Wrestlers you liked as a child/hate as an adult...SANS HULK HOGAN/BENOIT
 

They can be dead and gone/retired/still wrestling. Do you have someone that you adored growing up and got to know them, now you hate them?

Diesel is a good answer. I was a BDC fan growing up but as an adult it's really hard to watch most of his WWF work seeing just how lazy/green he was at times.

Lex Luger would be mine. Really bought in to his character, probably the one John Cena is carrying out, the American Hero. He is one of the worst on the mic. He carried himself like he just showed up to the shows.

Surfer Sting. Is discussion allowed in this thread or is this just for listing rasslers?

I'm re-watching every PPV of the 90's..currently in the hell called 1995 so along with Diesel, Lex Luger is a perfect answer. Fuck him so hard.

to be completely honest, not really....and IMO Diesel was not that terrible.... Luger on the other hand....

Sabu, thought it was extreme and cool when I was younger. After seeing him out there still having the same match and the fact that his matches tend to take you or of that suspension of disbelief, am no longer a fan.

Rey Misterio - Incredible when I was younger again, but his title run and the absurdity of the 619 made me go off him quite a bit.

Big Show - booked into oblivion

Noone I hate, but certainly people I have gone off quite a bit for various reasons...

Diesel could work pretty decently, just needed the right opponent, which was not a luxury he had in 1995.

Duke The Dumpster Droese would be mine.

probably X-Pac because I was a super DX mark when I first got into wrestling

I really have the same taste as a kid that I do now when it comes to rasslin.

I also don't hate any wrestler other than The Miz.

Brutus Beefcake

Big fan of Bobby Eaton as a kid, loved the Alabama Jam finisher but then he died. Can't like a dead rassler.

Thank goodness Mr Jaggers isn't around to hear you say this!!

Teenage me loved the hell out of John Cena, but now I can't really stand him all that much. A lot of that has to do with his evolution as a character though. I mean I can still watch his Doctor of Thuganomics stuff and semi-enjoy it, but anything post 2006 is booty. Can't really think of anyone that I loved as a kid that I actually hate now though. Most of my favorites then are still my favorites now.

Came into here to say this. I was still riding with X-Pax during the X-Factor stable. When I re watch anything with him in it I cringe.

No one else really comes to mind. Maybe Shamrock.

Steiner. It's amazing what a life of roids will do to you and that guy has seriously had his fair share of shitshakes. He was great when he was with his brother, but when they started pushing him solo, fuck me running he was absolute shit. Dude should have left wrestling when WWE bought WCW because that feud he had with HHH for the title was just awful to watch.

Also Waltman. Fuck that guy. Bob Holly too for that matter.

Rey Mysterio Jr. for me. I honestly thought he was the closest equivalent to a real Spider-Man when I watched him in WCW. Then he got a lot of tattoos, changed his look, the 619 was the dumbest move ever.

Pretty much turned me off altogether.

Roman Reigns.

I was a child last year when I started watching wrestling, but I've since become an adult, and yeah.

The 619 is one of the few wrestling moves to have actually killed someone though, I used to think it was stupid too, but I've since reconsidered.

X-Pac has always possessed this sort of weird respect X-Factor with me cause I grew up with him being the 1-2-3 Kid and remembered a lot of shit that he did. He is totally fucked later in his career, no denying that. It's a cringe moment when the Kliq is shown in backstage segments, he just looks out of place to me.

Duggan
Koko b Ware
Johnny B Badd
Bushwhackers

George Hackenschmidt, really liked him turn of the century but now that I look back, Frank Gotch was way better and I think he had an awesome run in 1905

Very true. I was actually saddened to see him thrown into the awful WWF/WWE version of the n.W.o in 2002, because it really seemed to destroy any shred of credibility he had left if any by then.

Still totally love his individualized DX theme, "Make Some Noise", though. Song kicks so much ass.

For your consideration: Kane

I mean when Kane arrived during the Attitude Era & even several years after in all of his incarnations he was pretty sweet (most of the time).

