*Official* Pro-Wrestling Thread II

[King Pietersen]

That Mankind reaction was pretty ****ing awesome. What an amazing period of professional wrestling that was!

 

[Athlai]

Those kind of crowd reactions are the best. You don't even need the sound to say how loud it is... you can see the crowd going bonkers.

Stone cold and mankind at their most popular. Heel rock at his most hated. Bobble head McMahon. WWF had never been stronger.

 

[Spikey]

yeah i watched that the other day cause it's the last raw is war match that's on the network and that's a clear number 1.

listening a bit to solomonster and he talks about how surplex city is now lame because of cole, and it's true. I mean, surplex city was, as far as i can tell, basically unplanned it, it went viral cause it was so cool. and so asap they've got heyman dropping it all the time, brock's new shirt is surplex city and cole is dropping it all the time too. it's just ugh. leave it alone for awhile before the cash grab

happy to see cesaro got the US title match (which is basically the raw headliner for now). hope he runs with it and gets to feud with owens when the cena programme is over. also because of said raw headliner i guess i want cena to retain at battleground. Owens destroys Cena, DQs himself? idk

started watching PWG. have to pay it obv so i'm just gonna watch the highest rated shows and also the new shows.PWG's crowd is great fun. ROH's crowd is really muted to me so I havent really made much attempt to get into it, but PWG's is great, ie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjUvYHbDwNY

that's from steen wolf (named after kevin obv). gonna watch threemendous iii next. angelico is gonna be on their next show!!

 

[Jono]

Also, WWE agrees with me so that's that. Lesnar's at #2, HHH at a lowly #8

Top video btw

Yeah great video. FMD at the reaction when Brock's intro noise hit. That's ****ing loud.

Bulldog beating Bret at SummerSlam 92 by just pinning him randomly after Bret tried a sunset flip Great moment to sneak in there, British crowd lost their ****.

 

[GIMH]

Can't watch as in work so:

- Was the HHH 'out of character' interview the 'Stephanie is the mother of my children' one. If so, awesome. If not, well it was still awesome

- someone provide me the full top ten

- Going to provide an alternative view that early 99 was all in all a pretty ****ty time for wrestling but it had stars that made it worth it. Nonetheless in the long term it did a lot of damage. IMHO

 

[Shri]

Jono doesn't get in here that often I thought? He's a myth.

haha so true, but at the time it was so cool.

He'd still be cool in Scandinavia though. Double denim is fine there.

 

[Jono]

Yeah great video. FMD at the reaction when Brock's intro noise hit. That's ****ing loud.

Bulldog beating Bret at SummerSlam 92 by just pinning him randomly after Bret tried a sunset flip Great moment to sneak in there, British crowd lost their ****.

Just watched the full clip on Youtube of Brock's return. Some of the fan reactions are hilarious.

How brutal is it that the camera panned away from Lesnar and Cena and to the crowd when Lesnar put his hand out to Cena? By the time the camera returns he's already putting Cena up for the F5. Someone would have been chewed out so bad after that. Huge moment and they almost ****ed it.

Do you think if Lesnar's return occured 20 years ago before the internet wrestling community and wrestling websites etc., and the crowd didn't know that Lesnar is returning, the reaction is bigger, smaller or around the same? I can see arguments either way. They clearly knew Lesnar was returning so were amped up and excited, but at the same time if he had just appeared without the crowd knowing it could have been gigantic as well. Interesting one.

 

[King Pietersen]

Don't announce beforehand and keep a secret = Louder live audience pop
Pre-announce to build hype = Better ratings

 

[Jono]

Yeah I get that ratings will be bigger obviously, but is your first point categorically true is my question - is it a louder pop live if its a surprise? You mentioned Triple H, everyone knew he was returning that night. Same with Brock. Yet they're the two crowd reactions you guys are debating as the best ever.

I can't remember whether people knew Taker was returning in 2000, but I imagine even if they did it was very few. That got a great reaction but not the same as Brock's or Trips.

Havng said that, I don't think people knew about Jericho, since the reaction only occurred when his name crosses on the screen, and that was a very loud reaction.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Can't watch as in work so:

- Was the HHH 'out of character' interview the 'Stephanie is the mother of my children' one. If so, awesome. If not, well it was still awesome

Nah, the moment was the one in which he took an autistic kid out to the ring to do the DX crotch chop routine. Seems a good bloke, especially to kids, because he consoled a Cena fan who was sobbing as Rollins curb stomped him to hell.

