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Originally Posted by #1-wwf-fan
I will say that if Benoit was never over-pushed and just remained the midcard title workhorse I probably wouldn't be as down on him but it's tough to ignore. If we're putting them in perspective though then yes, Benoit was better at his role than Batista was at his. I just don't think his role was ever as big of a deal. I forgot about the stuff in Japan. I think you overrate him elsewhere though. I don't think he was as important to WCW during the NWO run as you remember. Even in keeping eyes on the product, he was just one of many guys putting on quality matches on the undercard and the importance of those matches in making people stick around is debatable. I also remember thinking the feud with Rock for the title had him seeming out of place. It was really a Rock vs Shane feud with Benoit playing the part of the hired gun. Except he didn't have the intimidation factor to pull it off and it was odd.
Also the Backlash main event for Benoit was a WrestleMania re-match, too. The Kane stuff came later.
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You raise a good point with that over-pushed thing, but just to flip it, maybe a bigger problem is that he
wasn't pushed harder sooner? By the time you get to WrestleMania XX, Benoit has already been, somewhat, typecast as one of those WWE mid-carders, and it did kind of feel like an honorary mention win. A lifetime achievement award, if you will. When Batista ascends, he's relatively young in the business (although not in age), is fresh, and is kind of a "a new hope."
The way WWE presents stars is important too, because Benoit was never "theirs," whereas Batista feels like one of those "WWE prototype" wrestlers, and that is always going to skewer how fans who get used to how the WWE presents people, even if it's not always strictly true. Benoit doesn't
feel like a guy they were ever behind, so it's easier to just throw him in the "didn't draw" basket, when he actually never really
failed. People kind of bought him at whatever level, even if they did buy into Batista more when it happened, and it felt like a better "WWE fit" instead of "bizarro land."
I appreciate that I am somewhat arguing hypotheticals here. The mere suggestion that Benoit
could have been more obviously means that he wasn't. But if there were certain people willing to stay out of his way a bit, and they weren't so insecure about his talking (which did suck, although he did have charisma), then maybe he actually means a lot more with a harder push, and then when you need to push him hard, it's not weighted by years seeing him with soft pushes.
I may not be making myself completely clear on the WCW/WWF stuff: I get that it was never truly about him, but he
always felt like that rising star, or an emerging talent, or one of the best in the world. It's not really like the mid-carders today where you kind of think "Sami Zayn could be a lot more." Benoit felt like he champing at the bit almost every time he went out there. Upper mid-card programs that stole the show, put into top factions, depended on to be that wrestling heel (or babyface) that kind of floats the show.
He never really seemed like a turn-off until they actually decided to change gears with him in the twilight of his career, and even then, the different wasn't exactly gangbusters. If we were talking the drawing potential between Benoit and say, Ultimate Warrior or Goldberg, then I'd have a lot more trouble making this argument. The gap is too wide to ignore. But with Benoit and Batista, it's more "the journey was more important for Benoit, so the destination was slightly more underwhelming than it was for Batista." But I do find it hard to say that Batista meant more for wrestling, because odd-feeling or not, Benoit was involved in significant stuff at a time when it was making huge money, whereas Batista was involved in more significant stuff at a time that's probably not going to be remembered as golden years.
In many ways, the argument for Batista is kind of based on potential too, because he looked like he could have been a huge conventional wrestling star, but he really just ended up being a WWE Main Eventer.