they fought on 3 Saturday Nights Main Events in a row.

i like his chickenwing finisher but fuck he bores me.

He’s pure 80s camp and I love it.

Compared to nowadays where they’d wrestle in various tag/singles matches on Raw every single week though...

That feud was more over than anything in the WWE today

such a waste of Savage :'(

Bret / Owen is so insanely good. Just timeless. I watched it a couple weeks ago and was glued.


HBK/Razor is fun, exciting, and was so innovative at the time. The problem is that the Ladder concept has been pushed so far to the limit since then, it's not as impressive anymore.

to me, Bret and Owen is better than most ladder matches other than maybe Jericho vs Michaels.

Razor vs Shawn was still immensely good just as a wrestling match, but it's way overrated.

Gertner, what is the best surprise pin?

I'm talking small package, backslide, schoolboy, sunset flip or that sort of thing.

I read that the guy who invented the Irish Whip used it as a finish. Can you tell me anything more about that and also do you think wrestling could survive without it?

Always been a fan of the small package

Yup, Danno O'Mahoney invented the move in the late 30's. I'm guessing since there's no footage that he was doing the move by whipping his opponent into the turnbuckle.
There were wrestlers back in the day like Johnny Valentine that refused to do the move because it exposed the business.

I imagined into the turnbuckle too. I had no idea guys thought it was too obviously b.s though, that's great. I suppose almost every match would have been a mat wrestling affair until the Whip turned up.

I prefer schoolboys

Victory roll FTW, though I guess that's a SUPER surprise maneuvre

Best Doomsday Device counter on the market

I loved the old finisher where a guy would go for a body slam/power slam and the guy would hook his opponents head and turn it into a small package. It's the go to roll up in mid 80s WWF.

I love the suplex from the apron reversal pin.

This sounds good out of context.

Even in context...

I knew what I was doing when I set it up, Gertner wasn't going to miss that opportunity.

Nothing but net.

I should have said "I prefer a lovely schoolboy, stick my hand between his legs and get him on his back."

A reminder to be thorough with the innuendo like Lawler.

The Don Muraco Special

Do you think Ric Flair, Terry Funk and numerous other aged wrestlers actually became addicted to the buzz of announcing their retirement or are they really just crazy old men who can't sit still for five minutes to actually retire and enjoy it?

Which titles are your favourites? If you ran a federation which would you use?

I think the European title was my favourite non-World title. I liked the WCW TV Title too, just seemed like a silly name because they were all on TV.

Euro title would have worked if they didn't bury Davey and put the title on Shawn who subsequently turned it into a prop. The angle worked during the moment, and the Euro title was always a token for Smith. But the Bulldog fan in me loves an alternate universe where he stayed in the WWF, remained relevant/uninjured, and brought prominence to the European title.

BTW I have no idea why I'm responding to your posts, seeing as I'm not Gertner. Plus, he knows far more than me about wrestling.

I assume it's because I have very little to live for.

It felt like D Lo held it for ages but looking at the title history he had four very short stints over the course of a year or so.

He did his best. Honestly, what a great run he had in 1998 and 99 up until Russo left. Literally was supposed to be an extra in the nation. Then developed his character, lost a shit ton of weight, and had some great matches. Fuck he was funny with Mark Henry.

I loved everything about D Lo Brown. He had the best theme tune of all time and by a long way too. I still play it.

I think wrestlers get so consumed in the lifestyle that it's all they know. Andre the Giant worked consistently from late 87 until 1990 working a full House Show schedule. Dude was wrestling Big John Studd in high school gyms in 1989. The reason was because he loved being around the boys so much. Poor financial decisions play a part as well.

I would go with the World Title, a secondary title like an IC or US, a T.V title that was defended only on television, tag titles and womens singles title.

I loved the WCW T.V title due to the random names who held it. Lol friggen Rick Martel in 98. Just tremendous.

Haha I used to bump that theme in my 1988 Beretta all the time

Lol stop. If you posted 10 WWE theme songs, or wrestler photos from the past 5 years I would probably get 5 right.

I wouldn't know that much either. We have similar wheelhouses... I'd say mine is a few years after yours.

Wow. I'd have thought a fellow MSU fan would have nothing but love for an alumni like Steele. Had a great personality and a way more entertaining Animal than Batista. Really miss George.

I like George Steele in small doses.

You can tell the contrast in both Vinces in the way Steele was portrayed.

With Sr., he was kind of just a standard sleazy heel with a unique look who kind of acted like an animal. Cut heel promos like any other worker.

With Jr., he was a full-on cartoon character who couldn't even speak. Obviously the more memorable of the two portrayals and I would assume he drew much better as a muppet. But fuck, he was grating.