 

[Jono]

Wow, just randomly heard an Austin interview with Jericho. First time I ever heard that Austin regretted turning heel at Mania 17. Said its his biggest regret in his whole career other than refusing to job to Brock and waking out that day on Raw.

Really surprised at that, but his reasoning is solid.

 

[OverratedSanity]

The top 10 according to wwe.com goes

#10 CM Punk at MITB 2011
#9 Rock returns in 2011
#8 HHH returns in 2002
#7 Undertaker Judgement Day 2000
#6 Cena debut on Raw
#5 Bulldog beating Bret
#4 Jericho debut
#3 Ziggler cash-in (so awesome )
#2 Brock
#1 Ofcourse, Austin assisting Mankind

By no means a definitive list, but a pretty good one. All immense pops. I'd have a Hogan pop from around that time in 2005 where everyone went nuts for him in there. And they kept it to 1 per wrestler I think otherwise, the top 10 would have 8 Austin moments

Yeah I get that ratings will be bigger obviously, but is your first point categorically true is my question - is it a louder pop live if its a surprise? You mentioned Triple H, everyone knew he was returning that night. Same with Brock. Yet they're the two crowd reactions you guys are debating as the best ever.

I can't remember whether people knew Taker was returning in 2000, but I imagine even if they did it was very few. That got a great reaction but not the same as Brock's or Trips.

Havng said that, I don't think people knew about Jericho, since the reaction only occurred when his name crosses on the screen, and that was a very loud reaction.

People definitely knew about Jericho. There were Jericho signs all over the arena.

 

[sledger]

What was his reasoning? Heel Stone cold around that time was pretty gun, all things considered. Imo anyway.

Edit: Though my personal preference is face Stone Cold every time.

 

[Jono]

People definitely knew about Jericho. There were Jericho signs all over the arena.

Majority of the crowd? Fair enough.

 

[Jono]

What was his reasoning? Heel Stone cold around that time was pretty gun, all things considered. Imo anyway.

Edit: Though my personal preference is face Stone Cold every time.

Heel Austin 2001 one of my favourite ever characters. I think he was brilliant.

Anyway, basically he said he turned heel because he enjoyed doing it and hadn't done it for ages, but there is a time and a place for a heel turn and he was far too hot at the time . When you think that The Rock was going away then, they really did just lose their two biggest babyfaces within the space of 24 hours. Hunter then didn't turn face which by some accounts was also part of the plan. They therefore had Taker, and that's it.

I loved the heel turn but they probably did burn a bunch of money by doing it.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Majority of the crowd? Fair enough.

Think Jericho said it in his DVD that his debut felt as though McMahon had told everyone in the crowd and it was like a party arranged for him...he saw that many Jericho signs in the audience. Also said he was pretty surprised at the reaction he got.

 

[Jono]

Okay cool, stand corrected. Backs up my point though, that perhaps knowing about a return/debut makes it a bigger crowd reaction.

 

[OverratedSanity]

What was his reasoning? Heel Stone cold around that time was pretty gun, all things considered. Imo anyway.

Edit: Though my personal preference is face Stone Cold every time.

Heel Austin 2001 one of my favourite ever characters. I think he was brilliant.

I think he was alright, but my biggest problem with him was that seeing him being pals with Vince didn't make me feel angry at him, even as a kid. It just felt kinda jarring and weird.

 

[Jono]

That's why the heel turn didn't work from a money point of view, but from a smark point of view he was awesome to watch. His mic work was great.

Don't get me started on the Austin/Angle stuff too, fmd those segments had me in stitches

 

[Agent TBY]

Yeah I get that ratings will be bigger obviously, but is your first point categorically true is my question - is it a louder pop live if its a surprise? You mentioned Triple H, everyone knew he was returning that night. Same with Brock. Yet they're the two crowd reactions you guys are debating as the best ever.

I don't think knowing or not knowing is really the key factor here, but rather what the crowd is like. Trips' return was at MSG, which along with Chicago has traditionally had the smarkiest WWE crowds, and Brock's had the post-mania crowd, which has taken over that mantle the past few years. You could've kept Brock's return completely secret, but if you'd brought him out in one of the lamer locations the E travels to in their down months, half the audience would've still sat on their hands. In the same vein, trot out a crowd favourite at a hot location, and you'll always get a great reaction whether it was announced beforehand or not.