But as an adult going back and revisiting some of the messed up shit he has been involved in and goofy storylines, I don't think it's held up as good as most of the other big names from the era. Also considering his last several years have been near impossible to stomach (or care about)....

That's definitely a good choice there. Too much bouncing between gimmicks and him constantly jobbing took away the mystique and "aura" of being a monster like he was early on in his career.

For me, personally - Bret Hart.


Loved watching him as a kid and always thought it was cool how he would give his glasses to a kid at ringside and hoped I would be that kid one time.

Now he just sounds like a self-absorbed bitter old man who bitches about anything and everything wrestling related. Really made me not care.

Jake the Snake is good too. I remember going to see "Beyond the Mat" in the theater and being very disappointed that he would only fight if he was getting cocaine or something. This was all before I knew about how shitty things were for some guys in the "wrestling world" or w/e.

Ken shamrock for me.

Marked out like a little bitch at times when he would 'snap' and thought some of his lions den matches were pretty cool.

I watched a few episodes of Raw on the WWE network a few weeks back and could not get over the fact he cut such a shit promo.

Would not say I hate him, I just dislike him now!

The Jew is back! Hell ya!

Yeah we are in the slow season and my days have wicked boring spots. Good to be back.

The Undertaker, Owen Hart, Bret Hart

wow 3 posts and already a heel. You should get the rival teams jersey as your avatar next.

What's a heel?

I've never gotten the hate for the 619. Wrestling is full of stuff that when looked at realistically, is completely ridiculous. The irish whip, one the simplest fundamentals of a match is the dumbest thing ever. All I really care about is if it looks cool which the 619 does.

Think it was either Buddy Rogers or Wahoo McDaniels who refused to let guys irish whip him because it's so stupid.

To anyone reading this thread who is not familiar with Shisen Kopf, I feel I should say that Bobby Eaton is currently alive. Knock on wood.

I don't know if I have come to terms with this completely yet because I still enjoy his podcast and his past work holds up for me, but I used to be the BIGGEST Jerichoholic back in the day. I even stuck on board with him up through his "serious" character, which was awesome.

Every time he comes back these days though is almost embarrassing to watch. I want to love Jericho like I used to, but he's not really doing it for me at all in today's landscape.

Kind of had an argument one time with Tazz Dan about Jericho. Not really an argument on my side, but him instantly defending the guy for obvious reasons. I told him I preferred the Lionheart Chris Jericho to his Fozzy days Jericho gimmick

Conspiracy Victim, Loophole Jericho was the greatest character in wrestling history. He was OK in some other roles, but his cruiserweight heel run is stuff of legend.

Yeah, I was still a mark back then and one of the heelish things I couldn't resist was antagonizing Dean Malenko about his Man of 1,000 Moves gimmick he had. Dean really played a good part of disgruntled veteran to Jericho's rising star.

The Man of 1004 Holds. Seriously. Here's a list of them.

A+ stuff :y:

Oh yeah, WCW and early-WWE Jericho were very clearly much better than whatever piss he's been up to the past few years

Brutus Beefcake
Jimmy Snuka

Big Show. Liked him a lot in WCW and most of his WWF/WWE run but nowadays just hate whenever he shows up since it almost leads to nothing good.

Should have gone in a Mark Henry route of just showing up occasionally and helping others go over than being the focal point of feuds or ruin interesting stuff.

Big Show is a great answer and easy to justify the dislike.

Luger is a really good one.

Also, if I were to pick the inverse scenario, ie. someone I used to hate when i was young that I grew to love, I'd say Jericho.

I think WCW Jericho was annoying as hell for the most part character wise, however he quickly evolved and changed my opinion when he jumped ship to WWE.

Crush wins this one for me. Loved the colourful singlet in 93, the "Shakka Brah" and the head vice. I grow up, and the guy is a useless lug that gets worse and worse as the years go by. It literally seems as if the more he wrestled, the worse he got. He was insufferable in 96 and 97, and his NWO run was even worse.

