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I should perhaps clarify my Bret statement. I'm not hopping on the "Bret is bland" bandwagon, I always thought so. The difference between him and so many others is that he was given the opportunity to make it work anyway, be it luck or circumstance. I'm damn sure not taking away from his in-ring ability, it's just that he was built up to be the man a little more than he could sell it himself. He was being pushed as the archetypical babyface who wouldn't jump ship to WCW and leave all the crying masses watching a WWF show. This, as opposed to someone like Shawn Michaels, who took that superstar ball and ran with it (or even went home with it). Point being, just about anyone, including a Lance Storm, could have been as big as Bret Hart in that position.
Benoit may have been a star, but once again, he was built on a career of strong ring work and circumstance, and his mic skills went from abysmal to tolerable in all that time. We're talking about a guy who was given WCW's strap only so that he wouldn't leave, and then got screwed out of that, so he and his pals headed to Titan Towers where they got pushed to the moon not so much because "they deserved it", but because of who they were, how they ended up there, and as a way for Vinnie Mac to moon Turnerland. Anyone could have been The Radicalz, and I am willing to guarantee that if Benoit never even went to WCW and went to WWE after leaving ECW, he would have been job fodder within the year because of the "he's not big enough" excuse.
I mentioned Goldberg *because* he was green. Let's be serious here, it's common knowledge he was WCW's answer to SCSA. He was given the role of a lifetime because of how he looked, and was able to run with it. Anybody could have been in Goldberg's spot if they looked the shit. Hell, if Goldberg had a Jew 'fro and no facial hair when they first met him, WCW may well have missed that boat and possibly have saddled him with that Demon gimmick.
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