I understand watching that Brian Adams/Steve McMichael match is illegal in some countries due to the suicide risk.

Following on from that...

I loved Adam Bomb as a kid. All down to his look, I don't think I even saw an Adam Bomb match, not that I've had realised how bad it would have been at the age of 10.

I guess this sort of continued when I got back into wrestling in '98. My friends and I would spend hours playing WCW/nWo Revenge on the N64, and I loved Wrath. Again, I'd not actually seen him wrestle as we rarely watched WCW.

Then there's Bryan Clark. I saw some of the squashes as part of Kronik (with Brian "Crush" Adams) and thought that was passable at the time, then came the match with Taker & Kane at Unforgiven 2001 and oh my...

Wouldn't say I hated the guy, but I'd definitely question why I ever liked him.

I also loved Goldust, that time he paired with Luna, and they had this fetish style gimmick. it was creepy but you have to agree his theme was awesome

And I'm still putting hogan. From 91 til forever

To be a little outside of the box... I was a huge Al Snow mark in 98-99, but Network rewatches have shown me that he was pretty... not too good. Don't hate him, but just don't care for it any longer.

I'm also in agreement with the guys who mentioned Bret. Take out 1997, dude is boring as fuck.

Crush was also one of mine. The decline came before I was an adult though. The head vice was devastating and he could do no wrong in my book until he turned. The match with Yokozuna destroying him with bonsai drops still resonates in me, then he came back later and turned on Macho. Piece of crap

Loved Kona Crush when I was younger. Always hoped he was gonna win the IC title.

The Steiner Brothers - At different times in their early WWF/WCW careers they were my favorite tag team. Growing up I never noticed these things but....Once they stopped teaming up, Rick never lost his dog schtick and really shown how weak he was without Scott...and of course Scott went fucking insane. Apart from some wicked funny promos I can't remember liking anything either of these guys did once I smartened up.

This is my answer as well.

I'm also going to go ahead and say Triple H. I liked Triple H a lot between 1997-2001, but found him to be annoyinig from 2002-2003. I felt Triple H had a bit of a resurgence from 2004-2006 but then went back to being super annoying and stale.

After every time big show turns heel he says "I am a 7 foot 2 500 pound giant!"

I wouldn't say I hate these wrestlers, but the mark in me for them has left the room:

Test: The young mark for him in me is disappointed in some of the life decisions he made, obviously.

Matt Hardy: Loved this guy when I first saw him. After leaving the WWE in 2010 he just went to shit though. He seems to be trying to turn a corner in TNA, so I wish him the best with that.

Kane: His performance in the 2001 Royal Rumble is why I am a wrestling fan. That and William Regal. He's still got the mind of a good worker and experience worth having. He doesn't suck. I just think that the one-sided loss to The Shield at WrestleMania XXX should have been it for him and The New Age Outlaws. Oh, and that takes me to...

Billy Gunn: It is a testament to Jim Ross' commentary that I legitimately bought into "The One." He went on to do some entertaining stuff with Chuck Palumbo, but let's be honest -- the guy was never as good as people wanted him to be.

I don't hate him but man is it depressing to see him now...

Kane.

He used to be this dark, mysterious, violent, masked monster of a big man who was agile and quick as fuck for a guy his size. He put on great matches and had some really good feuds/stories for several years.

His constant face/heel transitions and combined with what appears to be his lack of agility/mobility (or lack of freedom to do the things he used to do) to have the quality matches he used to have killed him for me. Not to mention his stupid repeated masking/un-masking over the years and the whole storyline that occurred from the original un-masking and lack of disfigurement, etc.

For me anyway, Irish whip is just a given "mechanic" of the ring and it has always been that way and every guy does it, so you sort of accept it even though logically it doesn't make any sense.

The 619 move was fine but the way people fell into it was insane sometimes and made me feel a bit stupid watching it. I don't want to be the guy who goes on and on about his title run either, but it really was the worst run of all time in the WWE I think and it didn't feel right from the start.